A Justice Site
Mirror Sites:
CSUDH - Habermas - UWP
California State University, Dominguez Hills
University of Wisconsin, Parkside
Soka University Japan, Transcend Art and Peace
Created: November 8, 2001
Latest Update: November 8, 2001
jeannecurran@habermas.org
The November Novel - Day 7, Sort of . . .
Copyright: Jeanne Curran, November 2001.
"Fair use" encouraged.
It's going to be one of those days again. I don't think I like this phone. Too intrusive.Frankly, I don't remember the rest of that lecture. These are the moments when I'm grateful for all these years of teaching. Teaching is a little like driving. The car gets to know its way home or to school and then it takes over. My lectures get to know themselves, or at least the pieces of the lectures, like Weber and the "iron cage," Marx and commodification, Rambo and the Dalai Lama. So once I figure out what the question is about, like Cynthia's "How do I link capitalism and slavery?" then the historical pieces on the theory of capitalism, and some of the arguments of the North against the slavery of the South can go on automatic drive. That automatic drive gives me time to structure what I'm saying so that I can summarize and conclude and complete the path of the thoughts that let me answer the question in the first place.
Wow! I just articulated something I never thought of before! Active teaching consists of some skills, like the process of writing, that we just haven't been teaching. We've been assuming that kids come by them automatically, the way some of us came by phonics naturally. Lots of kids ended up functionally illiterate before we figured out that we could teach phonics as a separate skill. I'm using another separate skill here when I answer an off-the-wall question. And I'm using my lawyer skills to do it. I'm scanning the question and its structural setting for recognition of any relevant theoretical concepts. Then I go on automatic so I can think while I explain the possible causes of action to the client. That gives me time to think through the legal strategy, while I'm talking.I guess if you want to be a lawyer, you better be able to chew bubble gum and walk across the floor at the same time.
I don't think I thought any of this out in class. I just went on automatic drive for the less strenuous questions. None of this whole process came to me till I was struggling upstairs to face the latest Weird incident. But I've got to go back and check out Bruner and Alfie Kohn and Jonathan Lear and figure out where I can document this process in the literature. Maybe we could plan a whole new segment for December where the kids take off the wall questions on topics they know pretty thoroughly and answer them off the wall, consciously finding rest time in the parts in which they have confidence, while they search for the bits they need to pull the argument together and to conclude.
Maybe that's a little too much for the last couple of weeks in the semester? But the idea is good. Have to figure out how to teach the skill. Has to be practice. This isn't a cognitive skill, it's a behavioral pattern skill.
"Hi, Cynthia. Oh, I'm sorry. Have you been waiting long? I'm afraid I was just thinking out a problem on my way upstairs. Of course, you can bring a friend on Thursday. I think we'll get to book binding by then."
Well, the list is still here. What is their problem? I posted too many good grades, hmm? OK, I'll ask my kids to volunteer for C's and D's, guys, so we can create a nice grade curve. Of course, it will violate all the underlying assumptions of a normal curve, but nevermind. It's pretty. Normal curves are nice. They represent an orderly world. God preserve me from an orderly mind, nevermind an orderly world.
Drat. There goes the phone. Where is that key? I've got to take all these notes out of my purse. Here it is!
"This is jeanne. Oh, hi, Pat. I just got here. Yeah, the list is still there. Think I should test it for fingerprints?"
"Thy said they were hovering around it."
"All of them?"
"She called me and said they were all there. She was going to take it down, but she wanted to know what you wanted her to do. She's worried they're going to do something else to you."
"Yeah. Well, I don't doubt that."
"You're making them crazy!"
"No, they started out that way."
"What are you going to do?"
"I don't know. Probably nothing. There are some arguments that just aren't worth having. Remember American President?
"But eventually even the President had to answer the character arguments."
"Well, . . . you're right. But ignoring them brought him the time he needed for a considered response."
"Did you stop to think of all they said about him before he responded?"
"Well, . . . yes. But remember Art and Fear. If you're going to incite revolution against the Crown, don't expect the Crown to fund the revolution."
"Are you going to leave the list up?"
"Yeah, I think so."
"OK. See you at 4."
"See ya."
C'mon. We're talking about a list of student grades. Where, oh where, do they find the energy to raise such a ruckus about someone else's grades? Nevermind that their position is indefensible on statistical grounds, on learning theory grounds, and on the priniciples of liberal art education as I have known it all my life. Where do they get the energy for this much soap opera? Doesn't anything important happen in their lives?
614 words. Or was it 714? I counted them, sort of. Total word count: 2316. I think. And I cheated, again. I didn't get this up till Thursday morning - Day 8. But I vowed I'd write Day 8 later today, like after the Theory Project meeting tonight.