Hist3510
Tracy Penny Light
November 12, 2017
Reading Analysis Week 10
It seems that through time the education system stays the same in some way. It almost as if the system has kept the same idea but change it only slightly year after year. This idea is that some topics are seen as important and others less important. Those subjects that as more important are studied more frequently, whereas the others are only studied every so often. Which makes senses , but one can question who decides these topics are needed to be know? Students and parents think that the subjects are important but is that because they are taught to think that, possibly!
The system seems to follow the structure that when kids start school it is easy as they are just starting to grow their brains and it eventually gets harder. This makes sense but is this the right structure for every child as everyone is different in their own way. In addition to this everyone retains different information so doesn’t this make all schools different in a way being as teacher can’t all teach the same way. This can easily impact the way students think, from what they are being told to what they are seeing, with words being just as big as an impact as actions are. It is interesting to see that people view the education system as similar.
With looking at different stories of people’s education, one can draw many similar themes. Things like how kids study English, math and social studies as those are important. But things like art and music and others that require using the other side of your brain become optional. This is what it seems to be like in most schools. But there are also the difference from generation to generation. Things like the punishment for being bad, also the support that is given when going into higher grades, as well as what is seen as important. These things not only vary from each generation, but also each school and surrounding in the time.
So with there being so many similarities it shows how that way of thinking is tradition. It shows how this has always been vital in success as school systems see it. But it can also show progress as students may be learning the same but racial and gender issues change and also teaching techniques change influencing the way students think. From this people can lean tradition is good to some point but change and progression is also good. As some things can stay the same but some things need to be different every once in awhile.
Bibliography
Axelrod, Paul. “Beyond the Progressive Education Debate: A Profile of Toronto Schooling in the 1950s,” Historical Studies in Education 17, no.2 (Spring 2005): 227-241.
Heyking, Amy von. “Selling Progressive Education to Albertans, 1935-1953,” in Sara Burke and Patrice Milewski (Eds.), Schooling in Transition: Readings in the Canadian History of Education, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012: 340- 354.
Stamp, Robert M. “Growing Up Progressive? Part I: Going to Elementary School in 1940s Ontario.” Historical Studies in Education vol. 17, no. 1 (Spring 2005): 187-98.
Stamp, Robert M. “Growing Up Progressive? Part II : Going to High School in 1950s Ontario.” Historical Studies in Education vol. 17, no. 2 (Fall 2005): 321-31.
Sutherland, Neil. “The Triumph of ‘Formalism’: Elementary Schooling in Vancouver from the 1920s to the 1960s,” in Sara Burke and Patrice Milewski (Eds.), Schooling in Transition: Readings in the Canadian History of Education, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012: 375-397.