A reader recalls what Neil Postman wrote almost 40 years ago. He was known as a future-thinker, and this quotation proves he was:
I’m a public school teacher in NJ. Relevant in this context is a wonderful little book by Neil Postman entitled “The Disappearance of Childhood”. He ties the invention of childhood in the west over the past few centuries to universal literacy. In the book he argues that the concept of childhood peaked sometime in the first half of the 20th century, but since then has been worn down by a decline in literacy and our infatuation with other forms of entertainment media. Profiting from schooling, racing to the top, focusing on absurd objective criteria like standardized test scores might be further evidence of a declining belief in the idea of childhood, where children are something more like competitive employees than learners.
In his 1976 book “Crazy Talk, Stupid Talk” (now there is a title for our times!) Mr. Postman referred specifically to the trend toward objectivity in evaluating children: ‘In many communities around the country, the quality of education is being measured by the scores children achieve on standardized tests. Education thus falls under the jurisdiction of the language of statistics, and it is a fact that many schools are now designing their programs almost solely for the purpose of increasing their students’ mean test scores. Here, it is slightly unfair for me to repeat the joke about the statistician who drowned while trying to wade across a river with an average depth of two feet. The fault is not with statisticians, whose special language is a remarkably useful instrument for uncovering abstract facts. The fault is with those educators who have fallen under its spell and have allowed their purposes to be subverted by the seductions of precise measurement.’ |
Another helpful book from the 60s was Edgar Friedenberg’s “The Vanishing Adolescent.” Amazingly, it was required summer reading for our AP English course in 1967.
Mr. Postman warned us then of what we have seen play out to present day: the concept of educating children has been hijacked and transformed. It has turned from an endeavor to support the self-actualization of learners into an industry that channels and controls what students “need” to learn and where they will be allowed to go.
Once it was preparation with a base of knowledge and skills; exploration of history and analysis of events of the past and how they can inform our path forward; experience in areas of interests to someday (hopefully) end up in a place where the learner has been able to mistakes choose their path and their destination. Not only have they served themselves by following their interests and desires, they serve the community by applying what they’ve learned in a way that rounds out the services and products available to the community. Not everyone works at the factory. Not everyone is the CEO of the bank. Not everyone is expected to be one or the other-or anything. They become what their skills,learning and effort lead them to.
Now, cold, impersonal numbers (numbers that are being used to generate profits for the “education reform industry) determine success, as opposed to reaching the more personal and individual goals of learners. As with the economy and wealth, it seems even the choice of happiness (self-determination) is allowed to a relatively small percentage of people. It is probably no coincidence that people unfamiliar with guiding a roomful of children towards a common goal presume to be able to force the data parameters that are limiting the choices/freedoms once available to learners; no coincidence that the designers of the parameters and tests constraining learners stand to profit from public dollars first siphoned away from the system that promoted freedom and self-actualization; no coincidence that these profiteers are involved in the smear campaign against the institutions they have crippled economically; no coincidence that they and their children will continue to enjoy the freedoms and choices that others once had access to.
This is what happens when you objectify people-turn them into numbers. The masters of the numbers become the masters of the people they objectify.
Reblogged this on The Coal Mine.
So Neil Postman had it right? How many years did it take for Dr. Ravitch to realize this given Neil Postman belittled her ideas about education and technology years ago, when Ravitch “knew” he had gotten it wrong.