This is interesting.

[velvetpage]

It's about schooling as a way of creating dumbness and segregating society, for the benefit of the economy, among other things. I think I'll be buying this when I have a bit more money.

http://johntaylorgatto.com/underground/toc1.htm

Comments

[stress-kitten.livejournal.com]

Interesting.

I'd have to see his documentation and sources to see it as other than a conspiracy theory... it might well be a very interesting read.

It does sound like one of those books that I'll have to read a tiny little bit, then put it down for a while to digest and simmer down about what I just read... then try again with the next bit. When one is passionate about something, it can be hard to accept critisism of it without irrationally flaring off at it.

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

You haven't been in the school system as long as I have. You haven't seen kids essentially being warehoused because their natural rate of learning is slower than others'. I have little trouble accepting the central premise of his book: that a mass of slightly-educated sheep is necessary to keep the modern economic and political machines running the way the elite want them to run, and that the school system is busily turning all children into those sheep - slowing down those who move too fast for the system to cope, and labelling and warehousing those who move too slow. The educational system as a whole celebrates and rewards mediocrity.

[tormentedartist.livejournal.com]

I totally agree with you. In fact me and my old manager used to talk about how the school system doesn't teach children how to think.

And I know you aren't one of them, but I was always shocked by the stupidity of some of the teachers that I would come across.

If I have children I think home schooling may be the way to go.

Thanks for the link.

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

I see many of the advantages of home schooling, but I also see a few disadvantages. The biggest one is that there's no other teacher to be passionate about the things you have no talent for yourself. How is my little artistic genius ever going to discover that passion and nurture it if I, who can't draw a straight line with a ruler, can't show her? Where will she get the languages I don't know?

I'm looking into the Montessori schools in my area right now, and wondering if it's worth my while to send an application. They have the kind of experiential learning that would make the most of education, while still keeping the best parts of it. But I doubt I can afford the pay cut involved in moving out of the public system.