How the Conservative Worldview Quashes Critical Thinking -- and What That Means For Our Kids' Future | | AlterNet:
How the Conservative Worldview Quashes Critical Thinking -- and What That Means For Our Kids' Future
The education of our children is a core cultural and political choice that reflects the deepest differences between liberals and conservatives.
The Conservative War On Education continues apace, with charters blooming everywhere, high-stakes testing cementing its grip on classrooms, and legislators and pundits wondering what we need those stupid liberal arts colleges for anyway. (Isn't college about job prep? Who needs to know anything about art history, anthropology or ancient Greek?)
Amid the din, there's a worrisome trend: liberals keep affirming right-wing talking points, usually without realizing that they're even right wing. Or saying things like, "The education of our children is a non-partisan issue that should exist outside of any ideological debate."
The hell it is. People who say stuff like this have no idea what they're talking
Note: this is the second in a series of posts on the effect of conservative & progressive values on K-12 education.
Progressive values should set the ideals of teaching, and learning in American society. Unfortunately, the “cloud of authoritarianism looms over education, making it very difficult to design instruction around progressive values. We’ll refer to those who support this latter view as the “authoritarians.”
In order to understand the authoritarianism that has claimed schooling in America, we can glean insights into the effectiveness of this approach by using the values that conservatives use to frame their issues, and make their policy decisions. As George Lakoff says, ”radical conservatives have taken over the reins of government and have been controlling the terms of political debate for many years” (Lakoff, George (2006-10-03). Thinking Points: Communicating Our American Values and Vision (Kindle Locations 131-133). Macmillan. Kindle Edition).
Conservative World View
Note: This is the third post on a discussion of progressive and conservative values and how they impact education in America. In this post we will explore the progressive world-view and its values, and try and understand why the progressive ideals ought to form the foundation for American K-12 education.
Progressive values should set the ideals of teaching, and learning in American society. Unfortunately, the “cloud of authoritarianism looms over education, making it very difficult to design instruction around progressive values. In this post we examine education through the lens of the progressive world-view.
Progressive and conservative approaches to education have competed with each other in America for more than a century. The conservative view has dominated American education, but we’ll also find that the progressive view has impacted American education in powerful ways at different times during this period. We’ll examine the foundations of the progressive view and then apply our findings to the nature of education, including teaching, learning, and curriculum development.
Progressive World View
