Sunday, November 10, 2013

Quid Pro Quo

Yesterday, I unloaded on the academy.  Today, it's the practioners' turn to feel a little sting.

In that earlier post, I noted that part of the reason for the disastrous results of some so-called research-based best practices is reductionism.  I'm going to lay most of the blame for that at the feet of K-12 administrators. 

Make no mistake.  I think classroom teachers are guilty of reductionism, too, but, for the most part, they have very little power over what interventions get adopted by their schools.  If you have that power and are also a reductionist, I'm talking to you.

[Imagine I just put two fingers to my eyes, then turned them toward you, then back at me.]

What do I mean by reductionism?  It is the process by which a complex idea is divested of all its complexity either because the person dealing with the idea doesn't fully understand it or doesn't want to do the work all that nuance would require.  Let me give you an example.

A few months ago, I engaged a group of teachers in an activity designed to illuminate the societal changes catalyzed by World War I.  Among the artifacts they examined was Wilfred Owen's "Dolce et Decorum Est."  Ordinarily, I would simply provide a link to the text, but understanding the theme of the poem is essential to understanding what reductionism is.

Dulce Et Decorum Est Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of disappointed shells that dropped behind.
GAS! Gas! Quick, boys!-- An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;

But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And floundering like a man in fire or lime.--
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face
,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,--
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.


Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori: Latin, "It is sweet and proper to die for one's country."

Owen was a Lieutenant in the British army and, in fact, was killed in action shortly after this poem was written.  The poem describes a mustard gas attack, not the sort of subject matter usually found in British lit prior to this time.  The imagery is horrifying.  No one could read this and think Owen sees war as glamorous or heroic.

You would think.

I checked in with one teacher who pointed to the footnote in which the Latin was translated and claimed the poem was a call to arms, a glamorizing of warfare.  Think "Charge of the Light Brigade."

I pointed this teacher to the last two lines of the poem and asked, "What does the narrator say about this Latin phrase?"

"Oh, I didn't see that he called it a lie."

I think I demonstrated tremendous restraint in not asking, "And the rest of the words?  Did you miss them, too?"

This would be a particularly heinous example of reductionism.  You probably have students who do this--grab on to a fragment of a sentence and contort it into an interpretation of an entire essay. 

Unfortunately, you probably have colleagues, principals, curriculum directors, and superintendents who do the same. 

Reductionism can be avoided, but it won't be easy. 

First of all, the people who inhabit those offices need to be smart.  I once asked a guy in my Introduction to Statistics class at the University of Georgia, "What correlation are you trying to demonstrate?" 

"Aw, hell, I'm just gonna count some shit."

He was referring to his DISSERTATION!!! 

Somewhere in Georgia, people are forced to call this man "Doctor."

Second, assuming we get smart people in these essential positions, they have to read and interpret the research themselves.  We can't count on the salespeople that Pearson or Houghton-Mifflin or Renaissance Learning send into their offices to provide unbiased information. 

Would you ask your meth dealer, "What's this going to do to my teeth?"

We cannot rely on educational journalists to provide complete information.  Watch an episode of Good Morning, America! and see how a single medical study gets bastardized in mere seconds.

The bestowing of the title "Doctor" should also imply the ability to read, understand, and critique research.  If you can't do that, you don't deserve that job.  If you can do it, but opt not to, you still don't deserve that job.

Let's start demanding more of our administrators and ourselves. 

If your state legislature ordered you to eat something out of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle, I hope you would refuse.  We read labels at the grocery store.  I don't think it's unreasonable to read the labels of what we're being asked to consume in the classroom and say, "No, thank you.  No more rat droppings for me."

XOX,
The Know-it-All

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