Friday, November 14, 2008

Just Drink the Kool-aid!

Monday was probably the most interesting day this past week.

Monday for me is a day with two long teaching blocks (70 minutes each) and a whole slew of weekly meetings, from Curriculum Committee, Student Life, Admissions Committee, and just about anything else it seems.

I had looked forward all day to an evening of uninterrupted, I don’t know exactly what, but I didn’t have boarding duty, I didn’t have Arabic class—I had no commitments that evening. So maybe I would go to the gym, watch Jon Stewart, maybe even write some long overdue emails or follow through on some phone calls.


Uninterrupted
time? In a boarding school? Let’s get serious!

Right about the time that “uninterrupted time” was going to kick in, Greg, my former Hackley student and now Teaching Fellow protégé, came around the corner with two of his students. “These guys need to talk to you,” Greg said. He turned to his young scholars, “What do you want to ask him, guys? Why do we need to study history?”

I even had my magazines in my hand, gym clothes on, as I quickly answered, “It is all about learning to think, and effective reading and writing.” Greg said to me, “I’ll let you talk to them for awhile.” I could see the look of utter disdain on their junior-in-high-school faces.

I wasn’t going to the gym anytime soon. These two young men, rather bruised by a fair-but-tough test from Greg, couldn’t believe Greg cared so much about writing. “Who cares how you write—it’s a history class for God’s sakes,” announced one of the young men. “All you need are a few facts and that’s it! What is the big deal???” he asked incredulously.

Okay, come on in my apartment guys. Let’s talk.

For the next 45 minutes or so, I tried to explain to them about my understanding of the study of history. I tried to be cute at first, talking about Clio, the Greek muse of History, and how we build a house to Clio for our fellow lodgers. They didn’t buy cute. They wanted to know what any of this would ever mean to them, and why Greg couldn’t just give them a few facts and call it a day.

Interesting to note—because you may be wondering—these are both Americans, by the way.

When it was clear they didn’t believe in an esoteric pursuit of knowledge, I went for the jugular—you know, most of the jobs you want require reading and writing. And then there is college—you can’t get by on a ‘few facts’ in the kind of colleges you crave. What about that? It was almost funny, because they acted as if I did not have twenty years of experience, and that recent-Ivy-League-graduate Greg and I were just in league with the Devil.

I was very honest about my philosophy of education: if one only learns facts for a test, then you are learning/teaching only to a narrative of conclusions. Conclusions are pretty much a dead end—here is what happened, and that's it. But if you work towards a different end, you are learning/teaching to a narrative of inquiry. Inquiry is what unlocks all the mysteries of life—how you understand something, how you solve problems. College education is somewhat interested in conclusions, but they are deeply interested in inquiry. That is how the world has evolved is through inquiry.

While these two young men were getting madder at me by the minute, a strange phenomenon was playing out in the background, an almost musical counterpoint to the sturm und drang on the couch. Study Hall hours had begun, and a number of guys kept coming by to check with me about their writing.

The coming up next day my AP World History students had the “opportunity” to write an essay for practice. If they did a credible job on this document-based-question I would drop their lowest quiz grade. I warned them that this DBQ was a tough one, and they hadn’t written a whole DBQ yet, but I told them it was worth the practice.

The funny thing was, so many of the boys were working on this optional, extra-credit writing puzzle. The questioned explored, “What was the role technology played in the development of Eurasian Empires in the Classical Age.” The DBQ had seven documents, things like maps, to a photograph of a Roman aqueduct, to an account from an Indian trader, to a Chinese merchant, to a photograph of a golden belt buckle from a nomadic tribe.

When I give extra credit, I rarely have students complete it—it’s just not worth the effort, I think they think.

But Monday night, a steady stream of boys came by to check on their interpretation of a document, or to test their thesis. All of this while the soundtrack of “I just think it’s all a stupid waste of time” played out in my living room.

In between the essay help, I continued my diatribe with the Yankee doubters. I told them of my class with Dr. Eisenbeis at Denison: “When I went to college I thought most of what I would do is spout facts. I was in one class, a class where 50% of my grade was based on class participation, and there were no facts to spout. I went to the professor and didn't know what to do. The course was a philosophy course about thinking, believing and understanding. There were really no facts at all, but it was about how we react to religion and faith and deeply held personal opinions. The crutch of facts was just gone. It took me a few weeks, many weeks, to see what I even had to do, but eventually I did, and it has made me a better thinker ever since. But I still love the beauty of precise facts, so I became a historian so I can write well and use sterling facts that win my arguments.”

I spoke rather strongly to them that they could either start to embrace these things now, or put it off until college, and maybe they will have faculty caring enough to help them over this hurdle. It is a hurdle that every young scholar faces: how to go from being a successful middle school student (i.e. a student of conclusions) to a successful adult student (i.e. a student of inquiry).

Tarek, one of my AP students, came by with a thesis statement—without a doubt the best thing he had produced all year. He showed it to me—“I’ve worked on this for the last half hour.” Tarek had spent 30 minutes crafting a thesis statement. I wouldn’t have thought I would say those 9 words a few months ago. And it was good. Very good. I sent him off to work on the rest of the essay.

I told the arms-folded nay-sayers: "Look, I don't know your political affiliation, but one of Barack Obama's campaign phrases hits me as a teacher as so important--he speaks of ‘the urgency of now.’ He wants us to realize the vital importance of working on change now, not in a year or a generation, but now. That is why I teach the way I do--the urgency of now. It would be so much easier on me if I just had nice little fact tests--but once you know what colleges demand, and more importantly, how crucial it is to read and write effectively, I would be dishonest, and doing a disservice to just make it easier on me. Therefore, I teach to a narrative of inquiry, and I believe in ‘the urgency of now.’” Even though they didn’t seem very moved, the steady stream of AP students continued—earnestly, even urgently, working on these essays. It was obvious that a number of students had decided to drink the kool-aid.

‘Just Drink the Kool-aid!’ is a phrase that we tossed off very easily this summer at the AP conference I attended. If you remember, that phrase refers back to the bizarre mass suicide of over 900 people at Jonestown, Guyana, thirty years ago this weekend. Jim Jones, the leader, had convinced his followers to drink this Flavor-Aid laced with cyanide, and they gave up their lives. Later the media made this horrible tragedy more manageable by lightening the mood and calling it “kool-aid.” But that is certainly an odd phrase to pop out when making a parallel to education (!).The AP teachers stressed though, you have to have everyone on board to be successful at this AP game. Students, parents, and teachers just have to do what you gotta do to make this AP course, or education work. But here is a good parallel—Jim Jones promised his followers that if they just drank the kool-aid they would all find victory and self-determination.

Many of those AP students had break-throughs this week in their writing. They struggled on a tough essay, but there was a new attitude I sensed—not one of onerous homework assignments, but, dare I say it—an attitude of victory and self-determination.

I hope those other two young men figure it out someday. Why fight your own improvement? Why distance yourself from more effective communication and understanding? Why not just drink the kool-aid?

My page-a-day calendar on Monday had this quotation: “The whole art of teaching is only the art of awakening the natural curiosity of young minds for the purpose of satisfying it afterwards.”

1 comment:

Me and My Son said...

I think your question sums it up nicely - "Why fight your own improvement?" That is the persistant question. It's a good poser for personal growth too.