Sociology of the Anarchists - Gozips.uakron.edu - The University of ...

TEACHING
Everywhere not only education
but society as a whole needs “deschooling”.
- Ivan Illich
Introduction:
I am struck by how often “exerting authority” is mentioned by the graduate students
writing in Hare, et al. (1999). They accepted the same premise that many others have
recommended to me about maintaining “control” and “authority” over students in class.
This is fascinating to me and also pretty disturbing. Although I see the functional reasons
for this power differential, I wonder if there is evidence to show that this translates into a
conducive learning environment. I wonder because I know from my own student
experiences that teachers who pushed us around brought out more rebellious tendencies
in myself and other students; we would spend more time battling with the instructor than
learning from them.
There might also be an important distinction to make between being “authoritative”
(knowing your topic) and being “authoritarian” (demanding submission to your rule). As
someone who is almost medically-allergic to authority (ego-maniacs, presidents, and
despots make my skin break out!), I am struggling with the advice I receive (“exert your
authority in class”) and my preexisting ideology and leanings. I have no problem with
following a syllabus and demanding adherence to it, but I have never liked lecturing as a
hierarchist.
This topic bleeds into another interesting thread: gender and race. Being a white male, I
am typically viewed as having less “to prove” to others and already command respect
based upon my skin color and gender. Others who do not have this birth-derived
privilege, may need to find other ways of exerting themselves in a classroom. Getting
respect (i.e. that an instructor knows what they are talking about) and being paid attention
to may be more difficult for others than for me, due to the illogical respect paid to white
males. In a sense, I might have the luxury of not having to “exert my authority” because
my presence may command more respect than others'.
McKeachie (2002) writes in chapter 23 of “teaching students to learn”. The process of
teaching goes far beyond just conveying ideas, information, and thoughts, and asking
students to regurgitate them back to the teacher. McKeachie emphasizes the importance
of active agency on the part of the student—increasing their “self-awareness”, defining
their own learning goals, self-evaluation, wanting to learn, etc. Helping students to think
through these processes (the means), instead of just providing or forcing one's own
answers on them (the ends), seems to be what he encourages. And I am in agreement with
those conclusions, too.
Sociology may be an easier topic than most (in some respect) because people come to
most introductory courses with widely varying degrees of interest and prior knowledge.
This discipline may make it easier because everyone has prior knowledge about society
[ Williams 95 ] [ this is a draft. do not cite. ]