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For a generation, that’s what school did. It was a direct and focused finishing school for preindustrial
kids.
Then, as often happens to institutions, mission creep sunk in. As long as we’re teaching
something, the thinking went, let’s teach something. And so schools added all manner of
material from the academy. We taught higher math or physics or chemistry or Shakespeare or
Latin—not because it would help you with your job, but because learning stuff was important.
Public school shifted gears—it took the academy to the masses.
I want to be very clear here: I wouldn’t want to live in an uneducated world. I truly believe that
education makes humans great, elevates our culture and our economy, and creates the foundation
for the engine that drives science which leads to our well being. I’m not criticizing
education.
No. But I am wondering when we decided that the purpose of school was to cram as much data/
trivia/fact into every student as we possibly could.
Because that’s what we’re doing. We’re not only avoiding issues of practicality and projects and
hands-on use of information; we’re also aggressively testing for trivia.
Which of society’s goals are we satisfying when we spend 80 percent of the school day drilling
and bullying to get kids to momentarily swallow and then regurgitate this month’s agenda?
47. Academics are a means to an end, not an end
Go back to the original purpose of school: we needed to teach citizens to be obedient (to be
good workers), to consume what marketers sold them (to keep industry going), and to be able to
sit still (to be good workers).
Academics are one way to reinforce those ideas. Sure, there were a few things (like basic
arithmetic and the ability to read) that all civilized people needed, but we kept adding to the list,
creating a never-ending list of topics that students could be confronted with as a test of their
obedience. By conflating learning (a good thing) with obedience (an important thing for the
industrial age) and consumption (essential for mass marketers), we confused ourselves. We
came to the conclusion that increasing all three of these in tandem was what society wanted,
and we often used one to get more of the other.
Of course, those who were creating the curricula got focused on the academic part.
At first, we used primers and memorization as a direct method of teaching obedience. Then,
though, as we got smarter about the structure of thought, we created syllabi that actually
covered the knowledge that mattered.
But mattered to whom?
Stop Stealing Dreams Free Printable Edition 36