Lily's Post

Note: There have been some technical issue with the blog lately. While I try to figure out what they are, I am posting Lily's excellent class reflection that appeared in the comments to Leigh's post.

I’ve been thinking about the summary that Dr. Pope provided in wrap-up to Dewey last class: “The fundamental job of the Deweyian teacher is to understand the experiential makeup of her students as well as to understand the environment beyond the school and to construct a classroom environment that will connect the two so as to be conducive to growth.” Assuming I’m understanding Dewey correctly (huge assumption), as a future business teacher, I strongly agree that the classroom environment has to connect to the environment beyond school, but I don’t necessarily agree with Dewey on this first point; that is, the need for the teacher to understand the experiential makeup of her students in order for the classroom environment to be conducive to growth. I don’t think the students’ past experiences are all that relevant. I think that sometimes the “Duh” moment (to paraphrase Leigh) comes later. An hour later, a day later, often years later. To illustrate this point, my fourteen year old son mentioned to me the other day that he really has an appreciation for architecture. He had studied architecture in third grade and said that he thought it was really “dumb and boring” at the time, but that he really likes it now. The unit of study had concluded with a tour of downtown Pittsburgh (where we lived at the time). After the tour that day (five years ago), I had asked him what he had found most interesting about the tour. He replied, “I don’t Mom, I wasn’t paying attention.” In retrospect, he said he thought he was too young to appreciate it at the time. To the contrary, I argued and he agreed, studying architecture, despite having no prior exposure to it or appreciation of it, enabled him to appreciate it more after having studied it in the classroom. I believe that students might not appreciate, connect with, or even understand what they’re learning at the time, but that, regardless, the experience will enrich them. At least, that’s what I plan to tell myself when I look at my future classroom of business leaders of tomorrow, slumped in their chairs, yawning, doodling, and rolling their eyes.