So it's been awhile since I've posted--mainly just because I've been lazy. ah well. My aim is to make up for that by posting alot today! How does that sound. I have several thoughts to put down today, and two of them based on statements run across in Harry Potter, I suppose I'll start there.
Watching Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire for the third, yes third, time yesterday, I was able to be struck by several statements in a more particular way. The one that really grabbed me occured about halfway through. For those who have never read or seen this book/movie, it centers mainly around the Tri-Wizard Tournament, a very dangerous and famous competition held every few years between the three main wizarding schools. Not long after the second task, the Head of Magical Law Enforcement, is found mysteriously dead on the Hogwarts' school grounds. Dumbledore, the Headmaster, tries to convince the Minister of Magic, Cornelius Fudge, that the Tournament should be stopped. Fudge replies, "But what will people think?" Dumbledore's very astute answer is this: "A true leader does what is right regardless of what people think." That really struck me. I going to wax a little political now. In the last few years, much media emphasis has been placed on opinion polls--and not just with W., I believe the trend really began to amplify under Clinton. But now, of course, we end up hearing so much about them, and whether W. is getting good numbers, and whether his policies are popular. As though that really mattered. The fact is that Dumbledore is absolutely right--true leaders don't give a rip about opinion polls, they care about whether or not their policies are what they believe is the right thing to do. A politician (or authority figure of any kind, really) who changes their positions and policies to reflect what people like is not a leader. Whether I agree with W., or any other leader, should not affect what he believes to be right. Granted, we live in a country where we, individual people, have more say in the political and legislative process than in most countries in the world. I'm not criticizing that at all--it is basically the best political structure around. The problem comes when we decide that having a strong say automatically means that our leaders should bow to our every whim or fascination. Wrong. I have the utmost respect for leaders who stand for what they believe, even if what they believe is diametrically opposed to what I believe. If they have a reasoned-out position that they are willing to stand for regardless of what other people say, I respect them. The "leaders" that I do not respect are those who take their cues from opinion polls; those who walk around with their finger in the wind to see where they should take a stand today. So then my point--while I don't always agree 100% with W. on every issue, on every policy, I respect him greatly because he has done, and is continuing to do, what he believes is right regardless of what opinion polls or media commentators say. That takes guts. If people want to criticize him, they should do so based on the facts or on the reasons, but not on whether or not people agree with him or like him. That is a ridiculous criticizm to adopt. And furthermore it seriously weakens the position of leadership because people start to believe that leaders are merely to be a spokesperson for our opinions, and leaders are never merely that, esp. in difficult times. Leaders are those who choose to stand for right, regardless.
Next point, and another HP quotation. This is from Book 5, so those going only by the movies will get a sneak peak--no spoilers though. In Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix we meet the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Dolores Umbridge. At the end of Book 4, we watched as Lord Voldemort, a very evil and dangerous Dark Wizard trying to rule the world (as all the truly great villains so), has regained a physical body. The war between good and evil is back on the table, and danger is ever-present. The Ministry of Magic, however, is choosing not only to ignore this, but to attempt to discredit Harry's and Dumbledore's statements about LV every chance they get. It is to this end (and to place a spy at the school), that the Ministry has placed Miss Umbridge in the D.A.D.A. position. Of course, if what Harry and Dumbledore have anounced is true, Defense is probably the most important subject at the school now. But Miss Umbridge sets out to make it as harmless and impotent a subject as possible. On the first day of class she announces the changes by stating that the regular turnover of teachers, "many of whom do not seem to have followed any Ministry-approved curriculum" has critically hampered the students in light of their upcoming Ordinary Wizarding Levels (exams--think Standard Achievement Tests). But no worries, this year "We will be following a carefully structured, theory-centered, Ministry-approved course of defensive magic this year." Notice the twice repeated "Ministry-approved." She then lists her aims for the course: "1. Understanding the principles underlying defensive magic. 2. Learning to recognize situations in which defensive magic can be legally used. 3. Placing the use of defensive magic in a context for practical use." She then sets them to read a chapter in their textbook. Hermione Granger, however, has noticed something significant--the lack of mention of practicing the spells. In other words, Umbridge has no plans for application of anything they will be learning. This seems to be a serious oversight--after all, reading about theories and facts does not automatically lend one success when the time might come to use what one has learned. One must practice application, right? Not according to Umbridge. Her final statement on the matter: "It is the view of the Ministry that a theoretical knowledge will be more than sufficient to get you through your examination, which, after all, is what school is all about." and then "As long as you have studied the theory hard enough, there is no reason why you should not be able to perform the spells under carefully controlled examination conditions." So, why did I write all of this? Those who know me fairly well, already have an idea. Let me say right now, I have no argument with teaching theory and basic fact in a classroom--you have to. And, in fact, in the younger grades, that is mainly what you can teach. Youngsters aren't terribly good at out-of-the-box, abstract thought. However, the modern educational structure/system/theory is imbued with this same idea that the theoretical is enough to pass exams, so why bother with anything else. What it comes down to is this: is the purpose of a K-12 education merely to pass? or is it to train children to think and succeed in the real world? It's a serious question. It seems that the main idea that surrounds the education process these days is that as long as they graduate/pass, it's okay. But at what cost? Of course, we've all heard the dilemma of teachers feeling pressured to "teach the test," but I would question the entire emphasis of modern educational philosophy. The entire structure of modern ed. is centered around "teaching the test," just in a more subtle way. Educational textbooks are filled with watered-down, inoffensive sound bites and politically correct story problems, but very little meat to stimulate independent thought and analysis. We teach a novel so they will know the story and the facts, but how many teachers use literature to analyse the world we see around us? We teach history to know what happened before (although ideas of deconstruction have led to teaching "social studies"--facts about cultures--rather than history), but how many teachers connect what happened in the past with the reasoning behind today's culture and politics. The fact is that modern education at all levels has stagnated. By removing practical application of the theory-centered approved curricula, educators have crippled the thought processes of students. In order to avoid some mythical "offense," students have been cheated out of learning to make connections between their education and their every-day lives. Because of this, many students do not see the value of their education; they do not think it matters to them as people. Their education is merely some letters on a report card that may influence how much money they will make, rather than being a key to understanding and developing themselves as individual humans. They have no practical tools to apply knowledge. Just as Prof. Umbridge's students were just reading about some defensive spells rather than learning to actually defend themselves, many of today's students are merely learning some facts, rather than how/why they are the products of these facts history and literature and science and mathematics. By high school, education ought to be about more than learning facts to pass tests, it ought to be about using facts to understand ourselves, what we believe, and the world around us. I think the philosophy of the Ministry and Prof. Umbridge is exactly what we see in the system around us: safety rather than understanding. And as both the M and P.U. are actively working to blind people to truth while denying what they both know to be true, I think it is intended to be, as is, a very accurate criticism of the modern debacle that is the educational system. (I won't single out public education in this, b/c many private schools are slipping down that path, as well.) Something on which to think, eh?
This is a segue. I now have a small stack of papers to grade. Yes! I did an interesting experiment on my World Lit students. Having more time and ... thoughfulness ... in this class than in others I have taught, I had my students write a critical analysis of Oedipus Rex using as their basis for comparison Aristotle's Ars Poetica. Interesting, huh? Frankly, I think it would be easier to have a basis of critique than otherwise, as you have specific points to deal with and a particular viewpoint already there for you. But I guess I won't know that until I assign another analysis without a comparison ideal. We shall see. We also had a very lively discussion about Socrates and Plato in class. the insistence of Socrates on defining terms being necessary to discussing them, and that words have particular meaning and misusing them corrupts any debate. My students, very astutely, saw a significant cultural application with both those ideas. They are very aware that the culture around us has become rife with the misuse and careless use of words, and that it has hampered our ability to accurately and effectively communicate. Socrates stated that the misuse of words led to a corruption of the soul. I tend to agree with him. The Platonic Ideal was also a very interesting point of discussion. I am personally fascinated by it, which helps. The basic idea, for those who aren't familiar, is that what we see around us in not truly real--it is not the ultimate reality, but a corruption--a shadow, if you will--of an ideal that exists beyond what we see around us. For example, the chair you are now sitting in is not the actual, ultimate chair, but a shadow of an ideal chair that exists beyond us. Sounds kind of strange, doesn't it? Yet then I introduced the spiritual into the conversation--is the world that we see around us the perfect world? No. Is it then the reality that God created? Well, no--it is corrupted by the Fall. Excellent. Therefore, is it safe to say that the world we see around us is a corrupted shadow of the ideal in the mind of God that He will recreate in the future? Well, yes. It was a very interesting discussion indeed. Certainly, I wouldn't wholeheartedly advocate everything Plato wrote as true--we have, obviously, widely differing religious foundations which therefore leads to different conclusions and applications. But. . .he wasn't wrong when he realized that our reality is merely a shadow of Truth. That the corporeal world around us is not all there is to see, and that wisdom comes in seeking the Truth behind/beyond the shadows. Hmmm.
All right. Final thoughts--the girls' basketball team is 3-1 so far (the one ought to be a 0--seriously, you should have seen the game. :{ ). They are playing so very well now. I finally read Kim by Rudyard Kipling. Very interesting. I just may embark on an India kick very soon (two summers ago I was on an Africa kick--I read about 8 books set in Africa in a row). I think A Passage to India may be next--I've already seen the movie, so it's a less daunting project than it was the last time I thought about it. I've also just finished a very interesting and informative book entitled A Matter of Basic Principles. It is an excellent and reasonable criticism of Bill Gothard's Institute of Basic Life Principles and Advanced Training Institute (the homeschool curricula branch of IBLP). Not everyone who reads this blog will have heard of this, but many of you will--this book is worth the read. The authors have raised several impressive objections as talking points, and very soundly defended their criticism. It is not an emotional rant or an unfounded personal dissection as many criticisms are these days. It is a carefully thought out and reasonable approached examination of several key cracks in the foundation of Gothard's system. Definitely worth the time.
And very lastly--since odds are pretty favourable that I won't post again before Sunday (We'll see), I will wish everyone a very blessed Christmas. It is the day to mark the birth of He who gave us the greatest and most necessary example of sacrificial love. Revel in it.
