Reading Response #4: Gatto, Robinson, and Professor X

Reading Response #4: Gatto, Robinson, and Professor X

We do not know what jobs will be in demand in the future. The children entering the education system today, Ken says in 2006, will retire 2065. It is unpredictable what will be going on in five years, so there is no way we can predict what will be going on in 55 years. I think that Ken believes we need to not only be taught the basic subjects taught in school that were established in the 19th century & meant for industrialism, but that we should be able to pursue whatever interests us. He argues, “We are often told not to pursue art because we aren’t going to become an artist. Intelligence is diverse. Intelligence is dynamic and should be wonderfully interactive. Creativity more often than not comes through the interaction of different ways of thinking of things. Intelligence is distinct. People discovered their talents not by the rigid education system but by doing the things they excel at.”

I am of two minds. I agree that there are various ways to learn, all of which should be available for every student, but I cannot agree that people do not discover their talents through the education system. I believe that the education system is helpful in narrowing down what you do extremely well at and what you do not. Although for the most part, people agree that mundane and irrelevant classes are not helpful. I wish that classes could be more specific to what you hope to major in at a college level. However, even at a college level it is not uncommon for people to switch majors. I believe that the mandatory classes should be analyzed and determined useful for any type of life so college students’ time and money isn’t wasted.

Professor X believes community colleges to be colleges of last resort. X announces, “For many of my students, college was not a goal they spent years preparing for, but a place they landed in.” It is true that community colleges are generally not somewhere people aspire to be in, but a stepping stone in the path in order to get where they hope to be. I hope for the classes deemed mandatory to be taught in a fashion that enables the most learning.

I believe education should be altered to be more like Montessori school in that you can learn hands on, not sitting at a desk and being told what to. I went to Montessori school in Kindergarten and when I arrived at public school for the first grade I was baffled. Here I was reading Harry Potter while my class determined which objects in the room were red and proceeded to move them to a table deemed the ‘red’ table. There are so many different ways of learning- tactile/kinesthetic, visual & auditory. Not everyone learns the same way and although in future jobs you may have to learn a certain way, in the process of getting to those jobs I strongly believe that you should be able to learn in the way that is most beneficial to you. If I were to change anything about the education system I would divide the kids based on the way that they learn.

As well as the different types of learning available I believe that you should be able to learn at whatever level you are capable of, that learning should not be divided into grades based on age. Perhaps what were previously known as grades would be divided based on learning style and by what level you are on in each subject. This would allow children to be in an environment with others similar to themselves in comprehension and learning style, they would no longer be held back by those who don’t understand what they do or pushed on because they are below average.