I saw a FB post the other day warning parents to consider color when choosing their children’s bathing suits this summer. Apparently some will make it hard to see them under water.
It’s not just children who are being inundated with the dangers of this world. Their parents are too. It’s making them anxious and almost unbearable to be around. I’m not proposing that we stop taking normal precautions to keep kids safe, but we’re making parents and kids crazy with the current situation.
Whenever I read articles like this, about how we teach children about the world using examples that are speculative and pessimistic, I always think of the phrase-Irrational Exuberance. The parallel isn't exact, but I think many teachers have succumbed to the psychological contagion of "Be Kind".
After close to two decades in K12 I saw teachers put on "happy faces" so that they could avoid addressing real and tangible concerns with instruction, materials, and student growth. At the same time, they would catastrophize specific ideas as existential, dangerous, and unjust.
To go back to Irrational Exuberance, I think this does a good job of capturing the problems with schools. Never before have we had more teachers prompting kids to be aware and engaged with the world; while also telling them their country, culture, and history is tainted by stains they must carry forever. I do not know how we reverse this trend, but the speculative bubble that optimizes for anxiety must burst before we can truly reform K12.
Just finished watching this amazing presentation during my lunch break. Sadly, we have just completed our fifth year of mandatory negative primals training--not very pretty PD. What a waste it has been. And yet--all trainings for reading instruction are voluntary. And the beat goes on.
I just watched the live webinar with Jeremy Clifton. SO $#@% good-- SO many implications. SO much to think about! I took notes. I took screenshots. I must rewatch. The very end...yes!...just made me think of Milo from The Phantom Tollbooth, who starts out thinking the word is meaningless and boring, but then....
We teachers have been pushed to make our classrooms "safe spaces." I've always been skeptical whether such a thing is truly possible. And I've always been more interested in helping my students be hungry and curious about the big wide world out there. And, as a teacher of U.S. history, help them see that they have power to make "a more perfect Union."
Lol, I assume it's not because of my one comment. I hope the webinar got lots of views and will continue to do so. Lots of folks I want to share that link with...
One more thing...I note your comment above: "We have long had a problem with correcting and over-correcting in education thought and practice. Nuance and complexity are a persistent challenge." I hope Jeremy Clifton's research becomes more widely known in education, but I can imagine ugly PD workshops that will botch it up and make it unrecognizable.
Now you're playing my song. Well, part of it anyway. Because I don't think that seeing the world as safe is exactly the fix.
For most of the last part of my career, I noted the rising tide of fear and anxiety among my students. And this is an issue that transcends a lot of boundaries, because absolutely everyone deserves part of the blame.
Politicians on all sides have turned every election into an apocalyptic battle that could end Civilization As We Know It. Parents have hovered over their children to protect them. Parents and students are bombarded by the message that if they don't get a degree at a good college, they will be doomed to failure, eating cat food off a hot plate while living in a van down by the river. Social media ensure that every social and cultural misstep will be magnified. And, yes-- I include on my list the folks insisting that if children are exposed to certain ideas in books, they will be ruined.
The problem is not just that so many different voices are broadcasting that the world is a dark scary place. After all, the message that the world is dark and scary is as old as the Puritans.
The problem, I've been convinced, is that we send a two part message to students-- bad things are going to happen to you in the world, and you won't be able to handle it.
We keep telling them that they're weak. We minimize their strength and magnify the threats. No wonder they're so anxious. I agree that we should give them the message that the world is exciting and beautiful, but let's also tell them that there is ugly difficult stuff coming and they will handle it and they will be okay.
Telling students that the world is awful seems like part of the disturbing breakdown of distinctions between kids and adults. Kids get exposed to all kinds of inappropriate topics, while adults consistently demonstrate fragility and immaturity. Is there a corresponding article to be written about adults who can’t assume their responsibilities?
“None of this is to deny that suffering exists, or that students shouldn’t engage seriously with complex issues.”
In this piece, Occam’s Razor to the Rescue: Simplify the subject, not the student (https://harriettjanetos.substack.com/p/occams-razor-to-the-rescue?r=5spuf), I refer to your common sense insistence that we must make teaching doable for teachers, who are after all just ordinary people. The situations you describe in this piece offer more evidence for how we unnecessarily overcomplicate education. Thank you.
I saw a FB post the other day warning parents to consider color when choosing their children’s bathing suits this summer. Apparently some will make it hard to see them under water.
It’s not just children who are being inundated with the dangers of this world. Their parents are too. It’s making them anxious and almost unbearable to be around. I’m not proposing that we stop taking normal precautions to keep kids safe, but we’re making parents and kids crazy with the current situation.
Whenever I read articles like this, about how we teach children about the world using examples that are speculative and pessimistic, I always think of the phrase-Irrational Exuberance. The parallel isn't exact, but I think many teachers have succumbed to the psychological contagion of "Be Kind".
After close to two decades in K12 I saw teachers put on "happy faces" so that they could avoid addressing real and tangible concerns with instruction, materials, and student growth. At the same time, they would catastrophize specific ideas as existential, dangerous, and unjust.
To go back to Irrational Exuberance, I think this does a good job of capturing the problems with schools. Never before have we had more teachers prompting kids to be aware and engaged with the world; while also telling them their country, culture, and history is tainted by stains they must carry forever. I do not know how we reverse this trend, but the speculative bubble that optimizes for anxiety must burst before we can truly reform K12.
We have long had a problem with correcting and over-correcting in education thought and practice. Nuance and complexity are a persistent challenge.
Just finished watching this amazing presentation during my lunch break. Sadly, we have just completed our fifth year of mandatory negative primals training--not very pretty PD. What a waste it has been. And yet--all trainings for reading instruction are voluntary. And the beat goes on.
I'm pressing "like" to acknowledge the comment. And because there's no "dislike" button.
I just watched the live webinar with Jeremy Clifton. SO $#@% good-- SO many implications. SO much to think about! I took notes. I took screenshots. I must rewatch. The very end...yes!...just made me think of Milo from The Phantom Tollbooth, who starts out thinking the word is meaningless and boring, but then....
We teachers have been pushed to make our classrooms "safe spaces." I've always been skeptical whether such a thing is truly possible. And I've always been more interested in helping my students be hungry and curious about the big wide world out there. And, as a teacher of U.S. history, help them see that they have power to make "a more perfect Union."
My life has not been lived in vain.
Lol, I assume it's not because of my one comment. I hope the webinar got lots of views and will continue to do so. Lots of folks I want to share that link with...
One more thing...I note your comment above: "We have long had a problem with correcting and over-correcting in education thought and practice. Nuance and complexity are a persistent challenge." I hope Jeremy Clifton's research becomes more widely known in education, but I can imagine ugly PD workshops that will botch it up and make it unrecognizable.
Now you're playing my song. Well, part of it anyway. Because I don't think that seeing the world as safe is exactly the fix.
For most of the last part of my career, I noted the rising tide of fear and anxiety among my students. And this is an issue that transcends a lot of boundaries, because absolutely everyone deserves part of the blame.
Politicians on all sides have turned every election into an apocalyptic battle that could end Civilization As We Know It. Parents have hovered over their children to protect them. Parents and students are bombarded by the message that if they don't get a degree at a good college, they will be doomed to failure, eating cat food off a hot plate while living in a van down by the river. Social media ensure that every social and cultural misstep will be magnified. And, yes-- I include on my list the folks insisting that if children are exposed to certain ideas in books, they will be ruined.
The problem is not just that so many different voices are broadcasting that the world is a dark scary place. After all, the message that the world is dark and scary is as old as the Puritans.
The problem, I've been convinced, is that we send a two part message to students-- bad things are going to happen to you in the world, and you won't be able to handle it.
We keep telling them that they're weak. We minimize their strength and magnify the threats. No wonder they're so anxious. I agree that we should give them the message that the world is exciting and beautiful, but let's also tell them that there is ugly difficult stuff coming and they will handle it and they will be okay.
Telling students that the world is awful seems like part of the disturbing breakdown of distinctions between kids and adults. Kids get exposed to all kinds of inappropriate topics, while adults consistently demonstrate fragility and immaturity. Is there a corresponding article to be written about adults who can’t assume their responsibilities?
Yes. Thank you for saying it. Cross-posting.
Such an enormous problem. And then there’s this: https://youtu.be/37w6DeEUbVg?si=RUZvcZ6IxBVZonEm
“None of this is to deny that suffering exists, or that students shouldn’t engage seriously with complex issues.”
In this piece, Occam’s Razor to the Rescue: Simplify the subject, not the student (https://harriettjanetos.substack.com/p/occams-razor-to-the-rescue?r=5spuf), I refer to your common sense insistence that we must make teaching doable for teachers, who are after all just ordinary people. The situations you describe in this piece offer more evidence for how we unnecessarily overcomplicate education. Thank you.