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Brainwash Factory
John Taylor Gatto in his essay “Against School” explains the lack of motivation that students have to the educational system of the USA. He also explains the damage that the system makes to both, students and teachers, by the non-interesting topics they are taught class. Furthermore, he enlightens the indifference of students towards the teacher, seem as incompetent and unprepared. In addition, he also highlights the dark side of the school system which intends to brainwash and rescind the ideas from students. He addresses a main goal of the educational system; convert juveniles into the next docile and manageable generation. Wherefore, he proposes an educational system that should be structured and not controlled. In addition,
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Juveniles are being taught that in order to have a nice car, branded cloths and the house of their dreams, by getting into an expensive mortgage, they have to be an employee of a huge corporation. In addition, they have to undergo to a prestigious school, study hard, have excellent grades in order to become popular and respectable in the world. However, many people would not become those super leaders, but these majority of people have a great role in the capitalism society of the US. As Gatto says, “We buy televisions, and then we buy the things we see on the television. We buy computers, and then we buy the things we see on the computer. We buy $150 sneakers whether we need them or not, and when they fall apart too soon we buy another pair” (38). Such results are in part of a wrong education that teenagers have received trough many decades. In addition, Gatto highlights that modern educational system has been working in a six basic functions methods that makes the system strong and unbreakable: The adjustable function, indulge students to respect authorities. The integrating function, which builds the personality of the students as similar to each other as possible. The diagnostic and directive function, which allows a school to set permanent scholar grades in order to determinate his or her future role in society. The differentiating function, which gives to the student a good education and after his or her role is diagnosed, they prevent any educational progress. The selective function, function that the system has used to prevent academic growth for the non-selected students. The propaedeutic function, which works in the selection of specific groups of intellectual adults to keep perpetuating the system all over again making it a continuous sequence. (Gatto 34). Gatto’s facts revealed the survival of the educational system for decades,
Most high school students can 't wait for their school year to be over because they feel exhausted by the seven long periods of classes and not to mention boredom. John Taylor Gatto, a former New York State Teacher of the Year wrote an article called "Against School." Gatto criticizes the school system for their inability to meet the students’ expectations and for putting limits on their ability to learn. The children feel neglected, and the teachers feel helpless because they have to work with students who are not interested in the materials they are given. Gatto mentions how US high schools have become affected by adapting to the Prussian education system. According to Gatto, the purpose of high school is to manipulate the student 's mind
What is the heart of Gatto’s thesis, and what is the message he is trying to send? In summary, he says that school is dumbing us down, in 7 distinct ways, of which are: making students emotionally and intellectually dependent, indifferent, bored, paranoid, and provisionally esteemed (meaning that they “require constant confirmation by experts,” Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Schooling, Gatto, 1992). This is achieved through ‘brainwashing’ the students, encouraging and nourishing the growth of habits like seeking out approval or satisfaction from authorities. Gatto also compares our educational system to that of Prussian society, where the population was raised like cattle to more easily manage them through Pavlov-like conditioning, as the information taught to students is only there to confuse the students. It’s easy to fall back on the strawman fallacy to criticize Gatto’s argument, to say that Prussia has no relevance and doesn’t compare to the National School Board of
To begin, there are several concepts about compulsory education that aggravates John Gatto and he explains his concerns in his essay “Against School.” Gatto’s first concern is everything is about school is boring. “Boredom is the common condition of schoolteachers (Gatto 608).” If the teachers are bored, they will create a dull and boring environment for the students. “Boredom and childishness were the natural state of affairs in the classroom (Gatto 608).” Lack of creativity and freedom is another concern of Gatto. “An educational system deliberately designed to produce mediocre intellects (Gatto 611).” Also, Gatto thinks school is unnecessary. “George Washington, Benjamin
However there are people who believe that the process of schooling is a way of drilling children to become obedient servants to the government. Gatto’s article highlights children are part of an economic scheme which the government has concealed about the “true” meaning of education. Trying to illustrate how schooling works Gatto presumed, “Our schools are…factories in which the raw products (children) are to be shaped and fashioned…And it is the business of the school to build its pupils according to the specifications laid down” (148). Gatto saw how the government is trying to standardize education by telling what teachers are supposed to teach each child in order to design the children to their specifications. Children are obligated to listen to every lecture and lesson, as the teacher’s job is to follow each standard the government provides. Anyon illustrated in his book how children in different social classes were taught by different techniques, due to the fact that some children were being trained to listen and others were drilled to create decisions. Documenting how the children were taught in the working class Anyon shows how children were being drilled to constantly listen to orders by stating, “The four fifth grade teachers observed in the working-class schools attempted to control classroom time and space by making decisions without consulting the children and without explaining the basis for their decisions” (169). Anyon recognized more than one fifth grade teacher taught their students in the way supervisors would treat blue-collared workers, by constantly telling them what to do. The children were told what to do and how to do it, but they were never asked if they knew other ways to do the same action, as if the child’s input didn’t matter. Anyon
Otherwise, why now the parents spend a lot of money to send their children to a good school to study, because the school education environment to the children’s influence is very important. When Wes A moved to Bronx, his mother had made a decision to send her children to private school after her seeing how poor the public school system had become, so she worked multiple jobs to manage the cost and relied on her parents to take care the children before and after school while at work. “My mother decided soon after our move to the Bronx that I was not going to public school. She wasn’t a snob, she was scared.”(47) Because she knew, if the children are growth of a bad education environment, the children of the world to know nature will be distorted. Without a good education, there is also no habits; No good sense, and also there will be some bad behavior. Today, the rate of crime is high; almost all can find the root cause of their growth environment. Maybe the lack of discipline, discouraged by mistake friends or too much stress, but all shows the importance of good education environment for children to grow
One topic that is widely debated today is education and how well children are being taught. Education is a difficult thing to improve because every child learns differently. So how do we create a system to fit everyone's needs? A man named Paulo Freire studied the educational system and points out the systems flaws in his essay,”The ‘Banking’ Concept of Education” in which he explains how children are being taught and proposes a better method. Mike Rose, in his essay,”I Just Wanna Be Average” explains in detail his experiences and the problems he sees in the school system. Both passages look closely at the educational system whether it be through research studies or personal experiences.
“Against School” is a controversial article written by John Taylor Gatto. In the essay he describes the American School system as a “prison” and talks about how it attempts to make all the children equal by teaching the students topics that society think is acceptable. He also goes on to state, “Students would be willing to study if they were more motivated and were actually educated instead of schooled”. Many people say that the only way to become successful now a days is to go to school and get an education. Now I agree with this statement but what I don’t agree with is how the school system teaches. Even though some might discredit Gatto’s claims that we should get rid of compulsory teaching because he think it’s a huge
School is a miniature version of society which allows teens to explore what kinds of characteristics will prohibit or inhibit them to excel amongst their classmates and future peers. Socially promoted students tend to stay within their own ranks and center their attention on trivial things such as how good their eye brows look. On the other hand, students who go against the grain of being molded into “social norms” and stand out go unnoticed by fellow students and teachers. They are categorized as untouchable, undetected, and shunned from the lime lights others bask in. Botstein also implies that the socially promoted students “realize what really is at stake in becoming an adult and, too many opportunities have been lost and too much time has been wasted” by the time college registration and high school graduation come. Due to the lavished lifestyle in the spotlight, they forget the role that must be played in the near future. Rather than focusing on further expanding their education, their primary drive is to boost egos, popularity, and being the most remembered person from high school. This results in members of society intellectually and emotionally unprepared for life outside of the high school
In his essay “Against school” John Gatto states from experience as a school teacher that the current education system is ineffective and make students bored as well as the teachers. Indeed on one hand the students are not motivated by attending to classes because most of them have either already cover the concepts taught or just don’t understand what is being taught. “They said they wanted to be doing something real, not just sitting around” (142).Therefore they come to believe that their teachers are not knowledgeable about the topics they teach and don’t understand their real needs. On the other hand, teachers also feeling bored to “reach students who are rude and interested only in grades” (142). Those who try to change the curriculum that are set in order to create a more effective teaching classes found themselves “trapped inside structures even more rigid than those imposed upon the children”(142). The problem of boredom of students at school is addressed by Sugata Mitra in his speech The child –driven education. Indeed through his experiment a hole in the wall, he found that “children will learn what they want to learn to do” (1). For him, if students have interest into something they will not have any problems to learn this thing, therefore they won’t feel bored. In this point, Gatto and Mitra share the same point of view which is if children are motivated to learn they will learn, if they are not they won’t. The issue is to find an appropriate way to identify what children are really interested by and to have time to spend to each individual students. There are many students in a single class and each of them is interested by something different. This problem is solved by the system of homeschooling, because the child receives extra help in the subjects he or she is having trouble in. If a child does not
I have rode the article Against School by John Taylor Gatto, even it was long pages to read, it was interesting and at the same time controversial and but I disagree with the author. Why? He is encouraging the young people of today that education is not worth it, is just a waste of time. Is reasonable what is he quoting with his facts “six classes a day, five days a week, nine months a year for twelve years is a boring routine that every person must take” It seems depressing to be in school for so long just to turn ourselves to slaves, receive orders like a peasant and work for somebody with high economic status is not what we want. I understand his point of view but the author has been so pessimist about his declarations about going school
America’s greatest problem lies right in front of them. From ages 14 to 30, young American’s are dealt to obtain over 60 years of knowledge in such a short time span. Both male and females between the ages of 14 to 30 years old, are expected to know how to graduate high school, go to college, find a job, create a family, support that family, and have enough money to retire when that time comes. Think of these stages as categories. Each category has subcategories; one being how society portrays to accomplish such stage, another being the negative effects on a student’s health because of the systematic society, and finally my proposed solution to fix this corrupt society. The reason why America’s society is corrupt is because of all of the strenuous
Thus, they surmise that reform is not necessary for a system that has pursued without failure. However, this is based on the destination of the education process, rather than the journey these students go through to reach these positions. . Throughout schooling, kids may suffer from overly significant tests, harmful relationships and pressure from competition. The most probable result of these happenings is anxiousness and a declining mental health. In fact, according to statistics, “anxiety has now surpassed depression” among late years of school children, and the “academic pressure” has a detrimental effect on their well-being (Hoffman). While looking at success, it seems realistic that one could get caught up in a false sense of security, and believe that the entire system is ideal and perfect. However, in reality, fear, worry and discomfort are common among the general schooling population. This represents a system exceeding its impact on one’s life, going as far as to damaging ones character. The education system, rather than aiding these students in proper welfare, has proven itself as an inhibiting factor of this welfare, and in order for the quality of life of these students to be bettered, reform is a necessary objective. In turn, although there is in an increasing amount of Americans in occupations, this has not come without the sacrifice of mental health and positivity, and it is a choice for the system to choose between a chance for future success, or guaranteed contentment among the student
Gatto speaks of a man who broke down the purpose of schooling, according to him, into six basic functions. These functions were created by Alexander Inglis. Gatto himself claims that if one were to “innocently” believe in his three goals of education, one would follow those functions designed by Inglis. Inglis breaks down schooling as: adjustive or adaptive, intergrading, diagnostic and directive, differentiating, selective, and lastly propaedeutic functions. Gatto explains, “That, unfortunately, is purpose of mandatory public education in this country” (Gatto 147). Under these circumstances one could determine that Gatto compares his goals of education to that of Inglis’s breakdown of the public education one could receive in
Throughout the studies of some typical issues in education that the authors cited in the three texts, this essay will explore the perspectives on education and key aspects in each article. Meanwhile, the implications for contemporary education and their significances will also be examined in this essay.
Social institutions are an important element in the structure of human societies. They provide a structure for behavior in a particular part of social life. The five major social institutions in large societies are family, education, religion, politics, and economics. While each institution does deal with a different aspect of life, they are interrelated and intersect often in the course of daily life. For example, for schools to be able to exist they rely on funding from the government. This is an intersection between politics and education. Social institutions affect individual lives through other aspects of society such as culture, socialization, social stratification, and deviance. This paper will focus on the social institution of education, and how it affects individual lives through socialization, deviance, and social stratification.