Various opinions have been made about what makes humans different for any other living creatures. There is no real answer to the question. In Susan Blackmore’s “Strange Creatures”, she debates that our ability to imitate, and the idea of memes is what makes us different from others creatures. The idea of imitation is what makes humans unique, and different; other creatures take a while to imitate someone but for humans it comes naturally since birth. Learning is something that’s unique and it should not be adapted through imitative teaching but when looked at American education system, students are learning through imitation. To other creatures, imitation is something unique but in humans perspective, imitation is natural and not something …show more content…
Think about it, the people that smoke and drink, they imitated the others around them and started it. While many can handle smoking and drinking, some cannot and in that case there are sever consequences that can happen to them. Imitation might be special but is it that special to ruin a life over? Imitation has an impact on lives that try to be someone they can’t be. Imitation takes away a person that could have been something. Susan Blackmore discusses Dawkins viewpoint on the things that humans copy. She quotes Dawkins saying, “he talked about fashions in dress or diet,and about ceremonies, customs and technologies-all of which are spread by one person copying another. Memes are stored in humans brains (or books or inventions) and passes on by imitation”(36). Everything that we have in today’s world is developed through imitation, which means that children are just copying each other rather than being their own person. The idea of plagiarism leading us to jail, makes no sense when all our lives we have grew up copying each other. We have not learn anything and basically committed a crime, which should really have server consequence but it doesn’t rather it is something unique and …show more content…
Students are encouraged to memorize the things they learn, which basically defines imitation. Students imitated their teachers and show how well they know topic through various tests. Rather than getting grading on their performance on a given assessment, students should get graded on how well they have improved throughout the course. If they get graded on their improvement, more will be able to express their unique self and not have to imitated what the teachers taught them. Without the imitative way of learning, students will have better critical thinking skills. There are three types of learning that can be caught to students but by choosing to teach student with learning of imitation, the American Education is failing to find the real future of America. Susan Blackmore claims that, “We use the same word ‘learning’ for simple association or ‘classical conditioning’, for learning by trail and error or ‘operant conditioning’, and for learning by imitation” (34). With having the imitation learning there is no uniqueness to the work that one does, it rather repetitive and copied. If American Education wants to be unique they need to make students approach new ideas and talents on their own. By approaching students with learning by trail and error: ‘operant conditioning’, American Education can be unique because they are teaching students to learn from
Knowledge is everything, it's what separates humans from animals. It allows us to question the world around us. Another key aspect that separates humans from animals is that each human is unique. We all have different beliefs and ideals that help us explain the infinite amount of questions that this universe has gifted us. In his lecture, Christopher Viney goes over the many shifts in the origin of life and how each time there is a shift people start to adept to the new shift.
The human mind is perhaps the greatest object on the earth, animate or inanimate, but without the proper training, the mind is a relatively useless tool. Through the development of formal education systems, humans as a whole have tried to ensure the training of all minds so as to continue prosperity for the world. Most of the time, though, education systems do not realize the harm they are doing to developing minds and the subsequent negative consequences. Among the largest of these inadequate education systems is the American primary schooling system. The American education system is in fact failing; it continues to deplete children of their natural creativity and thirst for knowledge while preaching conformity, which in turn creates an ill-prepared and incompetent public.
"Whereas animals are rigidly controlled by their biology, human behavior is largely determined by culture, a largely autonomous system of symbols and values, growing from a biological base, but growing indefinitely away from it. Able to overpower or escape biological constraints in most regards, cultures can vary from one another enough so that important portion...
One teacher may adopt the banking concept while the other may utilize the problem-posing concept. However, while problem-posing education generates creativity by giving students the ability to communicate, banking education does not. Freire asserts that in the “banking” concept of education, “the teacher chooses the program content, and the students (who were not consulted) adapt to it” (217). Freire indicates that students, who are victims of banking education, have no control over how an instructor chooses to teach. Therefore, creativity is destroyed by the fact that it was not even permitted in the first place. Students are not able to express their opinions or solve problems using their own methods because in order to pass the class, students not only need to adapt to the teaching style of their professors but think like them too. Freire’s quote relates to experiences I have had with “banking” teachers throughout my twelve years of formal education. Those teachers only taught using textbooks, therefore, they insisted that the textbook was always right. If I were to solve a math problem using a technique different from the book, then I would not get points for the problem even though my answer was right. And if I were to interpret an open-ended essay different from how my teacher would then my interpretations would be wrong. By doing this, my teachers destroyed my creativity. I was prohibited from my own thoughts and penalized if I expressed them. The only alternative for me was to become a “robot” that followed the orders of authorities, but being a “robot” was not something I was ashamed of. In fact, my role as a “robot” led me to better understand the “drama of Education” in which teachers attempt to “regulate the way the world ‘enters into’ the students”. I was able to figure out that my own teachers had tried to handle the way the world “entered into me” by
“Men are dogs.” “Don’t be a chicken.” “She is sneaky like a snake.” These are common idioms that are spoken today among our society, but one question is comes to mind. Are humans and animals more similar than we think? Some would declare the only difference between human and animals is that animals lack verbal communication. According to Jill McCorkle’s book, Creatures of Habit, she explains the variations of similar characteristics between both, humans and animals. McCorkle uses sociobiology to develop her story titles in connection with the animal counterparts. According to the Gale Encyclopedia of Science, “sociobiology” is defined as “the study of the evolution of social behavior in all organisms, including human beings.” By using sociobiology, this gives the reader a better insight on the connection between humans and animals. Throughout my essay, I will select several short stories and illustrate the similar characteristic between humans and animals.
From all existing creatures, we humans differ because we are able to use our brain to make decisions. In
...llent imitators. Imitation ability was tested at the dolphin institute; two bottlenose dolphins each had their own trainer and could see the other dolphin, but not the other dolphin’s trainer. Trainers then gave commands to the dolphins. In this experiment, it was found that dolphins, despite not being able to see the trainer, could successfully imitate another dolphin’s behavior after that dolphin was given a command from its trainer (TDI 2012). Additionally, dolphins could imitate human movements after associating analogous parts of their body with human parts. For example, the dolphin raised its tail when its trainer raised her leg (TDI 2012). The ability for dolphins to successfully imitate another dolphin’s behavior suggests that dolphins have learning abilities, giving further insight and a better understanding of social structures of the dolphin community.
Besides the classroom, nowhere in modern society emphasizes learning for the sake of knowledge. In society, the people who receive praise are the ones who did not have a solid education. America has become obsessed with success stories that forgo education because educational knowledge no longer contains any value. American leaders do not make an extra effort to try and fix the failing education system, so if the world powers of America do not care to make progressive improvements for the education system, why should citizens of America even care about the education system? The students in school have picked up on these thoughts and instead of listening to the classroom teacher the students listen to the world teachers. Barber defines these world teachers as “the nation’s true pedagogues, are television, advertising, movies, politics, and the celebrity domains they define.” (Barber, 2014, p. 2.). These leaders have different values than the values set as the standard by the education system. The education system values wisdom, knowledge, critical thinking, and the ability to articulate one’s thoughts and ideas convincingly. While the American system contrasts these ideas: “We honor ambition, we reward greed, we celebrate materialism, we worship acquisitiveness, we cherish success, and we commercialize the classroom. . . We recommend history to the kids but rarely consult it ourselves. (Barber, 2014, p. 4.). This reasoning lays the foundation for the destruction of the school system. Adults do not find value in education, but they encourage their children to try and find value in area the adults do not. Children have caught on to this and decided the absolute best option for them to success is to flee the classroom setting and surround themselves in the world where they can learn firsthand the steps to become successful. The societal influence cultivates children more effectively than the classroom
In John Gatto’s essay “Against Schools” he states from experience as a school teacher that are current educational system is at fault (148). He claims that classrooms are often filled with boredom manufactured by repetitive class work and unenthusiastic teachings. Students are not actively engaged and challenged by their work and more often than not they have either already covered the concepts taught in class or they just do not understand what is being taught to them. The children contained in classrooms have come to believe that their teachers are not all that knowledgeable about the subjects that they are teaching and this advances their apathy towards education. The teachers also feel disadvantaged while fulfilling their roles as teachers because the students often bring rude and careless attitudes to class. Teachers often wish to change the curriculums that are set for students in order to create a more effective lesson plan, but they are restricted by strict regulations and consequences that bind them to their compulsory teachings (148-149). An active illustration of John Gatto’s perspective on our educational system can be found in Mike Rose’s essay “I Just Wanna Be Average” (157). Throughout this piece of literature the author Mike Rose describes the kind of education he received while undergoing teachings in the vocational track. During Mike’s vocational experiences he was taught by teachers that were inexperienced and poorly trained in the subjects they taught. As a result, their lesson plan and the assignments they prepared for class were not designed to proficiently teach students anything practical. For example, the curriculum of Mike Rose’s English class for the entire semester consisted of the repeated reading of ...
The American system of education is considered to be one of the most progressive in the world. One of the surveys on attitudes toward teaching around the world found that the United States is unique in its strong emphasis on "good teaching." My experience at State College has helped me to understand better how this system works, and what methods and techniques American teachers use to motivate their students for creative and active learning. However, I can also see that this system doesn’t work perfectly in every classroom. Reading Ernest Boyer’s article “Creativity in the Classroom” helped me with my understanding of the main problem that nowadays exists with the American college education system. According to the author, the problem is that teachers and students don’t see each other as one team doing the same business; therefore, in most classrooms the process of learning becomes a boring procedure instead of being mind-blowing. Moreover, reading this article, I could analyze the reasons of this problem that the author identifies through my own experiences at State College.
There is a “fear of being unorthodox…rooted in the American teacher’s soul” (Burgess 237). Burgess stresses the prohibition of an American teacher’s competence to instruct students using any type of experimental approach other than the standardized design. In consequence, America is unable to breed eccentric geniuses and has no capacity to create a burning desire to learn within their students. The reason this dilemma has been continuing for so long is because America has been blinded by their previous accomplishments, such as the landing on the moon. On behalf of their successful progressive past, the American people are in denial of how poor the education system is now and have a state of mind that the nation is still advancing just as it was decades ago when it is in fact, the exact
Margaret Mead said, “Children must be taught how to think, not what to think.” In our society we value education over everything else. If one has a high education, then they will be able to make a better living for themselves. No school system is alike, some are better than others. The American education system used to be known as one of the leaders in education, having the highest graduation rate, and being innovative when it came to teaching styles. Now, it seems that it’s changing and other countries have taken it’s places as the best. This makes sense since the statistics show that most American students are losing to foreign countries. According to Paul Zoch in Doomed to Fail, Japan’s high school graduation was 90% whereas, the United
“A learning style is a way of learning and refers to the way that you learn new information” (2). Most people have one preferred learning style and perform to a lesser standard when learning in a different style than what they’re used to. Nowadays, children are told to take a quiz in school to determine what their preferred learning style is, but after a few years, not many of these children remember what their preferred learning style is, or even if they do, they don’t apply it to their learning.
As a teacher, I have numerous personal goals. Mainly, my goal is to provide students with the opportunity and encouragement to succeed in life and to develop as free-thinking individuals in society. I consider myself a progressive and an essentialist, according to theory. I feel that students need to be given multiple opportunities to explore many different life skills that sometimes are overlooked in the education system. Testing, rote memorization, and lecture, in my opinion, do not promote students' own inquiry and does not give students opportunities to tap into their own source of knowledge that they each bring with them to the classroom. As a teacher, I hope to leave my students able to set and accomplish goals through the use of these life skills. Some teachers I have had while in hi...
Evaluated more thoroughly, these statistics show not only a problem with student plagiarizing, but also an underlying problem of the failure to recognize it as a severe threat to the future development of today’s society. In order for society to continue to grow and prosper in technology, educators and employers alike must realize that plagiarism is indeed a genuine concern and as a result, must be dealt with in a more severe matter to encourage individualism. Often the threat of a failed grade or expulsion from a university is not enough to deter students from cheating if known instances have not been appropriately dealt with in the past. If the problem is to be mended, educators must make examples of students who plagiarize written material, so we can discontinue the trend that seems to be irresistible to today’s society.