Please respond to the following quote from p.34 of Cochran-Smith and Lytle:
NCLB has redefined the politics of education for this decade and perhaps many to come… How do we respond to work that calls itself teacher research or action research or participant inquiry and yet is very much in line with narrowed policies that co-opt the language of practitioner inquiry to marshal participants’ energies in opposite directions?
Double speak. Code switching. Two faces. Subversive. I'm a woman in a man's world. I am a foreigner in Korea. My language gets co-opted regularly. And now with narrowing online programs like Twitter, my voice gets controlled into only so many characters. I live in a culture that is not my native culture. Adjusting to norms that are not mine is part of life. Learning how to work within, have power within, and maintain my identity within a context that is not congruent with my values, ideas, skills, abilities, and sense of self is just part of life.
How limited I let myself be depends on how much I submit to the 'alien' code, letting it override my thinking and how much I let it frame and control my experience. If I choose to talk in the alien code, I am controlled by its grammar, syntax, and dialog only if I stay within a double-voiced discourse, parroting what I hear, and not making it my own, not using the the code to express myself, but only letting the code frame me. But as we learn new codes, dialogic breakthroughs occur, bridges and boundaries between the codes emerge (because I am choosing how to play and re-frame the code to fit me) to help me express my power and myself in the new (to me) code. Those in power only have power over me if I give it to them.
Sometimes though, the alien code can just be thrown out, dismissed or ignored. Just because NCLB has a narrow discourse does not mean that it needs to be followed. In fact, I think the authors, Cochran-Smith and Lytle, in Chapter 1: Practitioner Inquiry in Trying Times give a host of examples that the NCLB discourse is not shaping, controlling or influencing a lot of teacher learning and action research. I also think that all policies really are just guidelines - suggestions to be followed.
Elizabeth: Wait! You have to take me to shore. According to the Code of the Order of the Brethren...
Barbossa: First, your return to shore was not part of our negotiations nor our agreement so I must do nothing. And secondly, you must be a pirate for the pirate's code to apply and you're not. And thirdly, the code is more what you'd call "guidelines" than actual rules. Welcome aboard the Black Pearl, Miss Turner . http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0325980/quotes
What teachers and learners are doing all over the world is creating contexts of communication to talk about, find out about, and assess what is interesting and useful for them in their lives. This is my first experience being introduced to the context and code of NCLB. I feel that I am negotiating meaning across a culture that I have no experience. This experience is shaping the context of my learning, but I am uncertain how it is expanding my intellectual and practical experiences as a teacher and learner as of yet. I feel that from the readings I am learning a new code, NCLB talk, that makes me realize the friction of our times - a movement from industrial to knowledge economies, and a backlash movement to an antiquated world view (the Modern World View) from the Contemporary World View (CWV). I find this especially ironic and sad as John Dewey was a pragmatist (CWV) and promoted progressive education.
References and Influences:
Kramsch, Claire. McConnell-Ginet, Sally. Eds. Text and Context - Cross-Disciplinary Perspectives on Language Study. D.C. Heath and Company. 1992.
Kramsch, Claire. Language and Culture. Oxford University Press. 1998.
Kramsch, Claire. Ed. Language Acquisition and Language Socialization - Ecological Perspectives. part Three: Discourse alignments and trajectories in institutional settings. Continuum. 2002.
Kramsch, Claire. Context and Culture in Language Teaching. OUP. 1993.
Evtuhov,Catherine & Kotkin, Stephen. The Cultural Gradient - Transmission of Ideas in Europe 1789-1991. Rowman & Littlefield. 2003. p117
Jay, Paul. Contingency Blues - The Search for Foundations in American Criticism. University of Wisconsin Press. 1997. p65
Questions:
In reading Chapter 3 of Cochran-Smith and Lytle, I really struggled.
What is the difference between pedogogy and methodology?
I use these terms interchangably.
Teacher training is not a dirty word to me. It's healthy. I don't understand why the authors had such a hate-on about this. I'm a firm believer that a learner controls their learning situation. Even if I am in a learning situation that I deem sub-optimal (no technology, inexperienced moderator, apathetic team mates), I still have a rich opportunity to apply myself to learn something new - it's up to me to motivate myself and look for a way to connect the learning opportunity to my life.
And why is instruction and teaching an 'intervention?"
I object to this type of problematizing of the learning situation, yet it is not questioned by the authors.
*************************
Peer 2 Response
"I see it as a tool to have a focused goal."
A tool. Nice. In a multicultural nation trying to have a focused goal is an extraordinary goal in itself. Bravo to the US for trying to open this dialog nationally and trying to give a baseline system to use as a benchmark. I think NCLB has helped make the marginalized schools, learners and issues become more visible in mainstrem discourse.
"At the same time, I cannot say that I agree entirely with NCLB and its attempt to bypass pedagogical backgrounds that teachers bring to the table."
Sadly this is a current trend in higher education. Philosophy departments (Chosun University, South Korea) , foreign language and literature departments (USA & UK), even English language and literature departments (South Korea) are being shut down in universities. A move towards vocational and technological departments has become more important in higher education than critical theory and pedagogy in and of itself. This is very scary to me. I think scholars and researchers only focusing on their speciality is just as important in Carribean literature as it is in genetics. (Blog entry: The End of Philosophy - Social Discourse of Disquiet)
" I wish we had the time to sort through personal trial and error."
It broke my heart to read this. I think the will to sort through trial and error is the cornerstone to learning deeply, at one's own pace, and with the stickiness to let answers emerge as solutions in times when we haven't enough time to think. I think trial and error helps create 'intuitive' thinking and solutions.
"Post implementation of NCLB, I feel that relationships, while possibly more complex than ever, are without the “us versus them” mentality."
Wow! This is huge! So much of discourse is divided into us and them, self and other. When we bridge this gap personally, it is a great feat. When we do it collectively, it can be called peace.
