Teaching as a subversive activity

What Hacker News says

1. tcjDec 2019
   I couldn't agree with this thread more. "Teaching as a Subversive Activity" by Neil Postman is a wonderful read that addresses how our obsession with grades, courses and syllabi is completely contrary to helping people learn.
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2. tcjDec 2019
   For anyone who enjoyed this, a lot of these ideas were really well discussed a few years back in Neil Postman's "Teaching as a Subversive Activity" (1969) and John Dewey's "Democracy & Education" (1916). As you can see these books are over 50 years old. These ideas aren't new, which goes to say how long we've known this and what little have we done.

   The real question Graham poses here is: what is the point of schooling? At the moment, it teaches and conditions people to "hack tests" as Graham puts it. So people continue to do that throughout their lives.

   It also conditions people to think there is a "correct" answer to problems. Which in the open-ended nature of the real questions we have to grapple with in life is a complete lie. A teacher will rarely say: "It depends."

   What passes for "education" today is really just "training" and very far removed from real learning. People only learn about things that interest them. And you learn by asking questions, which most of the time will lead to further questions to which you will only ever find tentative, temporary answers. Not that different from how scientists treat their "solutions" to big questions as tentative.

   What can we do to change that? Change schools. It's the one place where we have kids kept for 15 years by mandate! It's the biggest lever we have to change perceptions and attitudes. Remove tests and grading. Learning will free up when that happens. It's remarkable what happens when at the beginning of the year the teacher gives everyone an A. Let go of the idea that permeates American society that everything needs to be measured. Some things do, but things like intelligence can't and shouldn't.

   I know the immediate response is that this is unpractical. And to that I ask why? Because we need a way to control? Control what? What district is "performing" better? When was a score on a math test a true measure of human potentiality?

   We need to go back to core questions as to what is the point of schools and what is worth teaching and learning in today's world. The world has changed immensely, but our "curriculums" are the same. The only difference is we use tablets and Microsoft Word to hand in assignments.

   I agree with Graham's conclusion. When we liberate ourselves from these useless idealogical metaphors we will free people and society up to stop hacking tests and start living.

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3. lcuffJul 2018
   When I was in high school, I read Postman's "Teaching as a Subversive Activity". The thing I remember most about the book is it asking the question "What is important?" and suggesting that such a question might actually belong in the classroom. I think this article meshes with this - Shall we examine our own objectives, or simply carry on enthusiastically with the tools provided by new technology, to unexamined ends.
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4. TloewaldJul 2017
   Nail Postman, one of the two authors of Teaching as a subversive activity also wrote the prophetic Amusing ourselves to death.

   I read the introduction to the former when I was in college in the eighties, and it has stuck with me. They argue that the role of education (especially in a democracy) is to imbue students with "foolproof crap detectors".

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