It frustrates me when people claim that schools are "brain washing" children into believing certain things. The people in power will foster that distrust amongst the public while, ironically imposing their ideology onto schools through rigid reform.
From what it sounds like Tom, you are all too familiar with this?
I feel the same frustration! We had a very vocal education minister, Alan Tudge a few years back who was very quick to make the classic ideology claim to discredit teacher educators and others, yet never acknowledged how ideological his desire was to have Australia history taught in a way that he wanted (in his words, as a sacred day of the year).
Many forget to interrogate the ideological groundings of their approaches to education, which sadly just leads to arrogance and sweeping reforms. I've found that many feel alienated in their desire to see meaningful education in this country as a result of such things.
I just hope that in trying to make sense of the ideologies I hold, I can be open when things challenge my commonsense way of doing things.
Indeed! Sigh...
thanks Tom, very interesting presentation by Mr Apple
Very timely too!
The DOE stopped his talk because he opposed performance pay - amazing!
This is a brilliant piece, Tom. it deserves to be widely read. I would encourage you to develop it further and submit it for publication.
Thanks for the encouragement Chris! I may consider this now 🤔. It is looking like a number of my blog posts will contribute to my PhD thesis too 🙂
It frustrates me when people claim that schools are "brain washing" children into believing certain things. The people in power will foster that distrust amongst the public while, ironically imposing their ideology onto schools through rigid reform.
From what it sounds like Tom, you are all too familiar with this?
Thanks for the comment Cristina!
I feel the same frustration! We had a very vocal education minister, Alan Tudge a few years back who was very quick to make the classic ideology claim to discredit teacher educators and others, yet never acknowledged how ideological his desire was to have Australia history taught in a way that he wanted (in his words, as a sacred day of the year).
Many forget to interrogate the ideological groundings of their approaches to education, which sadly just leads to arrogance and sweeping reforms. I've found that many feel alienated in their desire to see meaningful education in this country as a result of such things.
I just hope that in trying to make sense of the ideologies I hold, I can be open when things challenge my commonsense way of doing things.
I am a teacher and I have a voice in policy making. We are represented.