Empowering Education, Critical Teaching for Social Change, Shor Response

I would have to agree with Ira Shor and her views on educating through political intrigue instead of monotonous spoon fed procedures. The social aspect of teaching and learning is as important as the act itself. To talk about the act of teaching is more thought provoking in itself. Self questioning always is. When we think back to our days at school we don't fondly remember PEMDAS or MLA formatting, rather we remember the relationships and experiences we had with one another. The emotions that our young minds experience echo throughout our lives and shape who we are in the current. Sure grades are a motivator but not to all students in early life. The fact that you got an A on a test felt good but what did that A really mean? Did it influence your decisions this morning or did it help you find out more about your self? In reality it's just a letter that can mean many things and means different things to different people. The act of laughing or a general feeling of happiness is usually achieved through social interaction, a common feeling that we all enjoy, yet schools tend to skip social action in favor of processed information injected through quickest means into our psyche, no matter the danger, because the only thing that matters is that A right? A chart of A's and nice report to the faculty's boss, just so they are assured that paycheck that they struggle to live on. All children want something, sometimes that shapes their future, but more times or not that want warps from the views and teachings of education, from the teacher. It is difficult for even a trace of that spark to come out of Highschool un altered by the standards set forth from standardization, from "what works".

In this reading Shor goes on with a process that I like to call PAPSMDDDRIA, A process in which she breaks down teaching to it's core to respond to the problem of mass produced education.

• Participatory

• Affective

• Problem-posing

• Situated

• Multicultural

• Dialogic

• Desocializing

• Democratic

• Researching

• Interdisciplinary

• Activist 

Long story short, Shore explains that participatory learning is important because interaction with the surrounding environment is one of the few ways that someone can truly learn from it. That interaction is the only way to transform the learning environment to your needs and that to not do so leads to being a slave to the education system. To accept your lesson inoculation and taste that sweet cherry "A" lollipop to distract you from the damage that has been done. 

Unnatural critical thought as the driver of social change: Steve Joordens at TEDxTrondheim

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM07P-5BlYI