John Gatto The Seven Lesson Teacher Summary

In this essay I will show that there are different views on education and that we see them in the different teachers. You can see that Hector is the more outgoing teacher. Mrs Lintott is the stereotypical teacher and Irwin is the new teacher with new views on education. I will go in-depth into the teacher's point of view. I will start with the one of the main teachers and that is Hector.

Students will become what their teachers believe they can become. If a teacher believes a student lacks motivation and is in the lower level class, such as the vocational track instead of the college track, often times the students won’t care or put in effort to succeed. The expectations or absence of them, damages the future of these students and their yearning for greatness. Mike Rose recounts his years in vocational school in the short story, “I Just Wanna Be Average” as he struggles with physical abuse from his teachers that utilized their power to control the ill-mannered youths, coupled with his lack of desire to learn, only to discover how one educator could transform his view on education.

The poem “Students” by Tom Wayman, shows four different learning styles: The Vaccination Theory of Education, The Dipstick Theory of Education, The Easy Listener Theory of Learning, and The Kung Fu Theory of Education. Wayman is a teacher that has noticed that every person devolves into one of these different learning styles. The four different theory of education are used every day even if we do not know.

In the essay, “Education”, Ralph Waldo Emerson, a transcendentalist thinker, asserts that Education is damaged and he knows of a solution – the educators. He develops this claim by first introducing the paradox linking “Genius and Drill”, expressing his ideal method of teaching. Throughout the essay, Emerson tends to have a condemning tone against the educator but towards the end he changes it into a comforting one. Emerson’s purpose is to present an alternative style of teaching in order to persuade educators to use the teaching method by using paradoxes, rhetorical questions, and shifts in tone. He establishes an informative and didactic tone for educators who value attention to detail.

However, through the piece, several of his points lack evidence, and has you looking warily at the rest of what he says. For instance, in paragraphs 6 and 7, Gatto mentions several people who never were traditionally schooled as examples of why we do not need mandatory schooling. While at first, it seems like Edison, Rockefeller, and Twain are all wonderful

     If I had to recommend an essay for teachers to teach this would be first on my list. This essay was so well written that it actually interested me, even though I have only read 5 books in my life. Reading is not my favorite thing to do but if this essay was a book I would read it. I was so intrigued by the reality of it and the way that he made those “teachers” look so stupid and how he made the administrators realize how evil we humans can be.

As her essay promotes the significance of confusion in learning growth, she also is able to indirectly raises the concern in our education system that lacks support from teachers making students suffer intellectually and creatively. “Chickering suggests that an optimum learning climate uses a balance of challenge and support appropriate for each student’s educational level” (Chitwood 231). Education systems lacking supportive demeanors from teachers leave students with an unhealthy amount of confusion and lack of motivation to learn the material. Chitwood acknowledges the idea that a teacher needs an awareness of a student’s ability to be faced with challenges with their support. While emphasizing that confusion is essential in the learning processing, she identifies it as only beneficial when there is a balance between challenge and support. Without this balance, students will become frustrated and unmotivated to learn about the material; if the confusion or challenge is too great then students will not learn. Chitwood’s hidden agenda within this essay involves her pushing towards teachers being more active in class. The hidden agenda adds a deeper purpose to her argument suggesting a broad claim of policy. Arguing that action should be taken with students to motivate them to learn the material aids her main claim. Her value of confusion correlates

“I won’t learn from you” is a classic and powerful group of essays written by Herbert Kohl. The first three chapters “I won’t learn from you”, “The tattooed man”, and “Excellence, Equality, and Equity” all explore ideas that students are more in charge of their learning than most individuals believe. With these theories, students and teachers can help improve each other in every way. Kohl writes a variety of humorous stories, lessons on teaching, and inspirations to be a teacher to any child, regardless of their race, gender, religion or abilities. He addresses serious issues in the public school system, such as reforming to the demands of the school district, adapting the curriculum, and the many pressures as an educator. Kohl helps the

Sams (2003) argues that the context approach is flawed because students have no background information on grammar, vocabulary or concepts.

First, Gatto who taught in the school system for thirty years uses his personal experience, and the rhetorical strategy ethos to show that he believes that being in the public-school system for twelve years is not good or helping the children in their lives outside of school. Gatto says “I’ve come slowly to understand what it is I really teach: A curriculum of confusion, class position, arbitrary justice, vulgarity, rudeness, disrespect for privacy, indifference to quality, and utter dependency” (607). In this quote Gatto is saying that when children are in the school system they are not learning things they will need in life. They are getting used to repeating the same process over and over again. They are also learning to be dependent on an instructor to tell them when where and how to do things and not relying on themselves for anything. Kids in the system become dependent on being around others and a lot of time do not know how to handle themselves. The author states, “well-schooled people are conditioned to dread being alone, and they seek constant companionship through the TV, the computer, the cell phone, and through shallow friendships quickly acquired and quickly abandoned” (615). In this quote Gatto is saying that people in the system get accustomed to being around a group of people and they cannot stand to be by themselves. The author is also saying that when the kids in the system are not around a group of people they fill the gap by watching television, being on a computer, and/or on a cell phone.

What is the main argument the author makes and how does it apply to contemporary education?

Gatto having been a teacher for years and writing various books on education made the argument much more effective and easier to accept his opinion.

With this essay Gatto intends to get the proverbial wheels by changing the reader 's mind by presenting them his own view of the educational world.He argues that the public school system crippled children ,he writes on how schooling has made some non-useful changes in the past generation following the others. He touches base with what was the purpose of schooling and what effects it has on students and how they may benefit from schooling and also how it harms them in some way. He shares a great deal about his own experience of teaching and his student’s response; he also refers to some articles written on schooling by great authors.

Teaching with purpose to have a desired outcome is one perspective to examine Dr. Robert Marzano’s book The Art and Science of Teaching. The instructional situation that I am familiar with is elementary. As I examine Marzano’s ten instructional design questions, that represent a logical planning sequence for effective instructional design, I will use elementary lenses.

Gatto is concern to society that the contemporary schooling system is trying to get rid of students’ personality by turning them into obedient students that are easy to have power over (control). Therefore, the system will produce uneducated voters that are easy to be misled by higher powers. In addition, students are not given the freedom of choosing what they want. He is saying that public schools are not the only way to success; also, unschooled people don’t mean that they are uneducated. Moreover, Gatto encourages home-school system than public school as option because home-school system has more independence but it’s not a solution for the US. I disagree to his solution because he is supporting examples from old generation such as Edison and Ben Franklin; however, our generation is different than before. It needs school environment like sharing our ideas in class and helping each other to solve problems. Therefore, homeschool is not the solution to success. It is a combination of the students’ skills, intelligence, and effort that makes up their success.