In my limited opinion it is not so easy to separate "how to teach" from
"what to teach". In this sense, I am against the mainstream in education
that tends to divide between curriculum and the rest of the educational
practices. Instead, I think that both are closely interlinked and
dialectically reinforce each other. the "what" embodies knowledge that
exercises power over the "how" and viceversa.
For example, it is difficult to explain high school students how the banking
system works without accepting -minimally at least- some of the
market-driven logic of the supply and demand of money (which is nonetheless
part of the common sense in our culture). Further, it is difficult to
explain a student why he should visit a doctor if he/she has a problem and
at the same time and at the same time encourage the student to have a
critical vieew of how medicine professionals have created their monopoly of
a professional discourse.
Further, Foucault, by far, talks more about learning than about teaching,
which is not the same.
PS: sorry my lack of english vocabulary. further, since I am not an expert
in education I don't tend to support my opinions with quotes and so forth.
this is just what I think + what I think might be tought about this issue.
-----Original Message-----
From: tony.m.roberts@xxxxxxxxxx [mailto:tony.m.roberts@xxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Tuesday, January 05, 1999 11:23 PM
To: foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: hello out there
I'm new here. My name is Tony Michael Roberts and I am an adjunct teaching
psychology at Kingwood College. My degree is in educational psychology and I
tend to interprete Foucault as a philosopher of education more focused on
how
we should teach than on what we should teach. Education should make a person
skeptical of the conventional wisdom or common sense of his or her
particular
cultural time and place. This is important because freedom most be practiced
in
thought before it can be put into action. I think Foucault would agree with
Michael Calvin McGee that we live in a society where what we can do is not
limited directly so much as indirectly through limits on what we can think,
imagine or "know" imposed by thinking, imagining and knowing within the
limits
of what goes without saying where we are. Where we are is inside a regime of
power which does not generate resistence precisely because the regime is
ubiquitous, without horizon and, therefor, invisible. The first stage in
resistence is imagining the impossible of desire as a zone of potential
existing beyond the horizon of what goes without saying here and now.
Learning
to question what goes without saying, to see what passes for normal as
quaint
or perverse, is the first step to personal freedom and social
transformation. I
know a little Foucault and I'm here to learn more. Turnip-witted rantings
like
the above are my attempt to provoke one or more kind souls into educating me
further.
Any Comments?
Tony Michael Roberts
"what to teach". In this sense, I am against the mainstream in education
that tends to divide between curriculum and the rest of the educational
practices. Instead, I think that both are closely interlinked and
dialectically reinforce each other. the "what" embodies knowledge that
exercises power over the "how" and viceversa.
For example, it is difficult to explain high school students how the banking
system works without accepting -minimally at least- some of the
market-driven logic of the supply and demand of money (which is nonetheless
part of the common sense in our culture). Further, it is difficult to
explain a student why he should visit a doctor if he/she has a problem and
at the same time and at the same time encourage the student to have a
critical vieew of how medicine professionals have created their monopoly of
a professional discourse.
Further, Foucault, by far, talks more about learning than about teaching,
which is not the same.
PS: sorry my lack of english vocabulary. further, since I am not an expert
in education I don't tend to support my opinions with quotes and so forth.
this is just what I think + what I think might be tought about this issue.
-----Original Message-----
From: tony.m.roberts@xxxxxxxxxx [mailto:tony.m.roberts@xxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Tuesday, January 05, 1999 11:23 PM
To: foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: hello out there
I'm new here. My name is Tony Michael Roberts and I am an adjunct teaching
psychology at Kingwood College. My degree is in educational psychology and I
tend to interprete Foucault as a philosopher of education more focused on
how
we should teach than on what we should teach. Education should make a person
skeptical of the conventional wisdom or common sense of his or her
particular
cultural time and place. This is important because freedom most be practiced
in
thought before it can be put into action. I think Foucault would agree with
Michael Calvin McGee that we live in a society where what we can do is not
limited directly so much as indirectly through limits on what we can think,
imagine or "know" imposed by thinking, imagining and knowing within the
limits
of what goes without saying where we are. Where we are is inside a regime of
power which does not generate resistence precisely because the regime is
ubiquitous, without horizon and, therefor, invisible. The first stage in
resistence is imagining the impossible of desire as a zone of potential
existing beyond the horizon of what goes without saying here and now.
Learning
to question what goes without saying, to see what passes for normal as
quaint
or perverse, is the first step to personal freedom and social
transformation. I
know a little Foucault and I'm here to learn more. Turnip-witted rantings
like
the above are my attempt to provoke one or more kind souls into educating me
further.
Any Comments?
Tony Michael Roberts