The Democratic Classroom

I was perusing the blogs on edutopia and I came across an entry entitled, "If they don't practice democracy they won't learn it" Here is a link to the blog: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/practice-democracy-to-learn-democracy-mark-phillips.

The blog discusses that schools, particularly high schools, do a decent job at preparing students academically for life after twelfth grade, but put forth little effort develop them as a citizen. The gist I took out of the article is that the schools are teaching students about democracy, but in the classroom democracy plays little to no role. The article mentioned students not having influence in the learning outcomes or school reform, both of which are places where students' opinions could be very highly cherished. I certainly see the point of this article, particularly in high schools where the students have the mental capacity and desire to have control over their education. Students' would certainly be good candidates for influencing school reform and learning outcomes. Just as we have mentioned in class, the learning outcomes must be tailored to the individual student populous.

One thing I disliked about this article is the tone it implies in Democracy, that students should have a democratic say in their classroom. In my high school experience I got to experience classes with a high degree of democracy and some with a low degree. In one of my math classes we were told exactly what we were supposed to learn and had almost no autonomy over our education. That class was disliked by many of my peers, but we did learn a lot, though the fears of freshman geometry still echo in my peers minds. On the other side I had a calculus class my senior year where the students had nearly all of the control. The class ended up being a lot of fun, we would have mandatory 'chill time' each day where we would not learn and each Friday we would have donuts or cupcakes or something of the like. In the end we had a lot of fun and developed friendships, but we didn't learn a whole lot. We were a month behind other classes at other high schools and I still don't know some of the topics we were supposed to learn in that class.

So no control will can to the students despising the class/material/teacher, though they may be more geared to learn the material. While with complete autonomy students will choose a more social setting that, though it will be fun, can severely damage the learning aspect of a course. Finding the right mixture of autonomy to give students is certainly a role the teacher needs to play. I remember one English class that had a degree of autonomy, where the students all felt like we were participating and engaging in the course, but the teacher retained some of her power, enough to guide us towards the material we needed to learn.

In short, the idea that students can use Democracy is certainly a good idea. Who better to tell the school board what improvements can be made than some of its students. Democracy also greatly increases the engagement in the class and the material. If the students feel that they have contributed to the course, they are more likely to care about the material that is covered. However, I think there is an amount of control that should remain with the teacher. The teacher has the students academic interests in mind, whether the students realize it or not. I think a teacher's role can be that of a voice calling out in a corn maze or lazer tag game. They direct the person towards the ultimate goal, but the people can choose which route(s) they want to take to get there.

PTL,

Travis Ray