1. Politics of Education
1.1. The Four Purposes of Education
1.1.1. Intellectual Purposes
1.1.2. Political Purposes
1.1.3. Social Purposes
1.1.4. Economic Purposes
1.2. Conservative Perspective
1.2.1. 1.The Role of the School
1.2.1.1. The conservative see the role of the school as providing the necessary educational training needed. This perspective also believes that in the schools prepare children in socialization for the adult roles necessary to the maintenance of the social order. They also see schools function as transmitting traditions for culture through the curriculum. All together this perspectives role of the school is essential to social stability and economic productivity.
1.2.2. 2. Explanations of Unequal Performance
1.2.2.1. The conservatives believe and argue that students as individuals or in groups rise and fall on their own hard work, intelligence, and initiative. They understand it as the achievement is based on their sacrifice and hard work.
1.2.3. 3. Definition of Educational Problems
1.2.3.1. They argue the following points: They believe in response to the demand for greater equality in 1960's and 1970's has lowered academic standards, they believe that the traditional curriculum has been weakened due to the multicultural education, they point out how schools had lost their traditional role of teaching moral standards due to cultural relativism, and they last they point out is how schools are stifled by bureaucracy and inefficiency.
2. History or U.S. Education
2.1. The Post-World War II Equity Era: 1945-1980
2.1.1. Opened and found ways to expand opportunities to more equal educational outcomes pertaining to all levels of education.
2.1.2. Provided college students with remediation, where they would have equal opportunity to receive a college education.
2.1.3. They aided in helping the low income families, by offering federally funded programs.
2.2. Conservative Perspectives
2.2.1. Progressive education was believed to have lead to poor quality of education.
2.2.2. Social problems were believed to have lead to schools failing in education
2.2.3. Political and social objectives was a result in what caused significant harm to the traditional academic goals for schooling.
3. Sociological Perspectives
3.1. Theoretical Perspectives
3.1.1. Functional Theories: Create structures, curricula, and programs that are rational, technically advanced, and also encourage the social unity.
3.1.2. Conflict Theories: They believe everyone in the school system is in a social battle., such as students struggle against teacher, and teachers struggle against administrators.
3.1.3. Interactional Theories: Attempt to make commonplace strange by ignoring or overlooking the everyday "taken-for-granted" behaviors between students together and students with teachers. By examining the interactional aspects, it is believed that people are less likely to create theories that may be logical or eloquent.
3.2. Effects of Schooling on an Individual
3.2.1. Teacher Behavior
3.2.1.1. Teacher sometimes can experience "role strain" due to their great importance and impact they have on a students life. It is found that a teachers behavior truly influences and impacts the students learning and behavior also. Research has shown that teacher with good behavior, and often praise their students for good work show a greater number of in students learning and feeling good about themselves.
3.2.2. Inside the Schools
3.2.2.1. Sometimes larger schools can offer morsuch as in their facilities, but the larger school may be more restrain initiative. When looking at smaller schools, sometimes the small schools over more student and teacher freedom, but may be lacking in resources for the students and the curriculum.
3.2.3. Gender
3.2.3.1. Sometimes gender discrimination is produced by inequalities. It is researched that males may be treated differently than females. Its also shows that females have outperform males on several subjects on college levels. Every student should be offered equal opportunity, no matter the race.
3.2.4. Tracking
3.2.4.1. It is shown in studies that students placed on "high ability"tracks are able to experience more interesting materials, receive better teachers, better facilities, and more extracurricular activities than the "lower track".So with that being said, track placement greatly affects cognitive development.
3.2.5. Student Peer Groups and Alienation
3.2.5.1. It is given in an example that in high school you never wanted to be labeled as a "nerd". Sometimes the focus is not on education, the students is more focused on athletic ability, looks, and style. Often with this,its a conflict with the student culture between the adult culture of the teachers and administrators.
4. Philosophy of Education
4.1. Pragmatism/Progressivism
4.1.1. Generic Notations
4.1.1.1. John Dewey's Pragmatism was founded on behaviorism, the new psychology, and the philosophy of education. The form of Pragmatism formed the idea of "Progressivism" in education. Dewey's beliefs were that each child should have an education that was developmentally on the individual child's level. Dewey's progressive methodology focused that children are active and changing and growing which required them to require a course of study that would reflect to their stages of development.
4.1.2. Key Researchers
4.1.2.1. John Dewey
4.1.3. Goal of Education
4.1.3.1. Dewey stressed the importance of the schools to have ideas and with having a goal for students to be provided with the knowledge of how to improve social order. He wanted to teach students how to become social.
4.1.4. Role of Teacher
4.1.4.1. The role of the teacher is to help plan and implement course of study. The teacher will also encourage questions and other suggestions. Another role for the teacher is to write the curriculum with including several demands of discipline to implement the curriculum.
4.1.5. Method of Instruction
4.1.5.1. John Dewey suggest that children can learn individually and in groups. They can do this by using independent study or using group work. He replaced the traditional school setting with problem solving, individualized study, project method, problem solving.
4.1.6. Curriculum
4.1.6.1. Dewey favors child-centered curriculum based on intuition and imagination. Progressive schools generally follow his core curriculum. Dewey also focuses on the students interests.
5. Curriculum and Pedagogy
5.1. Developmentalists
5.1.1. Student-centered teaching and learning
5.1.2. Relates to the students needs and interest
5.1.3. The teacher is the facilitator of student growth
5.1.4. Eating school to real life experiences
5.2. Traditions of Teaching
5.2.1. Mimetic Tradition
5.2.1.1. Transmit specific knowledge is the purpose of education
5.2.2. Transformative Tradition
5.2.2.1. Changing the student into some meaningful way such as, intellectually, spiritually, emotionally, and creatively.
6. Equality of Opportunity
6.1. Impact Educational Outcomes
6.1.1. Class
6.1.1.1. Directly related to educational attainment and achievement. Children's performance on test, curriculum track, placement, and parental income all have a direct correlation in educational achievement.
6.1.2. Race
6.1.2.1. A students race has a great impact on the education they are likely to receive. This includes success rates such as drop outs or academic achievement. It seems as if minorities do not receive the same educational opportunities.
6.1.3. Gender
6.1.3.1. In research it is shown that females show fewer dropouts than males, but males show a higher proficiency in math where females show higher in reading. Males are shown to be better at taking test than females. Gender is directly related to educational attainment.
6.2. Coleman Study 1982
6.2.1. Response shows that where a individual goes to school is almost always related to the students race and socioeconomic backgrounds.
6.2.2. According to Borman and Dowling's study, education reform must try to eliminate the increase of segregation levels in the United States education systems, including race, class, and gender.
7. Schools as Organizations
7.1. Major Stakeholders In My District
7.1.1. State Senator
7.1.1.1. Clay Scofield
7.1.2. House of Representatives
7.1.2.1. Kerry Rich
7.1.2.2. Will Ainsworth
7.1.2.3. David Standridge
7.1.2.4. Randall Shedd
7.1.2.5. Ed Henry
7.1.3. State Superintendent
7.1.3.1. Michael Sentence
7.1.4. Local Superintendent-Marshall County
7.1.4.1. Dr. Cindy Saye Wigley
7.1.5. Local School Board-Marshall County
7.1.5.1. Mr. Bill Aaron-President
7.1.5.2. Dr. Vince Edmonds-Vice President
7.1.5.3. Mr. Terry Kennamer-Board Member
7.1.5.4. Mr. Mark Rains-Board Member
7.1.5.5. Mr. Tony Simmons-Board Member
7.2. Elements of Change
7.2.1. According to Willard Waller, the school is a unity of interacting personalities and is a social organism.
7.2.2. Schools are now organized and shaped by series of inherent contradictions that can develop cultures that are conflictual and also even stagnant. The process of changing the cultures of schools requires patience, skill, and good will.
8. Educational Inequality
8.1. Cultural Deprivation Theories
8.1.1. Education disadvantaged students who poorly achieve because of the way they are raised and their skills and dispositions required for satisfactory academic achievement.
8.1.2. Non-white families and working class lacked cultural resources. This theory concerned failures by many of the compensatory education programs based on assumptions.
8.2. School-Centered Explanation
8.2.1. According to Coleman and Jencks academic achievement didn't relate to school resources
8.2.2. Edmonds results showed that school would be effective regardless of socioeconomic background.
8.2.3. The research focused on between and within school processes.
8.2.4. Differences are the results in the individuals differences in intelligence or initiative.
9. Educational Reform
9.1. School-Based Reforms
9.1.1. School-Based
9.1.1.1. In the 1980's and 1990's educational researchers saw a decline in public schools and they were failing morality, student achievement, and discipline. After research, Coleman, Hoffer, and Kilgore proved that students in private schools learned more that their public school counterparts.
9.1.2. School-Business Partnerships
9.1.2.1. Media has been attracted to this partnership, but there is very little evidence to prove or show that this partnership will be able to address the fundamental problems we are facing in the United States education.
9.2. Societal, Community, Economic, and Political Reforms
9.2.1. School accountability has been a huge issue in education nation wide. It has included state testing and monitoring, assessment of students, and state dissemination of report cards.
9.2.2. Some system take over the school or district as ultimate accountability measures. There still appears to be no standard method of imposing state control of local school districts. Also returning control to local authorities has no standard method.