My Foundations of Education

1. Chapter 7 Curriculum & Pedagogy

1.1. A curriculum theory that I advocate is the developmentalist curriculum. The curriculum is related to the needs and interests of the students rather than the needs of society. The curriculum stresses the importance of relating schooling to real life experiences of each child in a way that would facilitate student growth. The mimetic tradition is the closest tradition to how people think today. This tradition is based on the imitative process such knowledge can be passed from one person to another. Students mimic what the teacher teaches. Transformative tradition teaches attitudes, values, and interests. Transformative means capable of accomplishing personal modeling, persuasion, and use of narrative.Transformative teachers are trying to bring change to their students.

2. Chapter 8 Equality of Opportunity

2.1. Educational Outcomes: Class - social classes experience different obstacles. Examples include financial issues, and the expense of the class. High/Middle class tend to be more favored by teachers. Class is directly related to achievement and educational attainment. Race - race is related to educational outcome it is difficult to separate race from class. Minority receive fewer and inferior educational opportunities than white students. Gender - In the last 20 years, gender differences have been reduced, but there are still significant advantages for men. Females today are less likely to drop out of school. The two responses from the Coleman study were the estimated to control schools, it was small, they debated the issue, and discussed the control to serve the poor people. The second response was where an individual does to school is often related to their race and socioeconomic background. There is a greater effect than race and class.

3. Chapter 9 Educational Inequality

3.1. Two types of cultural deprivation: One suggests working class and non-white families often lack the cultural resources such as books and other educational stimuli needed at school and causes a significant disadvantage. The deprivation results in educationally disadvantaged students who achieve poorly because they have not been raised to acquire the skills and dispositions required for academic satisfactory academic achievement. Four school-centered explanations include school-financing. money resources, effective school research, curriculum and pedagogic practices and curriculum and ability grouping.

4. Chapter 2 Politics of Ed.

4.1. Four Purposes of Education: Intellectual, Political, Social, and Economic. Intellectual: purpose is to teach basic cognitive skills such as reading, writing, and mathematics; to transmit specific knowledge and to help students acquire higher-order thinking skills such as analysis, evaluation, and synthesis.         Political: purpose is to inculcate allegiance to the existing political order (patriotism); to prepare citizens, to help assimilate groups, and to teach children the basic laws of society.                         Social: purpose is to help solve social problems, to work as one of many institutions, and to socialize children to have various roles, behaviors, and values of the society. Socialization is the key ingredient.                                         Economic: purpose is to prepare students for their later occupational roles and to select, train, and allocate individuals into the division of labor.

4.2. Conservative and Liberal Perspective Overview: The Role of the School: The Conservative perspective sees the role of the school as providing the necessary educational training to ensure that the most talented and hard-working individuals receive the tools necessary to maximize economic and social productivity. Explanations of Unequal Performance: The Liberal perspective argues that individual students or groups of student begin school with different life chances and therefore some groups have significantly more advantages than others. Definition of Educational Problems: The Conservative Perspective argues upon the Decline of Standards, the Decline of Cultural Literacy, the Decline of Values or of Civilization, and the Decline of Authority.

5. Chapter 3 History of Ed.

5.1. A reform movement that I think has had the most influential impact on education is the movement of Education for Women and African Americans. This movement helped women and African American people receive educational opportunities. I feel as if this reform movement is most influential because throughout history multiple women and African Americans have made differences in our education and history and without this reform they would not have equal rights to be able to be educated like they should be.

5.2. One historical interpretation of U.S. Education is the Radical-Revisionist School, the democratic-liberal historians began to be challenged by radical historians, sociologists, and economists of education. Radical interpretation is a pessimistic one. They suggest this process has benefitted the elites more than the masses and has not produced neither equality nor equal opportunity or results.

6. Chapter 4 Sociology of Ed.

6.1. Theoretical Perspectives (School vs. Society): Functional Theories: stress interdependence of the social system, Functionalists tend to assume that consensus is the normal state in society and that conflicts represent a breakdown of shared values. Conflict Theory: social order is not based on some collective agreement, but on the ability to dominate groups to impose their will on subordinate groups through force, cooperation, and manipulation. Offers important insights about the relation between school and society. Interactionalism: interactions about school and society are primarily critiques and extensions of the functional and conflict perspectives. Uses macro and micro approaches.

6.2. Five Effects of Schooling: Knowledge and Attitude: important because school has an impact on student development and attitude helps lead to greater knowledge and social participation. Employment: Students believe graduating will lead to greater employment opportunities. Higher levels of education lead to higher paying jobs. Education and Mobility: where people go to school also affects their mobility, as well as the belief that occupation and social mobility begin at the schoolhouse door. Teacher Behavior: Teachers have a huge impact on students learning and behavior. Teachers become a model for students. If teachers demand more the students will feel better about themselves. Student Peer Groups and Alienation: Students subcultures continue to be important after high school. Student cultures can platt an important role in shaping students educational experiences. Schools develop multiple subcultures and it is an influence.

7. Chapter 5 Philosophy of Ed.

7.1. Pragmatism: comes from the greek work pragma meaning work. "By the fruits ye shall know them" this is a philosophy that encourages people to find processes that work in order to achieve their desired ends. They do study the past but are more interested in contemporary issues and in discovering solutions to problems in present day terms. Pragmatism is like existentialism. Generic Notions are are ideas that people are placed on the earth alone and they must make sense for the chaos they encounter. Goal of Education: education should focus on the needs of the individual both cognitively and affectively. Role of the Teacher: Teachers should understand their own lived worlds as well as their students in order to help their students achieve the best lived worlds they can. Methods of Instruction: they view learning and intensely personal. They believe each child has a different learning style and it is up to the teacher to discover whatever works for each child. Curriculum: choose heavily biased curriculum toward the humanities. Literature especially. Art, music, and drama also encourage personal interaction. Key Researchers: Soren Kierkegaard, Martin Buber, Karl Jaspers, Jean Paul Sartre, Maxine Greene.

8. Chapter 6 Schools as Organizations

8.1. Alabama State Senators: Richard Shelby and Jefferson Sessions House of Representative of Escambia County: Alan Baker State Superintendent: Michael Sentance Representative on State School Board: Alan Baker Local Superintendent: (City) Kenneth Varner (County) John Knott School Board Members: (City) Ola Ball, Mark Manning, Bart Till, Ann Peach, Regina Watson. (County) Kevin Hoomes, Danny Benjamin, Mike Edwards, Cindy Jackson, Willie Grissett, David Nolan, and Coleman Wallace. Elements of change: Conflict is a necessary part of change as well as staff involvement, new behaviors, team building. For process and content to be interrelated there is a requirement of time, effort, intelligence, and good will.

9. Chapter 10 Educational Reform

9.1. Two school based reforms include: school-business partnerships - concerned with schools not privacy necessary graduates, and this reform attracted the media coverage. However, this reform has shown little evidence of school improvement. The other school based reform is privatization - Private education companies increasingly are becoming involved in public education in a variety. This also took over low achievement schools to improve. Describe two reforms: Full service and community schools - not only educate whole child, but educate the community as well. Full service schools focus on meeting student needs between school and community efforts. Communicating school, community, and societal reforms - there needs to be leadership within the parents and the community. This includes professionalism, student centered learning and instructional guidance. Also needs the 5 elements. The elements include learning goals, intelligent accountability system, adequate resources, strong professional standards, and organized schools to be successful.