1. Philosophy of Education
1.1. Pragmatism
1.1.1. Proposed that educators start with the needs and interests of the child in the classroom, allow the child to participate in planning their course of study, employ project method, and depend heavily on experiential learing
1.1.2. Key researchers: John Dewey, William Kirkpatrick, Francis Parker
1.1.3. Dewey believed, schools should balance the needs of society and community on one hand and the needs of the individual on the other
1.1.4. The teacher assumes the peripheral position of the facilitator, encourages, offers suggestions, questions, and helps plan courses of study
1.1.5. Dewey proposed that children learn individually and in groups.
1.1.6. Progressive schools usually follow Dewey's notion of core curriculum. Progressive educators support starting with contemporary problems and working from the known to the unknown.
2. Schools and Organizations
2.1. State Senator - Richard Shelby. House of Representatives has 105 members. State Superintendent - Michael Sentence. State School board members - Kay Ivey, Michael Sentence, Mary Scott Hunter, Yvette M. Richardson, Jackie Zeigler, Betty Peters, Stephanie Bell, Ella B. Bell, Cynthia Sanders McCanty, Jeffrey Newman. 5. Walker County Superintendant - Jason Adkins.
3. Curriculum and Pedagogy
3.1. The developmentalist curriculum is related to the needs and interests of the students rather than the needs of the society. I believe that the students needs should always come first. This philosophy stressed flexibility in both what is taught and how it was taught, with the emphasis on the development of each students individual capacities.
4. Equality of Opportunity
4.1. Class - Education is extremely expensive. The longer a student stays in school, the more likely he or she needs parental financial support. Obviously, this situation favors wealthier families.
4.2. Race - Among 16-24 year olds, 5.2% of white students drop out of school, whereas 9.3% of African-American students and 17.6% of Hispanic-American students are likely to drop out of school.
4.3. Gender - Even though women are often rated as being better students than men, in the past they were less likely to attain the same level of education. Today, females are less likely to drop out of school than males, and are more likely to have a higher level of reading profeiciency than males. The same is true for writing.
4.4. There were two major responses to Coleman's findings. 1. Other sociologists examined and reexamined Coleman's data. 2. A group of minority scholars, led by Ron Edmonds of Harvard University, set about the task of defining those charecteristics of schools that made them effective.
5. Educational Ineqaulity
5.1. Cultural deprivation theory, popularized in the 1960's, suggests that working class and non white families often lack the cultural resources, such as books and other educational stimuli, and thus arrive at school at the significant disadvantage. Cultural deprivation theorists assert that the poor have a deprived culture - one that lacks the value system of middle class culture. According to cultural deprivation theorists such as Deutsch, this deprivation results in educationally disadvantaged students who achieve poorly because they have not been raised to acquire the skills and dispositions required for satisfactory academic achievement.
5.2. 1. Relationship between family and school. 2. School Financing. 3. Effective School research. 4. Pedagogic practices
6. Educational Reform
6.1. Vouchers - Vouchers advocates argue that school choice will have three important educational impacts. First, it will provide-low income parents with the same choices as middle- class parents and lead to increased parental satisfaction with their children's schools. Second, given the absence of the large educational bureaucracy of urban school systems, charter and voucher schools will provide better learning environments for low-income students and result in higher student achievement. Third, due to the competitive market effects of competition from charter and voucher schools, urban public schools will be forced to improve or close their doors.
6.2. School Business Partnerships - During the 1980's, business leaders became increasingly concerned that the nation's schools were not producing the kinds of graduates necessary for a revitalization of the U.S. economy. Several school - business partnerships ere formed, the most notable of which was the Boston Compact begun in 1982. Over the past decade, however, a group of foundations and entrepeneurs have contributed significantly to educational reform efforts, most often of the neo-liberal variety.
6.3. School Finance Reforms - The court ruled in 1990, stating that more funding was needed to serve the children in the poorer school districts. In order to provide a "thorough and efficient education" in urban districts, funding was equalized between urban and suburban school districts. IT was also determined that extra funding was to be distributed to provide additional programs in order to eliminate disadvantages within poorer school districts.
6.4. Community School - Another way to attack education inequity is to examine and plan to educate not only the whole child, but also the whole community. Dryfoo's model of full service schools, Canada's Harlem Children's Zone, and Newark's Broader bolder approach, are three models of community based reforms.
7. History of US Education
7.1. Old World and New World Education: The Colonial Era
7.2. The age of reform: The rise of the common school
7.2.1. Opposition to public education
7.2.2. Education for women and African-Americans
7.2.2.1. The movement for female education spread quickly through the Midwest. The University of Iowa became the first state university to admit women. Education for African-Americans was very limited. Southerners believed literacy bred insubordination and revolution.
7.3. Urbanization and the progressive impetus
7.4. The Post-World War II Equity Era
7.4.1. Cycles of Reform: Progressive and Traditional
7.4.2. Equality of Opportunity
7.5. Educational Reaction and Reform and the Standards Era
7.6. Understanding the History of U.S. Education: Different historical interpretations
7.6.1. The democratic-liberal school
7.6.2. The radical-revisionist school
7.6.2.1. argued that the history of education is the story of expanded success for very different reasons and with very different results.
7.6.2.2. they do not deny that the educational system has expanded; rather, they believe is expanded to meet the needs of the elites in society for the control of the working class and immigrants, and for economic efficiency and productivity
7.6.3. Conservative perspectives
8. Politics of Education
8.1. The purpose of schooling
8.1.1. Intellectual
8.1.1.1. 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
8.1.2. Political
8.1.2.1. to inculcate allegiance to the existing political order; to prepare citizens who will participate in this political order; to help assimilate diverse cultural groups into a common political order; and to teach children the basic laws of the society
8.1.3. Social
8.1.3.1. to help solve social problems; to work as one of many institutions, such as the family and the church to ensure social cohesion; and to socialize children into the various roles, behaviors, and values of society.
8.1.4. Economic
8.1.4.1. to prepare students for their later occupational roles and to select, train, and allocate individuals into the division of labor
8.2. Political perspectives
8.2.1. The liberal perspective
8.2.2. The radical perspective
8.3. Traditional and Progressive Visions of Education
8.4. The Role of School
8.4.1. is a central focus of each of the perspectives and is at the heart of their differing analyses.
8.4.2. is directly concerned with the aims, purposes, and functions of education in a society
8.4.3. Conservative - 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
8.4.4. Liberal -socializing children into societal roles, they stress the pluralistic nature of U.S. society and the schools role in teaching children to respect cultural diversity
8.5. The conservative perspective
8.6. Explanations of Unequal Educational Performance
8.7. Definition of Educational Problems
8.7.1. Liberal Perspective
8.7.2. Radical Perspective
8.8. Educational Policy and Reform
8.8.1. What Conservatives support
8.8.2. What Liberals support
8.8.3. What Radicals support
8.9. Education and the American Dream
8.10. The Neo-liberal Perspective
8.11. From Political Perspectives to the Politics of Education
9. Sociological Perspectives
9.1. Functionalism
9.1.1. Functionalists view society as a kind of machine, where one part articulates with another to produce the dynamic energy required to make society work. The earliest sociologist to embrace a functional point of view about the relation of school and society was Emile Durkheim , who virtually invented the sociology of education. He believed that education was of critical importance in creating the moral unity necessary for social cohesion and harmony.
9.2. Conflict Theory
9.2.1. Conflict sociologists do not see the relation between school and society as unproblematic or straightforward. Karl Marx is the intellectual founder of the conflict school in the sociology of education. His analytic imagination and moral outrage were sparked by the social conditions found in Europe in the mid nineteenth century.
9.3. Interactionalism
9.3.1. Interactional theories about the relation of school and society are primarily critiques and extensions of the functional and conflict perspectives.
9.4. Effects of Schooling on Individuals
9.4.1. Knowledge and Attitudes
9.4.1.1. It is found that the higher the social class background of the student, the higher the achievement level. Research indicates that differences between schools in terms of their academic programs and policies od make a difference in student learning.
9.4.2. Teacher Behavior
9.4.2.1. Teachers have a hug impact on student learning and behavior. Teachers must wear many different hats such as: instructor, disciplinarian, bureaucrat, employer, friend, confidant, and educator.
9.4.3. Student Peer Groups and Alienation
9.4.3.1. Students in vocational programs and headed towards low status jobs were the students most likely to join a rebellious subculture. Students are not only attacking each other, but they are also assaulting teachers.
9.4.4. Inadequate Schooling
9.4.4.1. The most obvious way schools reproduce inequality is through inadequate schooling. Urban education, in particular, has failed to educate minority and poor children.
9.4.5. Gender
9.4.5.1. Schools reproduce inequality through gender discrimination. Men are frequently paid more than women for the same work, and women, have fewer occupational opportunities than men.