1. Sociological Perspectives
2. Philosophy of Education
2.1. Student Centered Philosophy
2.1.1. Existentialism- modern philosophy, roots can be traced backed to the Bible,
2.1.1.1. Genreic Notions
2.1.1.1.1. people are placed on this earth alone and have to make some sense of the chaos they will encounter
2.1.1.1.2. Sarte believed people have to creat themselve and create their own meaning, "existence preceeds essence"
2.1.1.1.3. creating chaos and order and good and evil
2.1.1.1.4. Sartre rejected the idea of God while Soren Kierkergaard was a devout Christian
2.1.1.1.5. Kierkergaard was rallying against the scientific idea and Sartre was attempting to sort out the meaning in a world that supported inhumand events such as World War II and the Holocaust.
2.1.1.2. Key Researchers
2.1.1.2.1. Soren Kierkergaard (1813-1855)
2.1.1.2.2. Jean Paul Sartre (1905-1986)
2.1.1.2.3. Maxine Green
2.1.1.2.4. Martin Buber (1878-1965)
2.1.1.2.5. Karl Jaspers (1833-1969)
2.1.1.3. Goal of Education
2.1.1.3.1. emphasize the notion of possibility
2.1.1.3.2. individual changes in a constant state of becoming
2.1.1.3.3. education is an activity liberating the individual from a chaotic, absurd world
2.1.1.4. Role of Teacher
2.1.1.4.1. an intense personal role that carries a tremendous amount of responsibily
2.1.1.4.2. teachers need to know their "lived worlds" and those of their students to help students achieve their best "lived worlds".
2.1.1.5. Method of Instruction
2.1.1.5.1. learning is intensely personal
2.1.1.5.2. each child has a different learning style and it is up to the teacher to find out what works best for them
2.1.1.5.3. Max Bruber wrote about the I-thou approach--student and teacher learn cooperatively from each other in a nontraditional nonthreatening "friendship"
2.1.1.6. Curriculum
2.1.1.6.1. heavily biased toward the humanities
2.1.1.6.2. Literature especially because it is able to evoke responses in readers that might move them to new levels of awareness
2.1.1.6.3. believe in exposing students in early ages to problems as well as possibilities and to the horrors as well as accomplishments humankind is able to produce
3. School as Organizations
3.1. Federal State Senate
3.1.1. Richard Shelby
3.1.2. Luther Strange
3.2. Federal State House of Representative
3.2.1. Mo Brooks
3.3. AL State Senator
3.3.1. Bill Holtzclaw
3.4. AL State House of Representative
3.4.1. Mac McCutcheon
3.5. AL State Superintendent
3.5.1. Michael Sentance
3.6. AL State Representative for State School Board
3.6.1. Mary Scott Hunter
3.7. Limestone County Superintendent
3.7.1. Dr. Tom Sisk
3.8. Limestone County School Board Members
3.8.1. Earl Glaze
3.8.2. Brett McGill
3.8.3. Edward Winter
3.8.4. Anthony Hilliard
3.8.5. Charles Shoulders
3.8.6. Ronald Christ
3.8.7. Bradley Young
3.9. Elements of Change within
3.9.1. School Process
3.9.1.1. Schools are so political that effecting change is very difficult.
3.9.1.2. Schools are organized by a series of inherent contradicitons that can develop cultures that are conflictual and even stagnant.
3.9.1.3. Max Weber (1976) suggested theat bureaucracies are an attempt to rationalize and organize human behavior in order to ahieve certain goal.
3.9.2. School Cultures
3.9.2.1. Conflict is a necessary part of change. Trying to democratize schools does not create conflict but allows previous hidden arguments to surface.
3.9.2.2. New behaviors must be learned. Change requires new relationships and behaviors to change. The change process has to include trust, changing behaviors, communication, enabling leadership and initiative to emers, learning techniques of communication, collaboration, and conflict resolution.
3.9.2.3. Team building must extend to the entire school. Shared decision making must consciously work out and give on-going attention to relationships within the rest of the school's staff. Otherwise, issues will surface and resistance to change will occur.
3.9.2.4. Process and content are terrelated. The process in which team uses to make changes is as important as the content of educational changes it attempts. The substance of the project often depends on the degree of trust and openness built up between the team and the school. The usefulness of the project will influence future commitments and relationships of the staff involved.
4. Equality of Opportunity
4.1. How class, race, and gender each impact educational outcomes
4.1.1. Class
4.1.1.1. education is extremely expensive
4.1.1.2. The longer a student stays in school, they will need more financial support from their parents.
4.1.1.3. Upper and middle class families are more likely to expect their children to finish school.
4.1.1.4. Lower class and working class families have a lower expectation of their children finishing school.
4.1.1.5. From a cultural point of view schools represent the values of upper and middle class families.
4.1.1.6. Studies show the more books a home has is related to the academic achievment of its children.
4.1.1.7. Class is directly related to achievement and to educational attainment
4.1.2. Race
4.1.2.1. An individual's race has a direct impact on how much education he or she is likely to achieve.
4.1.2.2. There is a direct link between SAT scores and being awarded scholarships for study in postsecondary institutions.
4.1.2.3. It is extremely difficult to separate race from class.
4.1.2.4. Minority students recieve fewer and inferior educational opportunities thatn white students.
4.1.2.5. Minorites do not receive the same educational opportunites than whites and their rewards for educational attainment are significantly less.
4.1.3. Gender
4.1.3.1. In the past women were less likely to receive the same education as men.
4.1.3.2. Males perform better than women in Mathematics proficiency.
4.1.3.3. Males are more likely to perform higher on the SATs than females.
4.1.3.4. More women are attending post-secondary institutions than men, although the schools that women are attending are less academically and socially prestigious.
4.1.3.5. In the past 20 years the gender differences in men and women in terms of educational attainment have been reduced.
4.1.3.6. Recent data from the U.S., United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia have shown that girls caught up to boys in almost all measures of academic achievement.
4.1.3.7. Conservatives argue that the decline in male achievement and attainment is a result of the "feminizing" of the classroom.
4.2. Two responses to the Coleman Study from 1982
4.2.1. Statistical controls on family background are introduced. The achievment differences between the provate sectors and the public sector are reduced (more for toher private schools than for Catholic) but differences remain.
4.2.2. If trivial advantage is what they mean by such a claim, then we suppose we could have to agree. But judged against reasonable benchmarks, there is little basis for this conclusion.
5. Educational Reform
5.1. 2 School based reforms
5.1.1. School -Business Partnerships
5.1.1.1. Formed because business leaders became increasingly concerned that the nation's schools were not producing the kinds of graduates necessary for a revitalization of teh U.S. economy.
5.1.1.2. In 1991, the Committee to Support Philadelphia Public Schools pledged management assistance and training to the school district to restructure and implement a site-based management plan. In return, the city promised that by 1995 test scores would be raised of its graduates and improve grade promotion rates.
5.1.1.3. Other school- business partnerships include scholarships for poor students to ateend college and programs where businesses adopt a school.
5.1.1.4. Have attracted considerable media attention, but there is little convincing evidence that they have significantly improved schools or that as a means of reform school-based business partnerships will address the fundamental problems facing the U.S. education.
5.1.2. Privatization
5.1.2.1. Private education companies increasingly becoming involved in public education in a variety of ways.
5.1.2.2. For-profit organizations took over the management of failing schools and districts.
5.1.2.3. For-profit companies such as Kaplan and Sylvan Learning Centers, have the majority of contracts for supplemental tutoringunder NCLB.
5.2. Describe societal and community reforms that impact education.
5.2.1. Political
5.2.1.1. Mayoral control of urban districts.
5.2.1.2. Favored Neo-liberal reform
5.2.1.3. Urban mayors and business leaders arguing that centralizing governance into the mayor's office is more effective and efficient than traditional elected school boards.
5.2.1.4. Proponents argue that mayor control eliminates corruption, leads to effective and efficient management and budges, increases student achievement, and reduces the political battles endemic to elected school boards (Moscovitch et al., 2010)
5.2.1.5. Critics argue that it has not increased achievement significantly, is undemocratic, and has reduced community and parental involvement (Moscovitch et al., 2010)
5.2.2. Community
5.2.2.1. Another way to attack education inequity is to examine and plan to educate not only the whole child, but also the whole community.
5.2.2.2. Full service schools focus on meeting studens and their families educational, physical, psychological, and social needs in a cooridnated and collaborative fashion between school and community services (Dryfoos, 1994, 2005).
5.2.2.3. Schools service aas community centers within neighborhoods that are open extended hours to provide a multitude of sercies such as adult education, health clinics, recreation facilities, after-school programs and tutoring services.
5.2.2.4. Specifically designed to target and improve at-risk neighborhoods, full-service schools aim to prevent problems, as well as to support them.
5.2.2.5. Supports Anyon's (1997) argument to repair the larger social and economic problems of society as a means of improving public education, there is no evidence that full-service schools affect student achievement.
6. Politics of Education
6.1. Four Purposes of Education (Bennett & LeCompte, 1990, pp. 5-21)
6.1.1. 1) Intellectual--to teach basic cognitive skills such as reading, writing, and mathematics. To transmit specific knowledge. To help students acquire higher-order thinking skills such as analysis, evaluation, and synthesis
6.1.2. 2) Political--inculcate allegiance to the existing political order, prepare citizens who will participate in the political order, to help assimilate divers cultural groups into a common political order, to teach children the basic laws of the society
6.1.3. 3) Social--to help solve social problems, to work as one of many institutions, to ensure social cohesion, to socialize children into the various roles, behaviors and values of the society. Is the key ingredient to the stability of any society.
6.1.4. 4) Economic--to prepare students for their later occupational roles and to select, train, and allocate individuals into the division of labor.
6.2. Perspectives
6.2.1. 1) The role of the school--
6.2.2. a)Radical Perspective--sees the role of 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. Also believe that schools socialize children into the adult roles necessary to the maintenance of the social order. See the school's function as one of transmitting the cultural traditions through what is taught.
6.2.2.1. 2)Explantions of Unequal Performance
6.2.2.1.1. 3) Definitions of Educational Problems
6.2.2.1.2. Conservative-- decline of standards-schools systematically lowered academic standards and reduced educational quality. decline of cultural literacy--schools watered down the traditional curriculum and thus weakened the school's ability to pass on the heritage of American and Western civilizations to children. decline of values or of civilization--schools lost their traditional role of teaching moral standards and values. decline of authority--schools lost their traditional disciplinary function and often became chaotic. because they are state controlled and are immune from laws of a competitive free market schools are stifled by bureaucracy and inefficiency.
6.2.2.1.3. Liberal--schools have too often limited the life chances of poor and minority children and therefore the problem of underachievement by these groups is critical issue. Schools place too much emphasis on discipline and authority, thus limiting their role in helping students develop as individuals. Differences in quality and climate between urban and suburban schools and most specifically, between schools with students of low and high socioeconomic backgrounds and is a central problem related to inequalities of results. Traditional curriculum leaves out the divers cultures of the groups that comprise the pluralistic society.
6.2.2.1.4. Radical--Educational system has failed the poor, minorities, and women through classist, racist, sexist, and homophobic policies. Schools have stifled critical understanding of the problems of American society through a curriculum and teaching practices that promote conformity. Traditional curriculum is classist, racist, sexist, and homophobic and leaves out the cultures, histories, and voices of the oppressed. In general, the educational system promotes inequality of both opportunity and results.
6.2.2.2. Radicals like liberals believe that students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds begin school with unequal opportunities. Radicals also believe that conditions that result in educational failure are caused by economic system, not the educational system and can only be ameliorated by changes in the political-economic structure.
6.2.3. b) Liberal Perspective--belief in equality and opportunity, it stresses the school's role in providing the necessary education to ensure that all students have and equal opportunity to succeed in society. Balancing the needs of society and the individual in a manner that is consistent with a democratic and meritocratic society.
6.2.4. c) Radical Perspective--schools out to eliminate equality, school's role is to perpetrate the society and to serve the interest of those with economic wealth and political power. Believe that schools reproduce economic, social, and political inequality within U.S. society.
7. History of U.S. Education
7.1. Reform Movement with most influence on education
7.1.1. Charter Schools
7.1.1.1. *independent of local district control, but receive public funding
7.1.1.2. *by 1998, 33 states passed charter school legislation resulting in more than 1,000 charter schools.
7.1.1.3. *by 2012, 41 states passed charter school legislation resulting in 5,700 charter schools.
7.2. Historical interpretation of U.S. Education
7.2.1. Radical-Revisionist School
7.2.1.1. revised history of education
7.2.1.2. do not deny educational system has expanded, believe it expanded to meet the needs of the elites
7.2.1.3. suggest that expanded opportunity did not translate into more egalitatian results
7.2.1.4. other radical historians (David Hogan and Julia Wrigley suggest that the working class and labor unions actively supported expansion of public education in their own interests
8. Curriculum & Pedagogy
8.1. Curriculum theory which I advocate
8.1.1. Developmentalist
8.1.1.1. related to the needs and interests of children rather than the needs of society
8.1.1.2. emanated from the aspects of Dewey's writings related to the relationship between the child and the curriculum
8.1.1.3. also from Piaget, emphasized the process of teaching as well as its content
8.1.1.4. progressive approach to teaching
8.1.1.5. student centered
8.1.1.6. stressed flexibility in both what and how it was taught
8.1.1.7. emphasis on the development of each student's individual capacities
8.1.1.8. stressed the importance of each student's individual capacities
8.1.1.9. would make education come alive in a meaningful manner
8.1.1.10. teacher is not a transmitter of knowledge but rather a facilitator of student growth
8.2. Two dominant traditions of teaching
8.2.1. Mimetic Tradition
8.2.1.1. based on the viewpoint that the purpos of education is to transmit specific knowledge to students.
8.2.1.2. best method of doing this is though the didactic method (commonly relies on the lecture or presentation as the main form of communication).
8.2.1.3. multidimensional theory of teaching
8.2.2. Transformative Tradition
8.2.2.1. rests on a different set of assumptions about the teachng and learning process.
8.2.2.2. defines the function of education more broadly and, according to some, more abiguously.
8.2.2.3. proponents believe that the purpose of education is to change the student insome meaningful way
9. Educational Inequality
9.1. 2 Types of cultural differences theory
9.1.1. Sees working-class and nonwhite students as resisting the dominant culture of the schools.
9.1.1.1. Students reject the white middle-class culture of academic success and embrace a different, often antischool culture-one that is opposed to the culture of schooling as it currently exitst.
9.1.2. Argue that African-American children do less well in school because they adapt to their oppressed postion in the class and caste structure.
9.1.2.1. Ogbu argued that there is a "job-ceiling" for African-Americans in the United States.
9.1.2.2. Also for caste like minorites in other countries.
9.1.2.3. African-American families and school socialize their children to deal with their inferior life chances rather than encourage them to internalize those values and skills necessary for postions that will not be open to them.
9.2. 4 School centered explanations for educational inequality.
9.2.1. School Financings
9.2.1.1. Public school are financed thorugh a combination of revenues from local, state, and federal sources.
9.2.1.2. Majority of funds come from state and local taxes, with local property taxes as a significant source.
9.2.1.3. Families in more affluent communities have higher incomes, they pay proportionately less of their incomes for their higher school taxes.
9.2.1.4. More affluent families are able to provide-per pupil spending than poorer districts.
9.2.1.5. In Serrano v. Priest (1971), the California Supreme Court ruled the system of unequal school financing between wealthy and poor districts unconstitutional. It did not however, declare the used of property taxws for school funding illegal.
9.2.2. Effective Schools
9.2.2.1. A climate of high expectations for students by teachers and administrators.
9.2.2.2. Strong and effective leadership by a principal or school head.
9.2.2.3. Accountability processes for students and teachers.
9.2.2.4. Teh monitoring of student learning.
9.2.2.5. A high degree of instructional time on task, where teachers spend a great deal of their time teaching and students spend a great deal of their time learning.
9.2.2.6. Felxibility for teachers and administrators to experiment and adapt to new situations and problems.
9.2.3. Between School Differences
9.2.3.1. Differences are termed school climates.
9.2.3.2. Bernstein (1990), examining the situation in England, suggested taht schools in working-class neighborhoods are far more likely to have authoritarian and teacher-directed pedagogic practices, and to have vocationally or social efficiency curriculum at the secondary level.
9.2.3.3. Schools in middle-class communites are more likely to have less authoritarian and student-centered pedagogic practices and to have humanistic liberal arts college preparatory curriculum at the secondary level.
9.2.3.4. Upper-class are more likely to attend elite private schools, with authoritarian pedagogic practices and a slassical-humanistic college preparatory curriculum in the secondary level.
9.2.4. Within School Differences
9.2.4.1. Different groups of student in the same schools perofrm very differently suggests that there may be school characteristics affecting these outcomes.
9.2.4.2. Elementary school level students are divided into reading groups and seperate classes based on teacher recommendations, standardized test scores, and sometimes ascriptive characteristics such as race, class or gender.
9.2.4.3. Secondary level students are divided both by ability and curriculum, with different groups of students often receiving considerably different types of education within the same school.
9.2.4.4. Many teachers and administrators argue that heterogeneous groups are far more difficult to teach and result in teaching to the middle.
9.2.4.5. Results in losing those with lower abilities and boring those with higher abilities.
9.2.4.6. Critics in tracking (Oakes, 1985; Sadovnik 1991 b) suggest that homegeneous grouping results in unequal education for different groups, with differences in academic outcomes often due to the differences in school climate, expectations, pedagogic practices, and curriculum between tracks.
10. Sociology of Education
10.1. Functionalism
10.1.1. interdependance of the social system
10.1.2. view society as kind of machine
10.1.3. dynamic energy to make society work
10.1.4. Emile Durkheim (1858-1917) first sociologist to embrace functional point of view
10.1.5. assume consensus is normal state in society
10.1.6. educational reform is supposed to create structures, programs,and curricula that are technically advanced, rational, and encourage unity.
10.2. Conflict Theory
10.2.1. influential groups force their will on subordinate groups
10.2.2. schools are oppressive and students are rebellious
10.2.3. students are forced to go
10.2.4. where you go achieves your success not your actual achievments
10.2.5. schools are a status symbol
10.2.6. Karl Marx philospher believed working class would take over and create a better society called socialism, struggle in society was between the owners and the workers, workers had to work 18 hour days for little wage not making a difference in their own lives
10.2.7. Max Weber believed power struggles between subordinates and owners, college degree shows status symbols
10.3. Interactionalism
10.3.1. schools are middle class organizations
10.3.2. speech patterns reflect social class background
10.3.3. lower social classes are at a disadvantage
10.3.4. attempt to make the commonplace strange
10.3.5. process of labeling children gifted or learning disabled
10.4. 5 Effects of Schooling
10.4.1. Inadequate Schools
10.4.1.1. reproduce inequalities in children
10.4.1.2. children who attend elite private schools receive a better education
10.4.1.3. Urban education failed to educate minority children
10.4.2. Tracking
10.4.2.1. placement of students in curricular programs based on students abilites
10.4.2.2. tracking decisions made by race and social class
10.4.2.3. directly affects cognitve development
10.4.3. De Facto Segregation
10.4.3.1. benefits minorites
10.4.3.2. does not affect whites
10.4.3.3. African-American women less likely to have a child before the age of 18
10.4.3.4. African-American less likely to be arrested
10.4.4. Teacher Behavior
10.4.4.1. teachers have 1,000 interpersonal contacts a day
10.4.4.2. Teachers wear many different hats which can cause role strain
10.4.4.3. teachers are models for students and set standards
10.4.4.4. labels teachers apply to students can have an influence on their education
10.4.4.5. research shows many teachers have lower expectations from minorities causing them to fall into a viscious cycle of low expectation low achievement
10.4.5. Student Peer Groups and Alienation
10.4.5.1. teacher culture is in conflict with student culture
10.4.5.2. students attacking each othe and teachers are increasing in numbers
10.4.5.3. "bad" behavior is being taken as tough and smart
10.4.5.4. by the time a child is 12 they have been exposed to 12,000 tv murders