Carrie’s TEBlog

I enjoyed reading “Socializing Uninterested or Alienated Students” because I think many students feel this way. I saw a lot of peers in high school that thought school was a waste of time and did not see it as a meaningful part of their lives. Brophy called these students apathetic and said they lacked the motivation to learn. I thought a very interesting point he made was that these students do not understand school is a set part of culture expectations which is to help them become the “culture’s image of the ideal human being” (pg 314). I never thought of school as preparing students to be an ideal human, but it is completely fitting. Without some sort of training, schooling, people will not be able to function in society. This is much like functional literacy. They need some sort of functional literacy in a part of the culture to be effective in society. The issue then is to make this real to apathetic students. They do know to some degree this is true according to Brophy but have concealed it. Brophy had another key part of this which was to promote it in all parts of schooling. Students need to see that the overall curriculum is developing them into their identities they will fulfill in society.

            Also I think that Brophy made a good point when he said students are causing their negative reactions to school. Their own attitudes are what lead them to feel the way they do about school. Then as teachers, we are to help them develop affective response to school work. I thought the best one was showing them everything done is school has a purpose. I think the problem with this is teachers do not even think this way sometimes. Busy work is what destroys this statement. As teachers, we need to provide work that serves a purpose. The purpose should not just be test preparation. There should be challenge and problem solving that is required in every assignment. Then we should help students who are apathetic find these and learn how to help this motivate them.