Musings on Education Pt. Two

John Gatto proposes another way of education in his book A Different Kind of Teacher. He sees the need for the learner is more involved in determining what he or she actually learns. Gatto proposes that each day of the week have different focii through independent study, community service, field curriculum, & classroom discussion/research of different themes such as ethics, environmental concerns, poverty, etc. He also sees the need for more parental involvement in the education of their children.

Gatto states in his book A Different Kind of Teacher that an educated person:

1. Writes his own script through life. He is not a character in anyone else’s play, nor does he mouth the words of any intellectual’s utopian fantasy. He is self-determined.
2. Can be alone. He is never at a loss for what to do with time.
3. Knows his rights and knows how to defend them.
4. Knows the ways of the human heart; he is hard to cheat or fool.
5. Possesses useful knowledge: how to build a house, a boat, how to grow food, etc.
6. Possesses a blueprint of personal value, a philosophy.
7. Can form healthy attachments wherever he is because he understands the dynamics of relationships.
8. Accepts and understands his own mortality and its season. He understands that without death and aging nothing would have meaning. Any educated person learns from all his ages, even from the last minutes of his life.
9. Can discover the truth for himself. He has intense awareness of the profound significance of being, the profound significance of being here.
10. Can figure out how to be useful to others, and in trading time, insight, and service to meet the needs of others, he can earn the material things he needs to sustain a wholesome life.
11. Has the capacity to create new things, new experiences, new ideas.