Gaps in Knowledge

Post for 10/18

There was a brief comment in class today that really stuck out to me as something I need to consider in the future. I don't remember it verbatim but it was along the lines of being aware of the gap between our knowledge and our students' knowledge. In short, this articulated a point I've thought about but hadn't really been able to concretely explain this kind of disconnect. This is something I feel I need to be aware of in the future because I know that in the past I've made assumptions about peoples' knowledge out of concern for not wanting to patronize people. Essentially, this comment stuck out to me because I am concerned about walking the line between 'teacher that cares' and a teacher who over-explains or patronizes their students. Definitely something to be aware of in the future and take note of the negotiation between having a strong background in my content area but also being able to explain, facilitate and direct students in a positive and helpful way that connects to their own understanding.

In addition, we discussed the importance of how a teacher views knowledge. This forced me to really self-reflect about my own position on knowledge and what type of knowledge itself is important. To clarify – I come from a liberal arts background. In high school; I studied classical Greek and Latin literature, beyond that stuck to the British and American canon, endured lectures and question-and-answer sessions on obscure theology I barely remember now. In short, I went to Catholic school. In college, I studied history and in addition was required to have a liberal course of study to be “well-rounded.” I'm not sure how boiling hot dogs down in Baby Chemistry made me well-rounded but that was just how things had to work in a liberal education. They required two science courses, a math course, two literature courses and two social sciences so one may graduate. Now, I'm not opposed to this in principle but in practice it seemed arbitrary and wasteful since I don't even consider the content I learned in some of those classes useful at all in my life these days. However, what I do recognize is the challenge a liberal course of study presented to me and despite how much I hated some of those core classes, I will never forget the principles I was supposed to be learning.

So coming from this background and even thriving in it, I find knowledge for the sake of knowledge inadequate as a theory of instruction. I love Jeopardy as much as the next guy but my students won't. What relates to them? How does history inform who we are and what kind of world we live in right now? How does geography affect our lives in ways most of us take for granted? How was our society built and (most importantly) why should we care? Knowledge and the “stories” of history are extremely interesting to me and potentially useful as hooks, but for students to stick with social studies there needs to be more than just knowing trivia. Knowledge should be about self-discovery and particularly in social studies, should be about understanding our connections and divisions between people, events, discoveries and catastrophes. Knowledge for the sake of knowledge just doesn't do it for me despite coming from that educational background. I guess I still need to work on reconciling my belief in liberal education with my perceived value of the philosophy.