Another Brick in the Wall
Quotes about Education
Watch the video from Pink Floyd's "Another Brick in the Wall", then choose a quote from the list. Once a quote has been chosen, it is no longer available, so first come, first serve.
Relate the quote to the video and or song lyrics in some way. Consider that I am providing you with two resources, a quote and a song/video about the topic of education.
Talk about the topic of education. What do you think about it? Talk about education as a philosophy, or a practice, or a responsibility or ????????
When you respond to a classmates blog, do not comment on whether or not you like it. Rather comment on how you might challenge it or validate it with another point.
I am looking for posts that are full of thought about the topic. Perhaps you chose a quote that contradicts the lyrics or the video. On the other hand, perhaps you found a quote that drives home an important point brought up in the lyrics or video.
Most of all, I want you to think, deeply about the topic. You may also pull in any thoughts from pieces we have read in this unit.
Okay, I'm going to use "He who opens a school door, closes a prison." ~Victor Hugo
ReplyDeleteI am doing this quote "What does education often do? It makes a straight-cut ditch of a free, meandering brook." ~Henry David Thoreau
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI am choosing to use my blog exemption this weekend from Thesis Throwdown.
ReplyDeleteHe who opens a school door, closes a prison. ~Victor Hugo
ReplyDeleteThe video represents a boy becoming an adult. As a young child he seems to be well mannered as it appears that he is at a church with his mother. Then, he becomes a student in a corrupt school. He and his fellow students look like zombies. They are acting as though they are in a concentration camp, marching in order and at the end of their march it appears that they fall to their death. As he daydreams during his teacher's lecture, This is the student's interpretation of his school system. He feels that his school is against him and turning him into a zombie. It appears that he feels that he would do better without school, so he doesn't pay any attention. I assume that he dropped out of school eventually. In the third part of the video, it shows the boy as an adult and it seems that he has went crazy as he smashes his tv in and he can't sleep. His life just is a mess. His lack of schooling ends up to backfire and he pays for it. This is why I picked Victor Hugo's quote, "He who opens a school door, closes a prison ". High school dropouts are 8 times more likely to end up in prison than people who graduate high school. If this boy would have stayed in school, he would have done much better in life and I think he realizes that now when he destroys his tv and cannot sleep. By opening a school, many more people become educated and as statistics show, educated people tend to stay away from prison compared to uneducated people. So, by educating more people, less people end up in the prisons. Education is often times a lot more than just learning, it's becoming a more disciplined person with a bright future.
I am so happy to see you posting this early. Great job!!!!
DeleteBen, I never thought of it this way. I think of education more as an opportunity to open our mind and let creativity spread throughout all sorts of people. I think it is important to be a disciplined person who will get a job and be successful like your last line states, but I think it is also important to remember to open ourselves to a more complex, open minded, and beautiful way of thinking as well!
DeleteChest,
DeleteI believe that you did a great job interpreting your quote to the video. You give us a background on how education saves us from the harsh realities of life. You are saying that if kids stay in school and get and education then they are less likely to end up in prison. But, i think you could have added more of an in depth analysis of how the school were running that made the kids drop out. Why did that kid feel like he needed to drop out of school? Was he not receiving the proper education? Did he feel trapped while receiving his education? But overall good blog!
Ben,
DeleteI think you brought up some solid arguments, especially when you referred your quote to part three. The only thing I was a little bit confused about is the part when you talked about the zombies. I just felt like that did not have a lot to do with your quote. The argument with the high school graduates staying away from prison was strong. I like how you brought a statistic into it as well. If you would have referred part one and part two to your quote a little better I think this makes for an excellent blog. You did a nice job, though.
Ben,
DeleteOverall I thought your blog was good this week. I thought you did a great job pointing out how the students in the video look like they are in concentration camps, and very limited. I would have never thought of it that way. I think you could have done a better job explaining the part of the high school dropouts. Also, I would of liked you to look at it in a different way and consider people who dropped out that ended up being highly successful such as Wal Disney.
Chest I thought you did an excellent job. I think it is interesting how you bring the concentration camp into it. It is vary unique way of thinking but I don't understand why you think people that aren't in school go to prison?
DeleteA child educated only at school is an uneducated child. ~George Santayana
ReplyDeleteI choose this one
I am choosing this weekends blog as my exemption from Thesis Throwdown
ReplyDeleteI am going to do the quote "Education is what remains after one has forgotten what one has learned in school". ~Albert Einstein
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThis blog requires a slot of thinking and probably at least 300 words if done correctly. You should do your best to support your position by using quotes and examples. Using quotes from the song is a good idea. You are doing a rhetorical analysis of it of sorts as well as connecting the two and highlighting your personal philosophy. Take your time with it. I want you to really do a better job on the blogs this quarter.
ReplyDeleteAlso, consider your quote UNCLAIMED until you complete the blog. Looking forward to seeing some great stuff!
ReplyDeleteIf you sincerely desire a truly well-rounded education, you must study the extremists, the obscure and "nutty." You need the balance! Your poor brain is already being impregnated with middle-of-the-road crap, twenty-four hours a day, no matter what. Network TV, newspapers, radio, magazines at the supermarket... even if you never watch, read, listen, or leave your house, even if you are deaf and blind, the telepathic pressure alone of the uncountable normals surrounding you will insure that you are automatically well-grounded in consensus reality. ~Ivan Stang, High Weirdness By Mail
ReplyDeleteThis quote relates to the message portrayed in Pink Floyd's song about education. One main lyric that stood out to me was, "We don't need no education." I agree and disagree with this statement. The quote by Ivan Stang shows that education is not as important as many people like to make it out to be. Education would be more beneficial if it was balanced with creative things. We can not force ourselves to learn or gain anything from an education if we do not give ourselves a break and a chance to regroup through fun activities. However, it is incredibly important to receive an education. Education works to advance society in order to create a better world. However, the song Another Brick in the Wall shows its listeners that education has in a way gone too far. Schools have become machines that are destroying passions for the arts, imagination, and creativity. In the video, one of the teachers was seen criticizing poetry. Unfortunately this is an issue that could be found in many schools. There are many teachers who believe that math and science are the only important subjects, while any subject that involves an art is only teaching students to be more human and less machine. In order to improve education, we must work to ensure that education does not "automatically ground us in the consensus of reality."
Ivan Stang also commented on the fact that "middle-of-the-road crap" is found anywhere and everywhere. Society forces us to conform and many school community promote conformity. There have been a number of schools closing art and music programs due to their lack of importance in the curriculum. The same is also beginning to happen to literature. The world only wants to see people involved in facts. The decrease in creativity is beginning to cause a decrease in originality throughout society. If the modern day world wants to advance even farther, we must learn to incorporate the arts into the sciences. Creativity may even aid scientists in their ability to think differently and discover new things. Ivan Stang noted that in order to achieve the best education, we must study the extremists, the obscure, and the nutty. If schools begin to educate students in a nuttier way, the education of the modern world may begin expanding. Geometry teaches its students about various shapes, so once any geometry learns to draw the box, they may begin to think outside of it. We can not make any advancements or changes to the educational system until new thoughts and ideas are produced from one who has successfully balanced the "uncountable normals" with creativity.
Hailee, in your blog I would of loved to see the challenges that were created between one of our authors we talked about in this unit of "Education". As stated in my blog, I used Ralph Waldo Emerson to relate my quote/song to the views based on education. It may great a better unity within all of the points you covered. :)
DeleteHailee, i appreciated how you incorporated a lot about creativity needs to be apart of education, but has education gone way too far? I can see where your thoughts generate from, but I believe that education has not gone too far but rather have been spured out of control and we have forgotten what the real meaning of what our education is.
DeleteHailee, I personally think that you either have to strictly agree or disagree with the statement, "We don't need no education." A strong argument needs to be presented whether you are for the concept, or against it. Although you present good arguments for both, just one would be more effective, in my opinion.
DeleteThe founding fathers... Provided jail cells called schools, Equipped with tortures called education. School is where you go between when your parents can't take you and industry can't take you. -John Updike, The Centaur, 1963. I completely and wholeheartedly agree with this statement. When schools were first introduced to this world, they were considered great. They educated through books and personal experience, but that is no longer the case. In "We Don't Need No Education" by Pink Floyd, the composer talks through video and music. They show that education has greatly changed, and has taken a downward spiral.
ReplyDeleteAs portrayed in the video, education has vastly taken a downfall over the years. Children are not meant to sit in desks for seven hours, learning the same boring material over and over again. They are meant to learn through interaction with the outside world and personal experience. The first part of the video shows a mother, silently crying and praying in a church. What looks like her son is zooming around the building with a toy airplane. The small clip portrays how children would rather be active than stay still, even in tough situations.
The founding fathers really have provided us with jail cells, also known as schools. The second clip shows a student who is being criticized and humiliated by a teacher in front of his whole class, for writing "bad" poetry. After a slap from the teacher, he starts daydreaming. He imagines his day as a concentration camp, where students are being forced to march in lines, and one by one they fall into a food processor. This part, out of the whole video, strikes me the most. I believe that it symbolizes our modern day school system. The processor resembles the same old trap that we are being led through everyday, boring eduction. We all churn out of schools as ordinary people who are thrown around in this world.
School is a place in the world where your parents and industry can't take you. The third and final clip shows just how passionate people are about their terrible educations. It shows a revolt on the system. Because of our failure to educate, humans know nothing better than violence. They are not enriched enough to make a formal argument. Our education system needs a change. It needs diversity, interactions and culture. It needs enthusiasm so students do not view it like a death camp, like in the music video. It is the responsibility of parents, teachers, the government, and students to work together for a common good. We need a change so that educations is not "torture" or "jail cells", but instead, a time of enrichment in-between the two hardest stages of life, childhood and adulthood.
Charlie, in your blog I would of loved to see more diverse subjects, maybe say more about these "jail cells" and or "torture". Did all people think this? What did the parents think about them? The teachers who taught the material? I would have liked to see a possible challenge between the quote, video, and an author we covered in our unit also. Overall the blog was well said and made me think differently on the subject.
Delete
DeleteCharlie,
Your blog was great, although there was one more aspect I would have liked to see. Your point would have been stronger if you would have related this to your self. Maybe talk about ECC and how it fits into this? It seems as if you agree because of personal experience, and BY adding in these personal experience it would have made your essay sound more supported, and less like complaining.
Charlie,
DeleteYou stressed several important points, although I agree with Allie, the "jail cells" and "torture" were not explained very well. The relationships are there, they just need explained a little further.
"Education aims to give you a boost up the ladder of knowledge, but too often it just gives you a cramp on one of its rungs" - Martin H. Fischer. This quote relates to the song " Another Brick in the Wall" by Pink Floyd. Education is a great thing we have. Education is what makes us who we are today. I think education is one of the best things we have in our society. We should be greatly thankful for having education in our lives. Education is a great responsibility for ourselves. As said by Ralph Waldo Emerson, the parents and teachers are the key to our education responsibility. They are the base to our road of learning. In this regard, Pink Floyd states "We don't we need no education", We don't need no thought control"; but most certainly do we need it! We need to practice and control our challenges through educational aspects and we need to try our absolute best when learning. Education excels our everyday knowledge and advances our learning capabilities, but it sure can be a "brick in the wall", said by Pink Floyd. As stated by Martin H. Fischer, sometimes education gives us a cramp on one of its rungs, just like a "brick in the wall". In long run, education can be improved. Education needs a central balance among all people and subjects. With the technology we have today, we are not "conquering" the true meaning of education. The technology is minimizing our creativity and originality, which challenges our schools today. The schools are the central structure to our education and are our stomping groups until the end. We all face these challenges, these challenges make us stronger each and everyday, which will have a great toll on the rest of our lives forever; in high school, college, our jobs, and in our own self
ReplyDelete
DeleteAllie, your blog has many good points, but I do not agree with your thought on how we need thought control. Are students really learning is their thoughts are being controlled? You fail to mention how creativity and originality impact education, and how important or unimportant they really are.
This was a good quote to use for this blog. The part where is says "it just gives you a cramp on one of its rungs" is very similar to "another brick in the wall". I think you could have made this post better if you had analyzed the video and song a little more.
DeleteI agree with your ideas of schools being the center of the problem, but some other of your points I disagree with completely. Education is not a good thing in our society, our definition of education is slowly becoming nothing to be proud of in our world. The video compares education to a death camp, where students fall into a food processor. Technology, nor the students, are not the root of the problem, but rather the school are responsibile for the students. Schools no longer make students stronger, and soon they may have the opposite effect if a change doesn't occur soon.
DeleteAllie,
DeleteI like how you incorporated the song quote into your piece, but I think you may have misjudged the purpose of the song a bit. The thought controlling nature of teachers and guardians is a plague that is limiting the mental growth of children today. You make some valid points but I have do disagree on the thought control topic.
Allie,
DeleteYou made a great argument, however, I don't necessarily think that parents need to be completely involved in their child's education. I believe that the student benefits more when their parents are involved but are still allowed to make their own path.
Allie,
DeleteYou made some good arguments, but there are a few things that I did not agree with. I do not think education with the best thing we have in our society today because education in todays society is truly not education because students are not even working hard and they look everything up on the internet. Education though is a huge part of a person if they learn things in a correct manner. Although there was a few things I disagreed with you did make some good points. Good job!!
"We are students of words: we are shut up in schools, and colleges, and recitation-rooms, for ten or fifteen years, and come out at last with a bag of wind, a memory of words, and do not know a thing." This quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson fully portrays the feelings behind the song "We Don't Need No Education" by Pink Floyd and also a portion of what I believe is the truth in our education system.
ReplyDeleteThis quote is trying to intrigue a thought, and this thought may be " What are our students really learning?" The video to the song by Pink Floyd displayed students at a school that looked similar, in my thoughts, to a assembly- line. http://www.investopedia.com
gives the definition that and assembly line is, "A production process that breaks the manufacture of a good into steps into a pre-defined sequence." In the video, the students looked as if they were doing pre-defined actions and were obeying to what they were told rather than what they wanted. So what are our students really learning? They are learning to cut their thoughts into perfectly defined squares rather than big, bold, different, and beautiful bubbles. Basically, they come out of years of education with a bag of wind and a memory of words instead of a bag full of treasure and brain full of useful knowledge. With this knowledge, any student and every student can do reach their mind, body, and souls to their full potential. This is because teachers are not fully allowing our students to display their true selves. The teachers of this day and age are to obsessed with the idea of making sure our students learning what the curriculum says, but not learning what their minds say.
Personally, I feel as if education is responsible for our future in everything. Without good education, without an expression of the mind, future generations will be compelled to think inside of the box rather than outside. I believe that with this high honor and important job educators have they should use their powers to their fullest extent. They can allow students to spit their thoughts out and let them feel what they turkey feel rather than sticking to what the textbooks say. The textbook should not be our main source of education, the textbook cannot be the teacher. Education is responsible for letting students to let their ideas explode and learn how to live their actual lives. To create a better future our educators must decide to let go of online printouts or textbooks and allow students creative minds be free for discussion and expression of ones thoughts. Our students must not be controlled, they must not be dumbed to the idea that the textbook answer is the correct answer, and they must be open to all sorts of minds and thoughts.
Reilly, I thought that you did a great job with your blog this week. My only question is; Is it always the school systems fault that our generation is not being properly educated? I feel like you are putting most of you blame on the shoulders of the teachers, whereas it could be the fault of the parents, or even the students.
DeleteReilly,
DeleteI completely agree that education lacks individuality, but some say that a certain amount of similarity is vital to a great education. Would you agree with the use of some pre-defined actions in moderation? Addressing this point may have made your blog stronger.
Reilly,
DeleteI agree with the questions that Charlie and Jenna arose. I think there still need to be a balance between individualism and confirmatory. Throughout the song by Pink Floyd, they showed us how schools are conforming students into machines with no true personality. I agree with your statements about having more personality, but I think that there needs to be a balance. To truly educated students we must find that fine line between conformity and individuality. To do this it takes the teachers, parents, as well as 5the students themselves. Great blog this week!
Dear Really (haha),
DeleteI think you made a lot of solid points. The one I was very happy to read was when you said the printouts of the online worksheets need to go. I completely agree with that! My only problem with this is that you never really said what should be done to change this, through examples. Maybe providing an example as to what could happen if teachers stopped using a textbook, what would they use then? That would only strengthen the blog. This all of course in my opinion. Overall I think you did solid work on this blog, just like in the volleyball tournament this weekend. Go Reilly!
"No man who worships education has got the best out of education.... Without a gentle contempt for education no man's education is complete. "~G.K. Chesterton. This quote explains many things about education. Because education can be grueling and requires sacrifice, you could say that a man who loves his education has not stepped past his boundaries enough to actually get one. However, "We Don't Need No Education" is in fact, too much contempt. Education requires a certain uncomfortableness to learn, but this discomfort should not be inflicted by teachers or parents, but by the actual information and material.
ReplyDeleteIn Pink Floyds "Another Brick in the Wall", children are brought down for two particular reasons. A teacher stifles the creativity of the future poet, and parents fail to love their children enough to make them worth an education to themselves. Had the teacher stifling the students creativity been teaching right, he would have promoted the writing of his poems, because the student is inexperienced and is possibly uncomfortable with that idea, which would have promoted him to grow. The small boy lacks parental guidance as well as guidance from teachers. This puts all the weight in the small boys shoulders, who does not even know what is good for him yet. This boy will grow to hate learning because he associates it with painful feelings. This type of hatred does not help he boy grow in his learning.
Someone who is too comfortable with learning has not pushed themselves far enough, and therefor has not achieved their best possible education. For example, many students in ECC do not take AP language. They do it take it because they are not reading and writing experts, and much rather prefer maths or sciences. By taking the class now and pushing themselves out of heir comfort zone, they will not only learn how to think we'll, but they will learn to cope with fears of the unknown in regards to education. These fears will have to be confronted (most likely in college) or the student will not be able to reach their full potential. The student who has not found what he is bad at has not been educated at all, but rather just been congratulated on how much he knows
Catherine,
DeleteI agree with your points on the degree of contempt that must be present for effective education, but one may challenge you in saying that even the slightest amount of contempt for education may hinder a person's educational growth and desire to learn.
Catherine,
DeleteYou made several great points throughout your blog, however I do not necessarily believe that you need to be totally uncomfortable in order to receive a good education. I think you need a fair balance between both comfort and discomfort for the best education.
"The tragedy of education is played in two scenes — incompetent pupils facing competent teachers and incompetent teachers facing competent pupils. ~Martin H. Fischer" In simpler terms, Martain Ficher is basically saying that the problem with education is that there are students who do not care about school and have no passion or drive to learn with teachers that are exact opposites, ones who passionate about education with energy in the classroom. The other problem this quote brings up is the opposite of the first problem, students that want to learn and grow in intelligence that have teachers who are lazy and not committed to providing that education in the best of their ability. We need students and teachers to both acquire a passion for education.
ReplyDeleteNow while I listened to the lyrics and watched the video the words "we don't need no education" created some curiosity in my mind. The more I thought about it I realized that the entire purpose of this song can mean two things, just as the quote I selected does. If you think about "we don't need no education", it is a double negative that can actually mean "we need education". Was Pink Floyds songs about how the harsh instructor made him stronger in his life? Was this song written to promote education? The other meaning this song has is the meaning most people got out of the song: "we don't need this type of education." The quote for Fischer is also referred to the video portion of the song, in two scenes, just as the quote talks about education. The first science would be part two where the teacher is a little bit arrogant as he publicly makes fun of the student for being creative and writing a poem, something the child enjoys to do. The quote talks about teachers who are passionate about education, and I think it can refer to those teachers who are over passionate to the point of arrogance and self boasting. Just how the teacher took advantage of the power he had in the classroom. I think part three went on to show that if this type of educational process goes on (the way teachers act that causes students to lose creativity and passion for school) then the society is in trouble. The way it is pictured is in the second scene, or part three, through violence and rage as there are cars being burned and tvs being smashed.
In conclusion, the quote and video tie together well because the problems addressed in the quote about teacher/student relationships can be referred to the relationship the boy had with his stern teacher. Personally, I agree with the quote, and believe that teachers and students are not always on the same page. Now is that all teachers? Absolutely not. In my life I have teachers that are willing to go the extra distance to better my education, but this is not how it is everywhere. Both of my uncles who have children in the public school system in different cities in PA claim that the teacher their children have is lazy and does not put forth the effort needed. Once teachers and students together have a drive and passion for education and learning, our world will result in greatness, destroying any bricks that are trying to build a wall to prevent us from our greatest ability in learning.
I agree with your argument that teachers and students need to work together to have a good system of education and that some teachers go too far. I don't agree with the double negative meaning. The video doesn't show how his instructor made him stronger, but rather the result was chaos and rebellion. I believe the students are saying "We don't need no education" because they are so uneducated by the system that they are using improper English. The system haven't benefited them, maybe because their teachers were lazy, and they now believe that education is irreverent to them.
DeleteI think you have a good argument about how the double negative ties in. Your point could have also been made stronger if you would have tied in the beginning portion of the music video. You could have maybe talked about how he fit in with the whole view in education. I thought it was a very well written blog and you did a very good job over all.
DeleteGabe,
DeleteI like how you pointed out how the song's title could have different meaning and how that realated to the quote. You did a great job explaining the different parts of the song and their relation to the quote you chose.
“The aim of education should be to teach us rather how to think, than what to think - rather to improve our minds, so as to enable us to think for ourselves, than to load the memory with thoughts of other men” -Bill Beattie
ReplyDeleteEducation is everything. It cannot be neatly filed under one statement or another. It is a philosophy, it is a practice, it is a responsibility, but most of all it is a privilege. While education has many pitfalls as both the Bill Beattie and Pink Floyd brought to attention, education remains a vital aspect of learning.
I disagree with the statement "we don't need no education", the statement itself says that we do. The very statement is a grammatical error. And if taken literally, by cancelling the double negatives, it says that we do need an education. We cannot throw away every concept simply because a problem as become apparent. Every great thing requires work, and that includes education. Education is an important factor of life, it determines our success in this world. Why would we try to get rid of it? Although Pink Floyd's "Another Brick in the Wall" lacks grammatical accuracy, it does make several valid observations on the subject of education. It states the need for teachers to leave kids alone, meaning that individual thought cannot be provoked by teacher's constant hovering. Also, the songs makes a strong point that suggests education to be "thought control." This also alludes to teachers' inclinations to spoon-feed knowledge and opinions to students and encourage memorization of material. In the music video, the stifling of individual thought seems to be the main point, and I believe it shows the major problems of 21st Century education.
Bill Beattie's quote summarizes changes that must be made in educational methods with complete cogency. By suggesting such changes, he calls attention to the fatal flaw of today's education. I believe his quote complements Pink Floyd's statements. We should be encouraging students to think for themselves. If their minds are filled with others' thoughts, how can they be expected to make their own, too? Other opinions can help students form their own, but those opinions must be used conservatively. With the conservative use of others' thoughts, teachers can effectively educate students in a useful and individual thought process.
Without education, society would vanish into nothingness. If we learned nothing, we would become imbeciles with nothing to debate, nothing to work for, and nothing to contribute. For that reason, I say that education is everything. There is a philosophy for proper education, every individual may have a different philosophy, but it is nonetheless a philosophy. Education is a practice of obtaining knowledge, and students, teachers, parents, and many others are responsible for that practice. Lastly, education is a privilege for every student because it grants them the priviledge of knowledge, the greatest gift of all.
Jenna,
DeleteI thought you did a great job on this blog. You made some very powerful points, that very effectively related to both your quote and the Pink Floyd video. The only problem I have with your blog is that I personally do not believe that education is everything. I think there is much more important aspects of life then just being educated. All in all, I thought your blog was good though.
Jen,
DeleteI like how you made a point to address the double negative, and change it into a positive form. I would also have to agree with Frank though, education is not everything. This blog was very well thought out, and I think you did a wonderful job!
The whole purpose of education is to turn mirrors into windows. ~Sydney J. Harris. Education is suppose to help children experience new and good things. It is suppose to help them become better in life. Education will open new doors for them, they will get to do many more things because they know more. It will teach them right and wrong and how to handle things in stressful situations. In the video, "we don't need no education" this can mean a lot of things. I believe the main thing is that people do need education whether they need to figure it out themselves or have someone else guide them. They video showed how the children where moving like an assembly line and teachers beating them, this is not right. Children that go to school should feel safe and learn in a nonviolence environment and be able to express their true self without being judged by other students or teachers. The quote is really an eye opener because people really need to realize that education turn peope from looking at themselves or reflections of things but actually seeing things for what they really are and going forward to new things. People can not live in other people's reflections or their own reflection because they need to look out the window and then they will see everything that could be amazing for them . Children need education, it doesn't matter how they get it, but they need to see that they will succeed with education.
ReplyDeleteWhat do you mean when you say it doesn't matter how the get their education? And when you say, they need to figure it out themselves, what does that mean?
DeleteKira, I think you had some really good ideas in this especially about the music video but I think that you should have connected this to a piece that we did in class, I also felt that you could have devopled your ideas a little bit more. You had great ideas though and it was a good blog!!
DeleteI will use my blog exemption this week from the "THESIS THROWDOWN".
ReplyDeleteI am using, Education is the movement from darkness to light. ~Allan Bloom
ReplyDeleteI am using my blog exemption this week from the Thesis Throwdown.
ReplyDeleteEducation is the movement from darkness to light. ~Allan Bloom
ReplyDeleteThis quote by Bloom is very simple, but also very meaningful. Bloom uses the metaphor "from darkness to light," to describe education. This could be interpreted in many different ways. First, this quote could be looked at in the sense of enlightenment. An example of this would be Plato's "Allegory of the Cave." The prisoners of the cave do not know any better, and believe the shadows being displayed to them are real. In terms of education, the prisoners of the cave and school students are related. The students do not know the real meaning of education unless they are enlightened to its benefits, and shown why it is so important. In the Allegory of the Cave Plato says, "It is the job of the informed to lead the ignorant 'out of the cave' and into true knowledge." This, in terms of education can be related to teachers. It is the duty of teachers to show students the real practice of education, and lead them to becoming enlightened on the topic. Secondly, this quote can be directly related to Pink Floyd's "Another Brick in the Wall." In this song, they state, "we don't need no education." This itself can also have several different meanings. In the video, a young boy is humiliated by his teacher in front of the whole class for doing something so harmless, writing a poem. Instead of encouraging the young boys creativity, the teacher puts the boy down, and embarrasses him. Ralph Emerson, in his essay on Education stated, "Ideas will never mean anything, unless put into action." Emerson is saying than an idea will only ever just be an idea, unless practiced and used in a meaningful way. Because of his teacher, the boy will never be able to take the step "from darkness to light." For a student to become educated, the student, and the teacher must be on the same page. When dealing with education it is both the responsibility of the student and teacher. The student must be creative, and open to learning even when it gets hard. The teacher must be open to ideas from the students, and base her class off of the creativity and desire to learn from the students. Without the teacher and student working together, education really is "just another brick in the wall."
Frank.
DeleteI enjoyed your examples from the allegory of the cave and from your interpretation from the movie. But I also agree with the teachers needing to be on the same page as the students and vise versa . Good blog
Frank,
DeleteYou did a very good job with this blog connecting all of the topics we talked about throughout our education unit. You also could have connected it back to Emerson again when he talked about Charles Fellowes and how he was curious about learning. His natural curiosity drove him to learn all tha he could and I feel that is an example that could have strengthened your argument.
It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it. ~Aristotle
ReplyDeleteThe definition of education according to our modern system involves teenagers locked in a building for seven hours a day listening to an adult read out of a textbook or notes off of a slide. Students base their intelligence off of a percent given by a teacher. Students spend hours every night suffering through an enormous amount of pointless homework. Personally, most of the work I do in and out of school is considered busywork.
As the quote says, an educated person can think about an idea without agreeing with it. In school, it's almost seems that students are forced to think a certain way and that their opinions are irrelevant. We memorize facts and definitions to pass a test, not to learn because our grade is how we are defined. We don't know how to think. So really, "We don't need no education" as the song says because "We are just another brick in the wall". We are just part of a system, a routine that we have been forced into. Teachers re-state the same material every year, over and over. The problem with our education system is just that, it's too much of a system, and not enough creativity and expression. Students are penalized for asking questions and challenging thoughts. In the video, the student was mocked for his poem. Then his teacher had the class repeat definitions, which is sort of ironic. The student is the one thinking and be criticized, while the teacher is making the other students memorize.
The video compares our education system to a Nazi death camp because students are imprisoned from learning and unable to think freely. The prisoners are fearful, as their wills are showered away. The part that grabbed my attention more than anything was the conveyor belt with students falling into a processor and becoming mush. The schools are unknowingly putting us into this system and we are hopeless. We are falling into the world not knowing what to do. In the end, we have suddenly become the materials of the system.
As Francine Prose states, the problem with the system lies in the schools. Students aren't being taught because of the material and the teachers. The ambition of the students plays a role in ones education, but it only goes so far. There needs to be a change in education, as the way we think of education is slowly being accompanied by negative thoughts and feelings. We aren't learning to think, we just learn to get good grades. Our education system is teaching students to hate learning.
Justin, I think this was very good and I liked that you put Francine Prose in it.I think it would have been moore beneficail to add how some of the works that teachers are teaching does not actually make the students think. Overall this was a great blog.
DeleteJustin,
DeleteI agree with the amount of busy work given by our teachers, but that can help you learn. Our intelligence is not completely judged by our percent scores, but also SAT, ACT, and other test. Your blog does raise some good points thought
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ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteToo often we give children answers to remember rather than problems to solve. ~Roger Lewin
In Education today we are too often taught how to just find one answer. Our mind is no longer open to abstract thinking. When Pink Floyd said "We don't need no education. We dont need no thought control," this is so untrue. Without an education in todays world it is way to hard to make it with no education.Controlling our minds is the only way to become abstract thinkers. With no control and discipline our minds go crazy. We must discipline our minds in order to learn how to solve the problems and not just memorize how we are to do something. Without thought and discipline of our minds very few people are able to succeed. This discipline is a responsibility of not only the student but all the people involved in the students lives, parents, teachers, student, and God. We must change the way education is before it gets to far off track, teachers have to ensure that their students are thinking and not just learning the answers.
In I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, Francine Prose talks about all the works of literature that we no longer read that we used to. These are the books that Prose believes make us to think beyond the basic memorizations, to think about topics that are controversial and require much thought. Our education is about so much more then just passing a test, it is about enriching our mind the same way that we enrich our body with food. The quote that I chose contradicts the song lyrics because Pink Floyd believes that there is no thought control needed in order to succeed. I agree with Prose with the fact that teachers are going with the flow and reading what students want to read, or what is easier. Teachers need to read what makes the students learn and not what is easy.
Students are learning how to learn the answers instead of the process of getting there just so that they can get good grades. We are being taught how to pass with good grades. We are learning not to want more information, but rather to hate the whole system of education. Our education is more then a simple algorithm to get the answer, it is about so much more then the answer.
Makenzie,
DeleteIn your beginning paragraph you started with abstract thinking. Are you saying there is only one answer and the teacher is always right? I do not know if I agree with you. You stated many times how we are being taught today, to learn for the answer not to learn for the sake of learning. Which I think that is how our school systems work today.
A child educated only at school is an uneducated child. ~George Santayana
ReplyDeleteJust alone, within this quote comes one main statement. That would be that people can not just be book smart, but must also be street smart and learn things through experience instead of putting their nose into a book to figure things out. It means that we need to make decisions and live the consequences, this is how you learn outside of school.
In "we don't need no education" by pink Floyd I believe he considers the idea that we do not need an education to be successful. That what we learn from our personal experiences and own troubles actually teach us life lessons. Yes we need to learn to read and write but to live a simple life no we do not need to. In "superman and me" the young kid taught himself to read based off of the pictures to the words. This is one example onto why we don't necessarily need an education.
Any person can go to school and learn and memorize formulas or even definitions for words. But does everyone know how to change a tire on a car? I ask you this because just the other day a friend got a flat and at least 5 people had no idea what to do. I just though to myself that's crazy that some people don't even know how to change a tire on a car. This is because it was not taught in school. It is something that must be understood through experience. As the quote I chose says if you are only educated at school then you truly are not educated at all. So when a person is not taught basic things like changing a tire, then they aren't truly as smart as they could be.
Doug,
DeleteI like how you broke up the blog, it help me focus on the main points of the blog. I think you example was really helpful and really backed up your point.
Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself. ~John Dewey This simple quote by John Dewey explains to us how important education is in our lives. It can be related to the song "Another Brick in the Wall" by Pink Floyd because all throughout the song they kept re-instating that "we don't need no education." What I took from this emphasize on these words was that they are not benefiting from what they are learning in school. By reviewing the video of the song you see every kid wearing a mask and standing in a line in one seen. They are all uniformly the same and have no personality. That is what is happening; schools are conforming students into a mold that is the same and deters them from wanting to step out and be different. When this happens they no longer have a care to learn. They no longer are being challenged to go above what they had previously thought was their limit.
ReplyDeleteBy looking at education we can see that by becoming educated we are opening our minds to the endless possibilities that it may hold for us. The music video starts out with a young boy and his mother in a church. The mother is clearly annoyed by the boys free spirit of wanting to play and be imaginative. There is a line that must be drawn here. The mother must not scold her son from being creative and unique, but also the boy must know the correct time and place to be performing these actions.
Soon we are faced with a young boy who seems to be in elementary school. I believe that the boy is sitting in a science class. His appeal is not towards science, but rather, pelted and writing. When the boy is scolded the administrator humiliates the him and tells him that his poetry is not good. Sure, the boy should have been paying attention in this class, but again a higher authority had told him that what he was doing was wrong so it further deterred him from opening up his mind and having a free spirited attitude.
Blog continued:
DeleteThe last clip we see from the video is a young man who seems to be what one might call a "hippie." He is very disheveled and seems to have a no care attitude. He seems frustrated with something or with himself. He smashes his guitar into a television and the whole scene is very chaotic. He seems to have given up and has so much rage inside him.
I pointed out all three of these scenes because I like to think of them as a sequence. I would like to think that the individual that is in each of these sections of video is the same person. He starts out a ps a young boy. Mind open to endless possibilities with the sky as his limit. But, after numerous reoccurrence of scolding from his mother and the random guy at the playground he grows up with less and less drive to be different and unique. Because of the scolding he thinks being different is wrong. Then he grows. He still has some individuality inside of him, but that soon is deflated even further when again he is scolded for having a personality and love for something that is not of the normal character. As he goes throughout his school career I would like to think he continually received that idea that what he believed was right was really, wrong. Soon he drops out of school feeling as though his education was pointless to try and receive because his ideas did not conform to what was the proper normality. So he finds himself alone and with nothing but a guitar. He is frustrated. He wants to do something with his life, but his limited knowledge hinders him into being able to obtain that goal. Soon he gives up. He takes his anger out on the only thing he has left in his life.
Education is the basis of life, it really is. The habits and knowledge we are exposed to from an early age with be carried through our life. It is the foundation we build our lives on. To fully develop the field of education we: the students, teachers, parents, friends, and all others who impact the lives of the people around them must never give up and to always encourage creativity, individuality, and most important the courage to stay true to yourself and do what makes you happy.
You can get all A's and still flunk life. ~Walker Percy
ReplyDeleteThis quote from Walker Percy relates so much to what we discussed during our unit on education. The first thing that comes to mind is what we discussed earlier in the quarter, most students worry so much about their grades that they do not learn the material. There is so much pressure on students to get an "A" that they focus more on the grade and being perfect than making mistakes and learn the lessons being taught. Performing well in school and having good grades does not mean that a student is ready to apply those skills to the real world.
In the video by Pink Floyd, the message I got from the lyrics, "We don't need no education... All in all you're just another brick in the wall," was that in order to be successful you do not need a strict "cookie cutter" education that limits creativity. Also it says that most schools just have a single curriculum and do not focus on the individuals or bricks but the wall itself. All students should be treated as individuals and taught in ways that will help them fully develop to their true potential.
Education is very important, but maybe not in the way it is in use today. The music video which showed the teacher making fun of the boy writing poetry, I feel that particular part is a pretty good example of how most schools are. In public schools or schools with more students, creativity and curiously is pushed aside because there is not enough time for each student. The boy should have been praised for his love of poetry such as Ralph Waldo Emerson says towards the end the piece we read from Education. Students should be encouraged to follow their own curiosity and interests in learning because in order to learn properly you must want to learn.
Rachel,
DeleteI love this quote and was going to use it, until I saw you used it. You stated 'All students should be treated as individuals...' I wish I could put in the praying emoji because that sentence was beautiful.
I am using my blog exemption this week from the Thesis Throwdown.
ReplyDeleteThe education process in America is severely flawed, this is addressed in the song "Another Brick in the Wall" by Pink Floyd. The song introduces the topic of conformity that schools create. The quote "What does education often do? It makes a straight-cut ditch of a free, meandering brook." by Henry David Thoreau also makes a statement about schools teaching to make cookie cuter students. Students with high math, science, and test scores, with ignoring classes like music, art, and literature. Thus, students are almost becoming zombies or robots who only care about math and SAT scores. Then later in life become adults who have issues who have no education a out the arts and do not respect them. This leads them to not have a deeper knowledge of the true meaning of literature. It hurts the soul of the students, which can affect them later in life. The students also become all the way, which really hurts the students hat are creative and talented in the musical programs suffer though their years of school believing that they are dumb and not successful in school. This conformity directly hurts students that are diverse and have wide view points. The title of the song also directly relates to this topic of conformity. Another brick in the wall means everything is exactly the same. This mean that the schools are trying to make every student a brick to fit into a wall, which should be more like a mosaic. A mosaic is colorful and each piece of the artwork is completely different and shows different interests. The video shows the students with masks over their faces while on the conveyer belt, and their eventual death in the grinder, and everything that comes out of their is the same. The masks take away the students individuality and make them just another brink in the wall of education.
ReplyDeleteMitchell,
DeleteYou made some really good points here, but I don't think that all schools are making cookie cuter students. Some of the students that are very creative with art and music are still very good at math and do good on SATs. Every students is different. You do make some good points though so good job.
"We are students of words: we are shut up in schools, and colleges, and recitation-rooms, for ten or fifteen years, and come out at last with a bag of wind, a memory of words, and do not know a thing." ~Ralph Waldo Emerson
ReplyDeleteThe video shows students with a great disdain. Not for knowledge, no, but a disdain for incompetent teachers. Teachers who are merely trying to achieve the "norm" and mold students into a brain washed adolescence are ruining our society and the next generations. The entirety of the video focuses on the evolution of one boy, and how he goes through life thinking that he is "just another brick in the wall." He is taught the "right" way, but he rebels the teachers commands by day dreaming, and using his minds creativity to create a world of his own design. His imagination defies all that the teacher had been teaching, and it is the reason he is chastised, embarrassingly, at his desk. The quote relates to this video because the last part (part 3) shows a man, whose creativity was oppressed so much so that he must destroy anything that threatens him. By watching him evolve through ten minutes, you feel that this boy, remembers nothing from school, nothing of necessity anyways. The only thing that I can remember from my freshman biology class is that mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell. Does that not alarm some people? Students are being made to do work over the summer because schools are realizing the pupils are retaining very little knowledge from the year prior. I honestly could not tell you what most of my middle school education was. This quote, reflects what I feel, is happening across America. Students are only taught to remember very important details, and then our short term memory deletes the information after we feels that it is no longer useful for us. We are expected to know certain things, but the way we are being taught is not benefitting us in the long run. Im not saying that every teacher is like this, but there are many that are just teaching what is necessary of them, and expecting very little from the students, which puts them at a massive disadvantage.
Where Does Our Education Leave Us?
ReplyDelete“An education system isn’t worth a great deal if it teachers young people how to make a living but doesn’t teach them how to make a life.” –Author Unknown
This video, at the site below, was a depiction of Pink Floyd’s life. From the beginning to the end, this bizarre video showed the events of his life. His education seemed to be out of touch with reality, as with most of his life. This relates to my quote, because our schools teach us how to make a living but not how to make a life. Students enter schools at around the same age. Most kids do not change schools, which can alter their academia results. Relating to the part in the video where the students are marching in a straight line, falling into a pit becoming sausage. The student can be compared to the sausage. The students enter school with an identity, one where they have character. The students leave with no character or opinions of anything, they are just the same sausage, told how to act in society.
Schools today are cogent, especially in this video. The schools tell kids to act in society, but do not teach them how to do so. Much like what Prose states many times in her essay, many kids do not learn much in school from what they read.
www.thewallanalysis.com/main/
Education would be much more effective if its purpose was to ensure that by the time they leave school every boy and girl should know how much they do not know, and be imbued with a lifelong desire to know it. ~William Haley
ReplyDelete"Another Brick in the Wall" by Pink Floyd shows several views on education. Thorough out the video, there is a boy, he seems to be missing a father figure and does not know any better when following other fathers around. He is missing the support of his parents and does not know what to do. Later on, when he is a teenager, he is in a school, he is ridiculed for being unique, the class repeats word for word what the teacher says. It also shows shows students full of life and energy passing by a teacher and then students with emotionless masks leaving and walking into a meat grounder. It is showing their opinion on how schools are wasting students potential by creating a uniform student. The end of the video shows the boy and many other students revolting, this is showing that schools do not teach how to behave, they teach information to be memorized and move on. The quote can relate to the music video because it talks about how schools should educate. The quote wants schools to make students think, not give them an answer, students need to discover and have a desire to discover. Rather than making students think, schools try forcing memorization and students have no desire to learn anything else, by doing this, schools produce students that have a basic knowledge that many do not want to develop, or only develop enough to work a certain job. If schools taught according to the quote, students would leave with a desire to learn what they do not understand, pursue what is unknown. As shown in the music video, the uniform education taught in schools is not a very successful way to teach students, and the quote backs this. To produce students that have a desire to learn more and are unique, schools must stop memorization and revamp curriculums. A change will change the current generation from lazy students who do not want to work to find the answer, to a generation of students who are willing to work, willing to educate themselves.
I am using the quote Education is the transmission of civilization by Ariel and Will Duran. Education is the reason the world is productive. Even though school is helpful, many students do not use it to their advantage. For the most part, kids have a very negative outlook on anything to do with school. The song by Pink Floyd was written by someone who had bad experiences in school as a kid. He had built a wall around himself so that he would be safe from the teachers. I think part of the reason I do not understand where the song is coming from is because of the fact that Elk County Catholic has good teachers. I think that a good part of education is completely pointless. I will never need to know three quarters of the things I know. English is important for speaking correctly and writing papers, math and science are important because they will probably be applied in one’s lifetime, and that is about all that is needed. Most kids that I know including myself just memorize things, take a test, forget everything, and then repeat that for the next quiz. It is not learning. It is memorizing which eliminates the purpose of school. There is no way to force a kid to learn. You need to explain to kids why it is important to learn so that they will. Another thing that needs to be addressed is the fact that a good number of teachers are not efficient at all. Humans follow other humans by example. If teachers are not doing what they are suppose to, kids are not going to be doing what they are suppose to do.
ReplyDeleteSchool is terribly stressful. If a kid is doing what they are suppose to, they probably go to their sports practices or extracurricular activities, do homework, and then go to bed. It is a tiresome process that never stops. Students do not learn as well they are stressed, so that is a problem that could be addressed with a less involved schedule. Education is what makes the world as successful as it is, but it needs to be applied correctly. Learning is easier to do with a motive. Once people get into the workforce, they can do more hands on learning. For many, that is what happens. Like most people would say, you learn by doing, and you never stop learning. Most people learn something new everyday of their lives. For example, some would say my grandpa is done learning. That is not true at all. My grandpa is learning more and more about computers daily. He is almost as tech savvy as I am. It does not matter how much you learn. There will always be more to know. The population as a whole has more to learn yet. More than half of the ocean is unexplored which is proof that there is more to know. Once you get into a job, there will he tons more opportunities to take advantage of and learn from.