Category: Gatto”

While reading “Against School” by John Taylor Gatto, I can honestly say he lost me a couple of times. Although I agree with many of his points, I feel that at times he said a mouthful. Maybe it’s because I’m not a person that’s interested in history but he really lost my attention when he brought up old history facts. When reading about Prussia, Karl Marx’s conception, World War 1, World War 2,etc. I couldn’t help but feel like I was back in global class. I felt like I was being bombarded with too much information, too many references and I began to forget what his purpose was. Don’t get me wrong, I agree with his take on the educational system for example,”Is this deadly routine necessary? And if so, for what? George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln? Someone taught them, to be sure, but they were products of a school system, and not one of them was ever “graduated” from a secondary school.”(2) I do agree that school is not for everyone but you have to have some kind of plan. Plenty of people find a way to educate themselves without attending school. But as a writer, I think you have to think about what information your reader will find interesting and what will throw them off. It really is a great article and I like how opinionated he is but I believe he could’ve gotten his point across without overloading us with history.

Reading “Against School’ by John Taylor Gatto was confusing at one point and became boring. I was losing my interest in the reading as I moved further along. At first i like how he would talk about kids being bored in class. And i agreed with that because when i was in high school classes were boring to me. When asking kids why class was boring Gatto answers were, “They said they wanted to do something real, not just sitting around. They said teachers didn’t seem to know much about their subjects and clearly weren’t interested in learning more”(1). This is something i agree with i always wanted to do something real in class. Something connected to my life something that i  would use later on. But my teachers seemed not to know how and didn’t even feel interested in the subject that they were teaching.

Something that i was confused about was the history apart that came about in the reading that’s were Gatto lost me and things became boring and losing the interest to read anymore. Gatto starts talking about the history of schooling in the United States and the purpose of school. Gatto states, “We have been taught (that is, schooled) in this country to think of “success” as synonymous with, or at least dependent upon, ” schooling”, but historically that isn’t true in either an intellectual or a financial sense”. (2) After that is went on to talk about H.L Mencken more and everything when down hill there for me. I try to push throw the reading but because my interest was lost i started to do other things.

John Taylor Gatto was an award winning teacher in New York, but left the profession bitter and jaded. Gatto’s article “Against School,” berates the public school institution criticizing the founding intentions and effectiveness of producing educated individuals. Gatto’s references the Founding Fathers among other noteworthy individuals ranging from the 1800s to the early 1900s as Americans that achieved greatness in life despite not adhering to modern school framework. I found the examples Gatto utilizes in his article antiquated and irrelevant. Gatto states, “… a considerable number of well-known Americans never went through the twelve-year wringer our kids currently go through, and they turned out all right. George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln? Someone taught them, to be sure, but they were not products of a school system, and not one of them was ever ‘graduated’ from a secondary school.” (2) Gatto asserts that prominent leaders in American history that did not attend school is evidence that schooling is not necessary for the education of today’s children. Not only are the individuals he uses as examples outdated, the school houses they would have attended are considerably different from the modern day “school system.” Moreover, doing away with schools will not necessarily remove boredom in youth or produce unique intellectuals. Comparing the schooling of early America to the current educational system or even schools in Gatto’s time of the 1990s, is like comparing apples to oranges. A person’s achievements are not based solely on their educational background but their motivation and perseverance are major components. That being said, some careers, such as medical doctor, require substantial schooling that would seems unattainable without the “twelve-year wringer” as a adequate base to build upon.

John Taylor Gatto’s piece of writing “Against School” was difficult for me to read due to the ironic boredom that I faced while trying to get through it. I say that the boredom is ironic because of his statement that ” …during that time I became an expert in boredom” (1). Gatto at first talks about how the school system is boring for both the students and teachers. Afterwards he throws around an abundance of history while trying to prove his point. I felt like I had just put down an opinionated article and picked up a history textbook. I feel that there is way too much information to take in. Sometimes Gatto even states this information without even explaining how it works such as “…an educational system deliberately designed to produce mediocre intellects, to hamstring the inner life, to deny students appreciable leadership skills, and to ensure docile and incomplete citizens…” (3). He states that Prussian education brings all of these flaws, but doesn’t explain how. Besides all of the boring history and not being in depth at times, I do not fully agree with Gatto’s stance on the school system. He believes that “We have been taught (that is, schooled) in this country to think of ‘success’ as synonymous with, or at least dependent upon, ‘schooling’…” (2) and goes on to say that education being linked to success isn’t true. I believe that today’s world is very technologically advanced and is changing rapidly. In order for people to have a successful career in many jobs we have to prepare with school. We have to be educated and certified in certain fields in order to succeed in them. Maybe before, it was easier to be successful without an education, but now it takes a lot of knowledge to pursue most dream jobs.

After reading “Against School” by John Taylor Gatto, I automatically disliked and disagreed with his view on childhood. He instantly attacked children that don’t grow up fast enough and it confused me. I couldn’t picture someone forcing a child into an advanced educational system for the reason of wanting them to grow up faster. Children will always develop at different times. Gatto’s description of the school systems basically sounds like he’s talking about prison or a sweat shop. He claims that schools aren’t places for children to learn, develop, and thrive. But, some of Gatto’s criticism is fair. He believes that one of the main problems with the school system is boredom, both on the parts of the students and the teachers. “… their teachers were every bit as bored as they were.” (page 1) He states from his personal experience that schoolteachers are not even interested in being there at all and the students follow right in their footsteps. While some of Gatto’s criticism is fair, I think that he bends reality a bit. He only focuses on the bad view of the schooling system. Gatto doesn’t discuss some of the good that comes with school. While he talks about the negative effect that a bad teacher can have on a child, he doesn’t mention the huge impact that a good teacher can have on a child’s life. He also doesn’t mention that schools can be a way for people to make something of themselves in the future. So while Gatto offers some reasonable judgement of the American school system, he also shows some unfairness against it, and doesn’t really paint a picture for the readers.

“Against School” by John Taylor Gatto, was boring to me because the article didn’t grab my attention as the reader. The article started off interesting with his teaching experience with boredom and how it is a common condition of school teachers that show they are trapped inside structures.” We could encourage the best qualities of youthfulness – curiosity, adventure, resilience, the capacity for surprising insight – simply by being more flexible about time, texts, and tests, by introducing kids to truly competent adults, and by giving each student what autonomy he or she needs in order to take a risk every now and then”(1), I  agree that learning on our own would give us a risk that would make us push ourselves and be more successful independently. The author started to lose me when he brought up old history facts rather then keep the flow going with his experiences and knowledge of learning don’t get me wrong I love hearing history facts about Prussian, World War 1, World War 2, Karl Marx’s conception, etc. But when I started to read all those old history facts it made me wander off to my ninth-grade global world class where they would just throw facts at you and bore you to death which is the authors point “boredom”. I would be more interested in the author’s beliefs of how we can enhance children’s abilities to acquire knowledge and how we could improve our school system to help the future generations. For the most part, I agree with Gatto argument that schools make children to be employees and consumers and contents that is limited which shouldn’t be.

Reading “Against School” was somewhat confusing and eventually made me lose interest in reading further. First, I loved how the author was open-minded and discussed if being schooled really was necessary. He justified his statement by providing evidence with famous homeschooled Americans that succeeded although they were not a part of the school system. He then argued further that people tend to correlate being schooled as a guarantor of success but that isn’t the case, which leaves the question “why then do Americans confuse education with just such a system? What exactly is the purpose of our public schools?”(2)

Now here is where I get confused or more likely start losing interest, as I continue reading along the passage the author starts talking about the history of schooling in the United States and the purpose of the school, which was very obvious, “To make good people, to make good citizens and to make each person his or her personal best”.(2) He continued to talk further in depth about H.L. Mencken the Prussianization of American schools which honestly, made me confused and forget what the main idea or question was, which was “What is the purpose of our public schools?”. He then finally got to the point where a Harvard lecturer named Ingles broke down the real purpose of schooling. I felt that he could have gone to the point by mentioning Ingles sooner than wasting time writing about history.

I understand if his purpose was to probably show where the school system derived from and how it came about but when the author mentioned about James Bryant Conant – “president of Harvard for twenty years, WW I poison-gas specialist, W WII executive on the atomic -bomb project, etc..”(3) I honestly started to get even more confused like who is this guy and is he really important or am I just not reading carefully? There was too much information for me to absorb that I couldn’t narrow down which were the key points and which were not. Personally, it wasn’t that I did not understand the context but more like not being able to grasp every detailed information the author provided thus, making me feel confused.

1. Read and annotate “Against School” by John Taylor Gatto, which I passed out in class. You can also find it HERE
2. Write (and post on OpenLab) a 250 word “Difficulty Paper” on the Gatto reading. The category is “Gatto.”

What do I mean by a Difficulty Paper?  In this text low-key assignment, you will write about what you found difficult, confusing, boring, annoying, or painfully obvious in this reading. The most important thing about it, though, is that you BE SPECIFIC. If your mind wandered– tell us where your mind wandered– and start to explore WHY you think this happened to you, and, even more importantly , what you think Gatto may have been trying to say there (and, perhaps what makes you think he failed.) If you find a passage particularly confusing, cite the passage, and explain what specifically confused you about it– not just “the vocabulary was confusing” but point to confusing words, try to figure out what he might have said instead.

Why do we do this? This is not to get you to see what’s wrong with you as a reader. Quite the opposite! In fact, the places where you are most confused or frustrated (or even bored, believe it or not) are often the places you are doing your best thinking. You’re grappling with difficult questions. The difficulty paper can help you get deep into the heart of those questions. Believe me– I’ve seen it work wonders.

What if I don’t find it difficult? I would be a little surprised if you didn’t find anything difficult in this text at all– but it’s possible. Remember, difficulty can also take the forms of being boring or too obvious. Also, look for places you can dig in and look for something a bit deeper– look for clues you may want to know more.