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I had to post this link to a lovely blog from a new mum in London. It's postpartum hilarity, to which I relate well.

In fact, some of what she said related to (or at least reminded me of) some recent philosophical reading we've done around the bean-shaped table. Allow me to copy and paste:

People, it seems, need routine, whether they know it or not, whether it's good for them or not. Following a routine is comforting. We know what's coming next when we're in a routine. No big surprises. No big changes. We can relax. Sit back. Turn on the TV. Crack open another packet of biscuits. Slowly, slowly our routines settle us, de-stress us, relax us... and turn us into over-weight spuds with no will power, no social life and a craving for cheetos.

Our new friend, blogger Sparx, is talking about her baby's routine and about the routine of people crowding onto the Tube merely because it's the tube they always take (despite the human crush and all its accompanying odors; despite the fact that another one will be along in 3-5 minutes), and somehow that got me to thinking about the routine of education.

According to Paolo Freire's Pedagogy of the Oppressed, traditional education takes on a 'narrative' nature, in which one narrates -- the teacher, whom Freire calls the Subject -- and others sit and patiently listen. These are the students, also known by Freire as the Objects. Even in the handy labels he bestows, it's apparent that Freire sees education in this traditional, broken sense, to be happening to the students, rather than something in which they actively participate.

To hear Freire tell it, this passive education is grievous to the Objects, while it deifies the Subject. He describes timid listeners who are subjugated in every way to the teacher, and a teacher who sets education's agenda for the students through rote memorization and static, lifeless facts.

I should stop here to clarify: I like what Freire has to say. I agree with his observations. But I would posit that people -- being creatures of routine -- grow accustomed to this education-as-usual, and are not really complaining. Not that education-as-usual is acceptable and profitable. It's just that Subjects and Objects alike have grown accustomed to the narrative routine. If we weren't creatures of habit, this classroom routine of give-and-give (teacher to students) would not have developed, nor would it last. But it does. Case in point: Elementary math is taught differently than the way I learned. Long division is no longer long, but clustered. I found myself grumbling inside when I couldn't answer one of my son's homework questions in that framework; I wondered allowed what they were teaching him when I embarked on explaining how long division is really done. His math experience isn't fitting the routine developed for me in the fourth grade. Instead it was retrofitted to function better for its students today. And I think that is good -- but also not, because it isn't well-rounded enough to accommodate an already-established society that these kids will grow up and be asked to work in.

The "banking" system of education, as Freire calls it -- in which the Subject makes deposits of his or her knowledge into the Objects' mind-accounts -- could be likened to television. The box flickers and prattles as it receives megahertz of entertainment, which in turn happens before the eyes of a passive watcher. Behind those eyes the mind remains passive and inactive. It would seem that Freire esteems the narrative character education has developed little higher, or even on the same level.

While we know our minds suffer gray-rot while we partake of our habitual programs, we develop routines centered on our viewing schedule. Even my favorite new, witty-wise blogger, Sparx, admits to this. She closed her above-quoted entry with these words:

All these questions. I'd like to continue this post and perhaps find some sort of answer but House has started and we watch it faithfully every week... god forbid you ask us to change.

I think some memorization and fact-depositing is necessary. The basic tenets of science and mathematics do not change (or at least not without intensive scrutiny and peer review) and truthfully, asking "why?" can at times make a student bonkers. The Krebs Cycle is what it is, there's no real explanation for its existence, only an accepting and memorizing. The same can be said for pi and the hypotenuse formula and for Avogadro's number ("Why aren't there 7.25 x 10^23 atoms in a mole?" just isn't a question up for discussion.) History should be taught as it happened, not reframed for retelling. I could go on, but I won't...

I don't feel my education is happening to me in this narrative "banking-system" sense, even in the midst of a semester full of facts and laws and scientific theory. While I don't doubt that Subjects and Objects share the campus with me every minute of every day, this is not my experience. Perhaps experience is what separates me from the masses of Objects. Since my return to academia at 34, I have been fascinated with every subject I've encountered. Something my husband said to me a few weeks ago stuck with me. I was frustrated with a recent chemistry test grade. I had worked hard preparing for it, and walked away from the test confident that I had scored well, only to make a D. I was devastated, and in way of comfort my husband said, "I know how hard this is for you, especially considering how interested you are in the subject." Nobody would have said that to me in high school, as I was extremely vocal in my loathing for the sciences. But now, even chemistry is intriguing. I am an explorer seeking ancient treasure, a detective in search of hidden clues, an innovator on the trail of the latest-greatest invention -- every day that I attend classes or crack books or work calculations. And while I do leave some lectures feeling full enough to rip at the seams, I am no meek receptacle.

Nonetheless, I'm not blind to our education system's flaws. Teaching to the test is a hot-button topic in our home. My 4th-grader just finished his latest batch of TAKS tests. He's a brilliant student and has scored nothing lower than an A this year. He's also a non-traditional learner, as is his 2nd-grade brother. Fourth grade seems to be the first year his glorious potential has been on full display for his teachers; up until this year, they've seen talent and extreme intelligence, but only bits of it peeking through uncontrolled distraction and procrastination. I would counter that he was bored and unchallenged, that the teacher hasn't found his ENGAGE button yet. We nominated him for the gifted students program in hopes of catching his interest, only to have his teacher give him a poor recommendation because he wasn't completing assignments along with the rest of the class. It was that last eye-opening move from his 3rd-grade teacher that finally pressed his button, it would seem; he hasn't been late on a single assignment and has impressed his teachers enough this year to start the nomination process without any encouragement from me.

Has he finally come into his own in the classroom -- or has he just learned how to play The Game? The latter would only be negative if it aenesthetizes him and turns his education into routine. I believe you can play The Game well and remain a full partner in the educational process.

Meanwhile, little brother is already in the gifted program, having shown himself to be extremely ... ohh, let's call it ... unique. He is definitely a creative genius by many accounts. Nobody would argue his very obvious giftedness. But he is falling into some of the same procrastination traps that his brother fell for, and what's more, he reads 'below level' for his age group. Who actually sets the level and how is beyond me, but my little genius is below it. Lately we've noticed that the idiosyncracies of speech we once thought he'd grow out of have grown with him, and it dawned on me that they were probably affecting his reading grade. In 2nd grade, students are judged by how fluently they can read aloud, but if a student manifests tongue-thrust and other speech difficulties that weigh down fluency, it seems they can score below level. All the while they are reading long books with complex plots from the same series their older sibling reads -- for leisure -- as my son does.

So while I fully expect my children to learn how to function in the system in which they find themselves, to go with the flow when necessary, I also expect the system to grow, shift, and change shape in order to accommodate those within it, for which it exists. I think Freire would agree that the teachers -- the entire educational system, for that matter -- serve the students, not the other way around. My sons are not objects that meekly flip the lid of their skulls back so that an all-knowing teacher can pour a pre-approved knowledge-broth into them. We struggle to mold a teachable attitude in our children that is fully balanced with enough confidence to remain inquisitive, curious, and unafraid.