The Organization of Teaching and Learning (Text pg. 57-78)

This chapter discusses how schools are formal organizations, which is an interaction which people’s behaviour is directed towards specific goals, with divisions of labour, clearly defined relationships among other things. Schools are also bureaucracies which is similar in nature. There is a fuss going on about schools being too bureaucratic which in turn trying to fix it is only going to make things worse. Free schools, home schools and open structured schools are discussed. Free schools are falling short, home schooling is doing fairly well as it seems those students are where they need to be, and open structured schools seem to be having classroom management issues as everyone is all over the place and there aren’t clear laid out rules.

Canada’s French Immersion Movement began with some parents in Montreal wanting their children to be bilingual. They started up a kindergarten of their own and after 16 years of remaining officially experimental, French immersion schools were all over in Canada and now thousands of students are enrolled in French immersion schools or programs. These schools contain two streams, a regular English taught stream and a French immersion stream. It is still unsure after all these years whether or not relations between French and English speakers have improved. There seems to be tension even between each set of teachers in an immersion school.

Different policies, roles of teachers and principals are discussed as well as different debates going on in teacher education which include whether or not the teacher knows enough about their subject matter and if they know a set of teaching methods. The chapter concludes with two approaches to teaching. The first is the transmission model. This model says that learning is an objective process, with only minor variations from one student to another, as well as the fact that all the students in one class can be taught the same material at the same pace and be tested in the same way. The second model is the constructivist model. This model sees teaching as socially situated, child centred, and developed through classroom social interactions. The teaching emphasis is on discussion, collaboration, and negotiation. The cultural capital of all children is acknowledged.

I would first like to comment on the French Immersion Movement. Being a French major, I am all for French immersion schools. I think they are a great idea and I think they should be absolutely everywhere in the country. I would have loved to have the opportunity to begin to learn French in school when I was 5 years old. That is the best time to learn another language therefore why aren’t we all starting there? I don’t like the fact that relations aren’t any better even after there are so many more bilingual Canadians now than there used to be. While studying in Quebec City for four months, I found most people to be very nice. However I did not like the fact that when they could tell you were English, they would begin speaking to you in English, even if your French was obviously better than their English. They should be very happy and proud that so many others have the desire and the determination to learn their language. I hope that in the future there are more immersion schools and that the relations between the French speaking and English speaking Canadians become better.

Reading the description about the transmission model kind of made me upset. I’m happy to know that most people use the new constructivist model, which is the way things should be. We learn so much about differentiated instruction, different methods and strategies of teaching, and how important it is to know each and every student. I hope that all of the new teachers don’t even consider using the transmission model and have more sense than to think that every student is going to be the same, can move at the same pace, and can learn in the exact same manner as every other student. That sounds absolutely ridiculous to me!