Critical Pedagogy: Peter McLauren

The intentions of Peter McLauren’s article and the actual reaction that I happened to have, I am assuming, couldn't be further from each other. I started out the reading thinking about types of thinking and teaching theory like dialectical (process/product), contradiction vs. paradoxical issues, forms of understanding, macro and micro objectives, and knowledge or learning in general. 

As I continued to read, in the back of my mind it became more about all of the social aspects and affects school has on our students or children. The question that has posed itself in my mind since reading about all these concepts and pedagogies is: 

If we continue to teach our students cultural, social, economic, political, historical, technical, and practical information and continue to use history as a guideline, ... continue to show how woman were portrayed, show how cultures separate and differ from our own, continue to fall in line and teach social normalities and separate people on a basis of the previous--- are we then directing and predisposing though, feeling, roles, and standards or mindsets of our children? 

The question is so loaded but it kicked itself up in my thought process after reading McLaren’s “further questions: ...” on page 64. 

This is a very interesting reading on the basis of cultural and social questioning. The reading is very bold and blunt, it says what we all are thinking but typically wouldn’t mention with regards to approaches, theories, past and present social norms and interactions between classes, cultures, and genders. 

On page 75 McLauren talks about classroom sexism which, in my experience has always been a constant “issue” and has had a presence for as long as I have been in the classroom both as a student and as a teacher. For whatever reason teachers and students alike separate male and female student traits. In doing this I feel like we are setting a standard or an “ideal” expectation that predetermines the characteristics of a male or female students. I never thought this to be true but McLauren says

 “the hidden curriculum displaces the professed educational ideas and goals of the classroom teacher or school. ...teachers unconsciously give more intellectual attention, praise, and academic help to boys than to girls.” 

This is all stereotyping and I have seen students themselves use these stereotypes or ideas as excuses for why they “can’t” do something or “why” they do something the way they do it. This being said when we focus so much content on cultural histories, separation of classes, politics , economics, and all of these “things” that classify us as people or individuals, we set our students up for classifying themselves into categories verses encouraging them to grow and think into  the culture, class, or structure of thinking and strategy that will make them the best form of a person that they can be. Male or female. Page 76 gives numerous of examples collected within studies that demonstrate the issue of classroom sexism in action. Female students were not only spoken over the top of by male students but they also doubted themselves and were unsure of their answers (subordinate role).

“Classroom sexism ... results in unwitting and unintended granting of power and privilege to men over woman...” (75)

The theories and strategies by which we teach paired with the information we are teaching inadvertently can lead to cultural, economical, racial, and gender based stereotyping and biases. The content paired with how we communicate these topics and  information will ultimately guide and help students form and mold their own mindset about others and themselves. Educators and schools produce mindsets and thinking. What a powerful role schools honestly play for humans. 

Page 62 -- What is a school?

• indoctrination
• socialization
• instruction site
• cultural exposure
• cultural opinion formation
• social justice
• the teaching and formation of socially obedient worker development 
• domination
• liberation
• economic placement
• sexual placement
• gender role determination
• place of education 
• place of political formation
• place of mental programming