Progressive educators face regular attacks on social media. Comments are often aggressive and malicious, with traditionalists playing to the mob mentality of their followers by jeering at progressive ideas. This blog has documented the caricatures with which traditionalists hope to score cheap points in on-line ‘debate’. We expect nothing less. Traditionalists can only be defensive about regurgitating their sterile, discredited and moribund prescriptions for education. What is more puzzling is the way progressives respond to the attacks by denying they are progressive.
Continue reading “Why do progressive educators deny being progressive?”Category: Progressive education
Do progressive teachers fight cuts?
State schools in England are facing cuts of £3billion. The consequences are already being felt with more classes of over 30 pupils, less resources and fewer teachers. Progressive education suffers disproportionately in these circumstances. In First Do No Harm, Steve Nelson contends that progressive schools should have classes of 16 pupils at most if the teacher is to provide a truly child-centred education. It’s no coincidence that traditionalists, whose blunt methods are more suited to larger classes (see this post), currently find favour with government ministers. In our time of austerity, should the priority of progressives be on promoting our teaching methods or fighting budget cuts?
Continue reading “Do progressive teachers fight cuts?”Is progressive education dead in state schools?
To answer the question, we need to define what we mean by progressive education. Steve Nelson writes in First Do No Harm that, “A fundamental concept of progressive education is the idea of children being agents or architects of their own learning.” For me, this is the fundamental concept. Children negotiate with the teacher over what, when and how to study, learning to take and justify decisions independently. Using this definition, progressive education in the state sector has been extinguished.
Continue reading “Is progressive education dead in state schools?”The double duty of progressives
Progressives seem to be on the back foot at the moment because of how the educational system measures outcomes. We have to succeed at the traditionalists’ knowledge-based targets and also at our own aims.
Continue reading “The double duty of progressives”
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