Back To School: There's NOTHING Funny, About School.
Posted: Monday, August 22, 2011
by Paul Schroeder
alien / demonic attachment
As a lifelong educator, I recall with poignant ironic pain the audible groans and small noises of extreme displeasure that my students in all classes exuded when I excitedly and loudly announced,
"And now, with the power invested in me, in this state of intoxication, I pronounce you, pupil and book!"
Monitors came to the windows where books were piled high to distribute one to each seventeen and eighteen year old senior high school English student.
Over the next two, six week terms, we would en masse read, digest and absorb these books.
Our next generation sat groaning and miserable, eighteen year olds trapped in neat rows behind graffiti covered wooden desks, chafing under the inglorious restraint of required, assigned literature towards the light at the end of the tunnel, graduation from high school.
I could leave undistributed piles of books of American novels, Shakespearean plays, undisturbed, for weeks, on those window sills, (while I waited for inspired teaching approaches to those books to strike me), and noticed that in the hubbub of classes, no copies would vanish or be pilfered; assigned texts were uniformly clearly disliked, deigned as sour, uninviting classroom props.
I reminded these pupils who groaned and suffered aloud as they hefted these volumes, that they should be very proud to BE students, that no other strata of society regularly came and returned back, carrying books; that soon enough, they would be relegated to be wage slaves, working every day to get bread for the bologna and bologna for the bread.
I enforced upon them that the term "commencement ", graduation lexicon, simply and literally meant, 'beginning'; that they would, after leaving me, have a whole future lifetime reading assigned texts in schools, in pursuit of college, masters and doctoral degrees.
They were stunned that 'cease firing!" meant 'an ending', but that "commence firing!", meant to 'begin'; 'commencement' surely meant the beginning of an advanced education, yet to arrive.
They were unimpressed and unhappy, "Do we have to bring these books, EVERY DAY!?"
I assured them that "A" students would read the book and bring their texts, daily, that "C" students would merely bring the book and be generally unprepared, and that "F" students would look askance at me and ask, "What book?!"
"What will become of books?" is a pointed query, given my first hand experiences with America's newest, most dumbed down generation and their open abject love for their "Idiot Box T.
“School is a great cannibal of young girls and boys, withering their spirit, an oppressive institution, one solely of discipline and routine”
That screen and their computer screens, gave them a clear disdain for any imparted wisdom within the dancing linear lines of books.
If situation comedies, banal and superficial, were more loved than books and daily shaped the minds of this generation of Americans, what kind of uninformed citizens would we have?
One, surely that could be easily pushed around by a government!
They refused to do assigned readings and failed exams because reading" interferred with their after school (work and) free time".
Arthur Miller Plays were seen as Brussels Sprouts, modern poetry was cooked spinach, Mark Twain's works, mere waxed string beans
on the mind's table; next to those essentials was a box of sticky mind candy, a screen filled with images and music, caramel coated, directly in front of their favorite chair.
I told them that they had been "dumbed down"!
They refused to accept that idea. I asked them
what they thought could happen to a nation of people by their government, who rather
than read books, are addicted to watch nightly series of sit-com's ,
simple plots filled with smarmy, banal characters, surrounded by synthetic, plugged-in laugh- tracks?
What citizens would these people likely be?
They were stubborn.
Why work and struggle to understand an oblique idea written in a paragraph on a white page?
I assured them that if they WERE devout and eclectic readers, they would be deeply insulted by television's use of
"plugged-in laughs", from audiences who were never there, to affect the viewer's mind into thinking that what they had just heard WAS funny.
If one person yawns, it's contagious; if many people laugh, electronically, what happens? .
They would, I said, resent the scheming, sneaky subliminal attempts to 'force' a laugh from undiscerning, unsuspecting viewers, by the laughs that were electronically plugged in to banal, unfunny spoken asides and unfunny, banal retorts, in all sit-coms.
None of the spoken lines, I dared them, were remotely funny enough to ever deserve even THOSE electronic laughs.
To the majority of students who said that they could name five situation comedies that they watched each night, I suggested an extra credit field experiment:
They were to watch those situation comedies, but were directed to be aware of and to "remove" the 'laugh-track', from their mind ; they were to be aware of the artificial "studio laughs", and to 'weigh' how appropriately or inappropriately they were plugged into the 'writing' of the show's so-called funny lines.
Suddenly, the television comedy that had earlier made them smile and grin, truly wasn't funny at all, they now found, if it were viewed without that background laugh -track!
I brought in filmed copies of shows with edited out laugh tracks.
Critical awareness grew, in class, of sit-coms' forced subliminal control, a manipulation that they now resented, but one that had been attempted and had succeeded with them, earlier.
Now, they felt disappointed but also felt a little smarter..
I told them that "Mash", the series, had been shown in England without the laugh track heard in America, and had succeeded, nonetheless, as a funny sitcom on its own funny merits, actually benefiting from the lack of a laugh track.
But now, how to encourage them that the dancing linear line, in reading books, was superior to the idiot box?
School's disciplines and routines had them well toasted, burnt out and apathetic, by the twelve successive grades , before I got them, as seniors.
What's the real truth about school?
School is a great social cannibal of young girls and boys souls; it withers their spirit as it is an oppressive institution, one of uninspired teaching, one of no real learning except that of discipline and routine.
Orders are passed down from the Mayor's office to the Chancellor and to the Superintendants and to all principals; because of their test score fears, training for official exams takes almost all of the time spent in academic classrooms.
Discipline and routine masquerade, in the whole educational system, to replace creative teaching; both critical thinking skills and an innate love for books and learning are smothered in most students, vectored away.
High district test score marks on official math and reading exams are coveted, rather than an education delivered .
(Some students, in spite of that awful place of school, manage to evolve into writers, doctors, architects, lawyers, teachers and surely prove exceptions to this 'rule'.)
But, even these exceptions, prove the 'rule'.
How do most students feel, about school, for the most part?
Having taught for thirty-five years, I once stumbled across a desk -carved graffiti graphic that was succinct and apt in its genuine emotion about school;
within the face of a drawn tombstone, with set flowers, read:
R.I.P. :
"This is Dedicated
To All of Those
Who Died,
Waiting For the Bell to Ring"
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Top-level comments on this article: (2 total)This sounded vaguely familiar to me. My husband is an educator and has taught everything from English to History, Welding, Photography and more over the years. In English students lamented at having to read a book, in Photography they'd groan and say, do we HAVE to take pictures? And in Welding class, they'd attempt to melt everything or start fires. Maybe they need to bring back the Nuns with the pointers. If I recall correctly, they seemed to get the job done! Interesting article Paul.Please log in to respond to this comment."Vaguely familiar", is what's printed on my marriage certificate!
Is teacher's pay, up there, by the Arctic Circle comparable to NYC pay?
With a P.H.D. and thirty some very odd years, in the NYC system, I was making a little over ninety, a meagre pittance.
Please log in to respond to this comment.It wasn't, 'pointers', Iv'e been told by friends, who say they 'survived' Catholic Parochial Schools.
One recalled a hand carried thimble, by which means a sharp rap on the head could be delivered, at close range, as this nun passed through rows to check on homework.
He said that as a result of his sometimes mumbling epithets at her, under his breath, he was sporting small bumps, all over his head.
Such teacher 'attentiveness', called back into action, should mean lawsuits, unlike the past.
The 'wilding' of pupils, their acting out of control in class, happens more. Amotivational parents are to blame in addition to
a failed educational system.
I appreciate you in my corner.
Affection,
PaulPlease log in to respond to this comment.
Hi Paul.
First off, let me say that I absolutely abhor laugh tracks. They are an insult to my intelligence and just plain annoying. I don't watch sitcoms and if Bernd has tuned to one (he has more tolerance than I do) and I walk into the room, he quickly changes the channel. Good boy!
My experience of grade school was not that bad. But I could definitely identify with that last bit of graffiti. I did have one teacher in high school, however, who was a huge influence on me and was what I considered a good teacher should be in all ways. But I still felt that I could do a better of job of educating myself. Sad, isn't it?
Your article was well written ... as it should be. :) And it was easy to read. I enjoyed its artfulness.
Hugs,
DiannePlease log in to respond to this comment.Hugs, back to you!
(see me, after class......)
Please log in to respond to this comment.Hmmmmm.Please log in to respond to this comment.Or summer school!?Please log in to respond to this comment.You craft jewelry, I attempt to craft words.
I appreciate your own 'artfulness', as more valuable a craft, dazzling candy on a lapel compared to mine, requiring a trudging through pages,
but I do much thank you for noticing.
Affection,
PaulPlease log in to respond to this comment.Honestly, I don't think that because what I do is tactile that it is more valuable. I would guess that it is a little easier for the average person to appreciate my art, but I really enjoy a well crafted paragraph. I find myself wishing that I had written it. A clever turn of phrase can bring a smile to my face as easily as a pretty bauble.Please log in to respond to this comment.
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