Is Our Children Learning?
A story from New Zealand illustrates an educational trend that is spreading worldwide. A trend I see in the U S of A in the news far too often.
Schools, districts, and government instituted curriculum plans are trimming the meat from classroom learning. The article describes Shakespeare studies as being one of those trims: “Shakespeare’s plays and other great works of literature considered too difficult for some pupils will disappear from classrooms under proposed changes to the curriculum.” That statement makes me sick.
Isn’t school meant to be challenging? I remember complaining about difficult parts of class in middle school and high school, but dangit, I learned something!
Standardized testing and the like are putting emphasis on subjects of minimal importance. You can’t have a multiple-choice test on literature. Learning can’t be measured. Why not reintroduce Shakespeare and other “difficult” materials into the classroom and have the youth of today learn culture, critical thinking, and appreciation of art?
And who says Shakespeare is difficult? The real difficulty today is people finding the patience to really learn something that takes time. Anything worth learning can’t really be studied in one or a few class sessions, can it? I’ve been studying Shakespeare for years! Many have studied Shakespeare (or other creative arts related subjects) their entire lives and still find gratification in the pursuit of knowledge.
What will the world of tomorrow be in an education system that teaches us to skim the surface of the knowledge pool without ever swimming to the deep end of knowledge?
Willshill Nov 17
“Shakespeare’s plays and other great works of literature considered too difficult for some pupils will disappear from classrooms under proposed changes to the curriculum.” That statement makes me sick.
_______________________________
“My gorge [also] rises at it.”
Interesting isn’t it? The very ones making the decisions about such things are, in fact and in the first place, the very reason for the need for any such decision to be made at all. It must go a long way towards assuaging the guilt felt for doing such a lousy job of ‘teaching’ something so unsuccessfully all these years. But I suppose supplanting such authority and responsibility, particularly and especially in face of its bungled mishandling,is an effective way of holding on to the reins. And let’s not forget to also blame the horse at the end of those reins for steering the cart into a muddy ditch. It’s “too difficult”–not for them, you notice–but for the students.
____________________________________________
And who says Shakespeare is difficult?
_________________________________________
Well, the students, of course!!!
They’ve been bored to death for years by the didacticism associated with teaching Shakespeare AS fossilized literature. I too hated Shakespeare as a high school student, and at the time would have gladly contributed to a chorus of those who found it as a component merely ‘ancillary’ or ‘unnecessary’ to a list of ‘useful’ educational subjects. But I also felt that way about Algebra.
Gee, I wonder…Is algebra ‘too difficult’ for a lot of students? Let’s dumb it down or teach it in such a protracted fashion that it becomes pretty much a ‘useless’ exercise. Better yet, let’s get rid of it altogether– because very few actually use it as a tool later on.
Because THAT’S really what they’re saying, though I’m sure they’d deny it. Doesn’t it logically follow, that something considered to be an integral part of so many curricula, now found to be ‘dispensable’, is also found to be useless as important preparation and background in a well-rounded education?
Their techniques have led to this ‘economy of importance’; some of the results of which were related to in another section on this blog dealing with “Translating Shakespeare”. It just takes too much time.
I could go on about the contribution of the ‘get to the point’ mentality inherent in today’s social attitudes–particularly as it relates to these ‘educators’ and their inability to ‘get to the point’ when it comes to Shakespeare–but that’s another piece of the mess that reams could be written on.
I was once advised when writing for message boards and blogs to ‘keep it short and sweet; that way people are more inclined to read the whole piece”. Sadly, this seems to apply across the board everywhere and in everything. No matter what the worth of what’s written; no matter how important it might be; no matter how inclusive or enlightening–make sure it’s 10 words or less. Impossible.
I should have asked for pardon in advance- I didn’t quite ‘cut to the chase’ here.
Clix Nov 20
I didn’t see anything about Shakespeare being off-limits to teachers. It looks to me like the curriculum is being shifted to focus more on skills, so that students can then apply those skills in the pursuit of new knowledge.
The “get to the point” mentality comes from a realization that we have a limited amount of time to spend on the various tasks we understake. Time is valuable. I think it’s important to ask ourselves, as teachers – in the time we spend teaching one particular unit, what other alternatives are we choosing NOT to teach?
And – is it worth it?
Willshill Nov 20
The ‘educators’ I refer to are not Teachers, but School Boards, Committees, and Officials, who often have an agenda much departed from the long-term interests in the students actually learning something worthwhile.
What I meant by getting to the ‘point’ when it comes to Shakespeare, is that it’s much more to the point when the work isn’t treated as so much dry literature for literature’s sake. This is the approach that’s deadly to generating the interest that leads to a desire learn anything at all about the subject. When it’s taught as theatre–which is what it is–viewpoints change. Participation begins almost immediately to amend the idea that it’s “too difficult” when everyone shares that ‘difficulty’. What’s difficult actually can be fun. The students’ involvement and their mutual participatory investment is key.
“And-is it worth it?”
Do you mean is Shakespeare worth it?
To paraphrase Hamlet:
Aye, there’s the Rub; if That is the Question.
jodi Jan 22
I help with a Shakespeare Club at the elementary school that my children attend. Not only is it the most popular club at school, it is absolute proof of the fact that Shakespeare, when taught in an engaging way, can be grasped by 5 year olds. My 4th grader is working on her lines from Antony & Cleopatra as I type and she LOVES that she gets to slap a messenger for bringing her bad news. She is the Queen of Egypt, you know…
Willshill Jan 23
Jodi, that’s so good to hear. All it takes is someone to realize the kids are ready–more ready than most, whose first exposure is in some boring literature class in high school. Lately my focus has been as an artist in residence in elementary settings. I’ve learned that so many good things emanate out of the students getting up on their feet and doing the work–not just an interest in the work itself, but the confidence to say it out loud. This can translate to confidence in anything they do. My students love the idea that they’re accomplishing what’s supposed to be “too hard” for them. You might be interested in checking out the RSC’s program “Stand Up for Shakespeare”. Although I’m pretty much a grass-roots one-man-show and I don’t have their vast resources, having been trained in RSC techniques as an actor/director, I’ve experienced some very similar, positive results with the syllabi I’ve written for the children.
Kent Richmond Jan 28
It is tempting to blame the loss of Shakespeare in some schools on uninspiring teachers, lazy students, and busybody school boards. But I concluded ten years ago that Shakespeare’s language is the main impediment. Getting up to speed in a 400-year-old dialect is a chore and requires more exposure to the language than any responsible school curriculum can offer.
It is difficult to expect people to make such an investment when the payoff is access to just 15-20 plays. Nearly half of Shakespeare’s plays are rarely performed, and non-Shakespeare plays from that era and the century that followed are mostly ignored. Moliere, translated from the French, is Shakespeare’s only competition among those who wrote before 1720.
Shakespeare is too influential to ignore, so well-written and faithful translations are one way to go. They involve real reading of very challenging material. Since comprehension increases greatly, the discussions do not need to be so teacher-directed and students can read more plays. (My son says that it took 6 weeks for his teacher to get a 9th grade class through a play that Shakespeare says “Is now the two hours traffic of our stage.”) The hands-on methodology is fine, but kids are already pretty good at playacting and slapping.
This next observation may seem counter-intuitive, but these translations seem to work best with gifted students and college students. A translation that maintains the complexity of Shakespeare’s expression is still too challenging for students with weak reading skills. They better stick to the comic book versions. The stronger students, on the other hand, blossom.
Gedaly Jan 28
Of course the language is an impediment to the success. It’s a challenge to many students. So is algebra, so is a foreign language, so is chemistry, biology, and so is grammar. But a great science teacher is committed to helping students understand what everything means and its significance. There are fewer teachers of literature that can do that for Shakespeare. Unlike the first half of a semester in a science or math class, literature can be taught without understanding Shakespeare so it’s easier to gloss over.
While teachers are not entirely to blame, it has a lot to do with it. In a situation where students do get excited about reading or acting Shakespeare, the success ALWAYS is due to an amazing teacher who teachers his/her students the patience to learn it as well as all the fun and learning there is afterwards.
Just look at this success story: http://www.hobartshakespeareans.org/ Many of these are kids who speak English as a second language. So if a non-native speaking child can learn to appreciate Shakespeare’s work under proper guidance, I’m sure most others could too.
Kent Richmond Jan 29
Why is it important for children so young to appreciate Shakespeare? What’s the rush? Schools sure have an inflated sense of their importance. Regardless of what schools do, Shakespeare will still be the most performed dramatist in the world, and will probably be performed by a lot of people who ignored him in high school. Shakespeare does not need the help of overachieving school kids to remain at the top of the heap.
I wonder what we would be teaching today if Shakespeare had been run over by an oxcart in 1588 and never penned a thing. Would we really be looking for the next best thing and moaning that kids today just cannot get into Ben Johnson, Marlowe, and Fletcher and Beaumont?
Gedaly Jan 30
When asking students of any age if they like Shakespeare, the common response is no. The reason? They don’t understand it and they’re afraid of the unfamiliar language.
It’s not essential for kids to appreciate Shakespeare, but I would rather that most of them did not fear him.
Willshill Jan 30
“Why is it important for children so young to appreciate Shakespeare? What’s the rush? Schools sure have an inflated sense of their importance.”
I believe your question can be answered.
First, I think it might be advisable to set some parameters:
What Is important enough for children so young to appreciate? And determining what those things might be–what’s the rush?
Finally, would it then be a given that the body of consensus from which the determinations might issue, in any such case, have an inflated sense of its own importance?