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Summary: Great!
Comment: i got my product in a timely manner and it was in great condition. Thanks!!

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Summary: a must for taxpayers, teachers, parents and students
Comment: John Taylor Gatto taught in New York City public schools for 30 years. He is now a writer and a
lecturer. He was named New York City Teacher of the Year and New York State Teacher of the Year.

"The Seven Lesson School Teacher" is the first chapter of his book. It is the speech
he gave after he was named New York State teacher of the year in 1991.

I've summarized
the first chapter (which I taught to my high school sophomores and juniors).

Mr. Gatto
said that he teaches 7 things. They are as follows:

1)confusion - lessons are out of
context & out of sequence; random instruction; standardized tests; too many subjects; assemblies;
fire drills; staff development days; age segregation; no depth in subjects; most teachers are not
experts

2)class position - kids assigned numbers; stay in classes; stay in classrooms;
envy and fear of the better classes; contempt for the lower classes

3)indifference -
forced enthusiasm; bell rings, students must stop doing stuff (in class or change classes) />
4)emotional dependency - individuality is discouraged; students lack rights; teachers &
administrators manipulate and control the students

5)intellectual dependency - lesson
chosen by teachers, administration or school board; students told to wait before working; wait for
the expert to tell you what to do; helpless people are good for the economy (food service, law,
medicine, teaching, tv, entertainment)

6)provisional self-esteem - confident people are
problems; you are to be evaluated & judged; most grades have very little work in them;
self-evaluation is rarely done; people must rely on experts to see their value

7)one
can't hide - control and surveillance; no private spaces or private time; little time between
classes; people trained to tell on each other; homework keeps them busy and away from other
learning

"Schools are an essential support system for social engineering that condemns
most to be subordinate stones in a pyramid that narrows as it ascends to a terminal of control" pg.
13 (this reminds me of Huxley's Brave New World)

Mr. Gatto makes a few other points in
his speech as well. I've listed them in bullet format for you.

- Schools were created
partly as a result of two "Red Scares" in 1848 and 1919. People in power were afraid of the
industrial poor and wanted to reign in the culture of the new immigrants (Celtics, Slavs and
Latins).
- Look at the seven lessons: they are "all prime training for permanent underclasses,
people deprived forever of finding the center of their own special genius." (16)
- These
lessons and the problems in our schools have now seized the middle class as well
- Critical
thinking is not taught
- Solutions: family schools, farm schools, small entrepreneurial
schools, religious schools, craft schools
- Lessons not taught: self-reliance,
self-motivation, perseverance, courage, dignity, love
- TV, sports/clubs, and jobs take up all
the free time outside of school - learning and the feeling of community are stifled

Customer Rating:

Summary: Makes you think.
Comment: I wish I'd read this while I was in school; I'd have seen then that there was something wrong with
the system, not me. This book is thought-provoking and a must-read for parents of kids of all ages.

Customer Rating:

Summary: Great Diagnosis; Solutions Not So Great
Comment: Gatto makes a compelling and strong argument for precisely what the problem is with our educational
system - in essence, that it is designed to make good consumers who follow the rules and don't
challenge authority, and who can be trusted with doing repetitive tasks and quietly occupying their
designated socio-economic niche without much complaint. Given that he has over 30 years of
experience in the public school system, he almost assuredly knows what he's talking about. />
Unfortunately, the last few chapters in the book dip severely in quality, as Gatto presents
his "solution" to the problem: complete privatization of the school system. His assumption that it
would be better is never fully explored; it's simply stated, with some great comments about how
wonderful homeschooling is. But in a completely free market system education, like everything else,
becomes a product, and unfortunately it's one that parents can't fully explore before they've
already "purchased" it. That is, after all, the entire premise underlying this book - that there is
a "hidden curriculum" in public schools (Gatto never mentions that it's also in many private
schools, though that's obviously the case) which parents usually aren't aware of until the damage
has been done. How, then, are parents going to make an intelligent choice between the options
available to them in a fully privatized school setting? Gatto never makes that clear.
/>Furthermore, if indeed it is corporate and governmental interests which push this hidden
curriculum, then how could complete privatization help? They are, after all, the groups with the
money, and in the free market those interests would almost assuredly be able to offer a
near-complete monopoly on the market. Parents, after all, will only ever have limited choices on how
to educate their child - homeschooling, various local private schools (unless they're willing to
board their eight year old somewhere), or public schools; all privatization will ensure is that
public schooling is no longer even an option and instead parents will be entirely dependent on what
the local private schools have to offer or the possibility of homeschooling.

The
obvious solution to this educational dilemma would be for the government and private organizations
to encourage more parents to pursue homeschooling, or to promote "alternate" educational systems
such as Waldorf and Montessori schools which don't have the same problems Gatto notes.
Unfortunately, Gatto doesn't bring up those possibilities. For him, "privatization" is presented as
a panacea which will miraculously solve the problem.

By all means, read the book. It's
a scathing report on the way "traditional" education destroys children's interest in learning and
ability to think independently, and well worth the read. Skip the last chapters, though - in them,
Gatto depends on his readership having had their own critical thinking ability destroyed.

Customer Rating:

Summary: excellent read
Comment: this title by john gatto is an excellent read with a thought provoking analysis of the current
educational system

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