Finn and Oakes (Extended Comments)

Katie's Blog
Quotes from Finn and Oakes

As I read the two articles for this week I tried to keep Dr. Bogad's words in mind, "can separate be equal?" I found that unlike the Brown v. Board case, where I could firmly say that separate was not equal, I could not come to a definitive answer on either side of the issue of tracking students in public schools.

Starting with Oakes, Tracking: Why Schools Need to Take Another Route, I found myself going back in forth between arguing that schools should group students into different levels to arguing that it is harmful to students to do so.
Oakes writes,

"Tracking leads to substantial differences in the day-to-day learning experiences students have at school. Moreover, the nature of these differences suggests that students who are placed in high-ability groups have access to far richer schooling experiences than other students."

I’ll draw from my own experiences to comment on this quote. In my own school, Math, English and Science classes were broken up into high, middle, and lower level groups. When I was in honors classrooms I did much better than when I was in inclusive classrooms because the teachers spent less time on discipline, we went at a faster pace, and I was motivated to keep up with the other students. In my regular classes I was bored easily, distracted, and less challenged. While on the one hand I think it would be beneficial for previously labeled lower level students to be in classrooms with highly motivated students, I worry that it might drag the material behind for the students who are moving faster.

I enjoyed reading Finn’s experience growing up and teaching in urban Chicago schools in, Literacy with an Attitue but when he described the feelings of some of his graduate students, I must say that I had to agree with them,


"When I suggest to my hard-bitten students that poor children are not being as well educated as they could be, they are not amused. They take it as a personal attack from someone who has been living in in ivory tower for the last thirty years and they resent it—a lot"

Finn describes the only 8 years he ever spent teaching in public schools as being the wrong way to go about it (militant-like, not challenging) and then went to graduate school where he changed his perspective. But he never describes how he personally implemented his new teaching method theory. Considering how difficult these teachers in urban areas seem to have it, if he hadn’t tried these ideas on his own I probably wouldn’t listen to him either.

I think the best quote from Finn was about students in working class areas and schools systems,

"Their capacity for creativity and planing was ignored or denied. Their response was very much like that of adults in their community to work that is mechanical and routine."
I am a firm supporter in social justice opportunities for underprivileged students and I think it is horrible that teachers significantly lower their expectations and materials to those children who deserve a good education. That being said, I also think it is unfair to punish highly motivated students by giving them less attention because they somehow, “don’t need it” and this is the unfair attitude that these authors seem to suggest.

If you are interested in social justice and equitable education, I suggest looking to books by Louise Dunlap: Undoing the Silence I met and worked with her at a teaching conference two years ago and found it to be a great experience.

I’m interested to hear what the rest of the class thought of these articles and the conference. Do you think schools school segregate based on GPA and perceived abilities of students?

My Response:

While reading Katie’s blog I really like the quotes and points she used and agreed with what she had to say. These two articles by Oakes and Finn are about the idea of tracking in schools. The students are separated into different classes and even different levels depending on their skills. The first quote Katie used I felt that I also could relate to it.

"Tracking leads to substantial differences in the day-to-day learning experiences students have at school. Moreover, the nature of these differences suggests that students who are placed in high-ability groups have access to far richer schooling experiences than other students."

Like Katie I could personally relate to this quote. At my High School classes were broken up by Advanced Placement, College Prep, Honors and regular classes. The AP classes were at a much faster pace and required the students to do a lot of work on their own. The CP classes were at a fast pace but not as fast as AP classes and the work load was not as much. For the honors classes and regular classes there was not much of a difference besides a little extra work for honors. The students that were in AP and CP classes were given more praise because they were said to be the “smarter” students. Some students though who should have been in those classes opted out of taking them and took a lower level class. If you were not “smart” enough to take them then you could not because of the fear that the students who were not “smart” enough to take them would slow the rest of the students down and take away from them. The AP and CP classes were taken very serious by both the students and the teachers but the honors and regular classes were not taken serious by both the teachers and students. Some of the students were in the honors and regular classes because the AP and CP classes were too fast for them but the students still wanted good teachers who take their class seriously but since they are not in the “smarter” classes they do not get the same experience. I think that although it may be okay to separate students by levels, each level should be able to have the same experience and same quality for learning.

I also like this quote that Katie cited by Finn.

"Their capacity for creativity and planning was ignored or denied. Their response was very much like that of adults in their community to work that is mechanical and routine."

Katie said that she thinks it is horrible that teachers lower their expectations and materials for underprivileged students but she says that they deserve a good education, I could not agree more. Expectations and materials should not be lowered but just made equally.

In class I would like to talk about if anyone has experienced tracking or knows someone who has been.