When I read over our classmates' writing journals, I'm continually struck by entries from the full time teachers in the class. It's probably not much of a surprise, but I wasn't much of a high school student--teetering on the edge of a C-/D average. Maybe it sounds strange, but I often felt buried by the rigid, task-oriented work so much a part of the daily grind of a high school student. I still struggle with this everyday as a graduate student and am baffled by it truthfully. My mind burns for inspiration, a spark somewhere--when it disappears, I am catapulted back to the land of the mundane--a truly miserable, rather suffocating landscape with no exit route. Perhaps everyone feels like this, I don't know. But in this way, I have battled with the structured world of school. Immaturity is certainly a possibility.
So, when I read our classmates' journals--especially those on teaching, by teachers--I find myself vastly interested, moved even. Zac wrote an interesting entry detailing his endeavor to "spark" this desire to "want to pass." So, the question is: how to spark this desire? No easy answer, I suppose--certainly not even limited to "one" answer, but instead a series of active engagements. I recall a class discussion from few weeks back where many of the young pedagogues explained their frustration about this issue. How do you reach the students that are uninspired--is it that creativity is so associated with the un-structured world of non-school? That's why I find Davidson's technique so unique-- it intricately weaves the world of art, inspiration, and creativity with that of the intensive world of study, practice. All the things that you need to really hone your art and creative energy. Through this, that old idea of art being so "un-structured" becomes obsolete.
The questions still remains: how to incorporate this to high schoolers, those who "have to be there." I guess I really don't know just yet. Interesting, this, though.
I share Zac's concern with students, and I could see how many students fall through the crack. In high school, I was unmotivated by school, but I knew that I had to work hard to get into college. I was a B+ student that turned in work, but always the bare minimum. Now, that trend has plagued me somewhat, because I run into "myself" in the students I teach. The problem is that many of them aren't even willing to do the bare minimum. I struggle with the same things of motivation, and "going to college" doesn't seem like much of a motivator. Which is surprising, since many of the students say they want to go to college? We have a new generation of students that expect everything to handed to them, and I don't blame them for some of the disturbing trends I see in education.
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