LEARNING WHAT THEY LIVE : not what they're told

Years ago John Dewey tellingly observed that children "learn what they live." Teachers can gabble on and on about democracy, for instance. But if they run a despotic classroom, the kids learn to adjust to despotism. Possibly they even learn to need it. Dewey was precisely right. Children learn what they live.  

It's hard to overemphasize the importance of this "hidden curriculum." It is powerful, yet often overlooked. Lessons "taught" in this way can last a lifetime. The person who taught me the most about tyranny and abuse of power, for instance, was my fourth grade teacher, Miss Weast . (Behind her back we kids called her: "Miss Weast, the big fat beast.") Feared by all, this angry woman extorted compliance by means of threats and violence. A ruler across the knuckles of your out-stretched hand, for example. 

Eventually, she did go too far. She held a youngster against a hot steam radiator as punishment. His relatively minor burns did not get her fired, as you might expect. But she was transferred to another school. But not before she had unintentionally taught me about the abuse of power. I still remember that lesson even though it was many, many years ago. It remains vivid.

Here's another example. This one concerning some Catholic parish schools of the 1950's. In those days a nnumber of overworked and under appreciated nuns bullied, slapped and otherwise mistreated the children in their charge. This taught some unfortunate lessons. For instance, the little girl next door to me developed severe school phobia in consequence, even though she was never touched herself. I'm not sure what these nuns thought they were doing. Making 'better' Catholics, perhaps. But in this girl's case they taught her that the sermonizing about Christian love, mercy and forgiveness, was all talk. And she learned that it's not what people say, but what they do that counts. Valuable lessons, to be sure. But hardly part of the official curriculum.

Here's a final instance. It involves entirely different circumstance. As a professor of education I visited a lot of inner city schools. Most were chaotic. In some the turmoil was so bad that learning was nearly impossible and safety very doubtful. Evidently those in charge lacked the power and/or will to impose meaningful consequences for gross misbehavior.

What did youngsters learn while enduring this chaos? That bullies rule? That might makes right? That there is no point in even trying to learn? That the real world is not even close to what it's supposed to be? Take your pick. 

Do children learn what they live? Count on it.