Eisner Response: Oct. 11th

 One part of this reading that really stuck out to me was the paragraph on page 89 that discussed criticism of schooling point out that one of the first things students learn is that providing the teacher with what they want to hear is often the path of least resistance. Students are very good at figuring out exactly how much effort is required to receive a specific letter grade and beyond that they engage autopilot and disengage with the lesson. This is a huge problem with the traditional model of schooling in my opinion where students are given very little agency or power over their own education.

Another stopping point in this article for me was about the 'implicit curriculum' that schools teach. I think this is such an important point because the way that a school is, how it is designed, the layout of classes and breaks, the facilities available to students, all of these things speak of the way education is perceived, how it is carried out, and the lessons that students take away from it. How can students believe that education is important if their school is falling apart? Will students value their education when their teachers are not engaged and show little interest in the material?

I think the definition of curriculum needs to be broader. It's not just about the topics students learn, but it's about how student learn, where they learn, and the values that are implicitly imparted upon students over the thousands of hours they spend in the education system. BC's curriculum connects to Eisner's ideas in that it is founded on three core competencies: thinking, communication, and personal and social. The idea being that students are not only learning how to think in school but they are learning how to operate in the adult world, ie. communication and social skills. Furthermore, the curriculum in BC has been broadening over the years with more and more diverse offerings coming forward as there is a demand for greater specialization at the high school level. Eisner advocates for subjects like art, economics and law to be taught because it is highly useful for adults to have a working understanding of how these things work or contribute to our societies. It would be difficult to fit all of these subjects into the time available for instruction in high school, but there is something to be said for efficiencies being made so that students could at least be exposed to some of these forgotten subjects.