Shor: "Education is Politics"

Shor argues that communication and participation are the most important things for getting an empowering education. Shor also says that the teacher should be the person that motivates the students to communicate and participate. Shor also argues that we have to not only educationally empower students, but socially as well. Almost all education methods try to influence or shape the curriculum in some way. Because of this, students are not taught to think critically or to solve problems in a pratical way. Shor discusses how it is the teacher's job to not only educate the students from his or her own knowledge, but also to motivate the student to seek out education on their own. Teachers who don't do this, in my opinion, are not really doing their job at all.

 

 

Shor also talks about, to some extent, not being  so narrow minded. When teachers are narrow minded, the scope of what they can or will teach becomes diminished. When I thought of this, the reading from Rodriguez came to mind. I thought that a narrow minded teacher could potentially jepordize the cultures and identities of some students. Shor says that teachers need to know how to deal with their students' varying strengths and weaknesses, and know how to properly respond to them. I thought of the "Safe Spaces" article when I came across this point. Shor says that if teachers create a comfortable environment, then students will feel good enough about themselves to speak in class, which obviously leads to communication and participation skills. Through this, students learn that speaking up in life is the only way to get their point across. If students do this enough in a comfortable environment at school, they will eventually get over their fears of doing it in other situations.