Piling Up the Knowledge

In the last few years in education there has been a shift from teaching content to teaching skills. The idea is that skills are things that students can use forever whereas content can be only used in the moment to pass a quiz or a test. Sort of like the teach the kid to fish so he can eat everyday, it's a pedagogical teach the kid to think so he can think everyday.

On the surface the concept is great, but as anything it most successful in moderation. Siddhartha's middle way consistently accurate, I find. I digress, it seem like we are constantly attempting to give students more tools in their toolbox but at the end of the day, they have no idea what they are suppose to be building. What is the purpose of teaching them to communicate effectively, if they don't know why they should communicate at all. 

We have begun to say that there is information that students can just "google"  like a geographical place, an definition,  or a quick reference but it don't seem to explain to them how to put it in context with the rest of the information in their heads. Before google we had libraries filled with books filled with information but we didn't dismiss the importance of needing to know where Syria is. Why is it important to know the neighboring countries?

It would be handy to have an understanding of geography now as the Arab Spring has occurred. Knowing the religious backgrounds and historical content of these countries may help us in understanding the reasons for social change or revolt in some cases. How do we teach our students that Google is just a nugget and that they tools that are taught are suppose to be fashioning a great big web of knowledge to make them better global citizens?

Loss of Depth

What am I responsible for as a teacher of religion? Is my objective to teach the details such as rituals, rites, history or am I to engage in discourse about faith? Emotion? Ethics? Difference? And of course the search for Truth?

Every teacher struggles with not having enough time. A few hours a week is not enough to teach everything there is to know about reading, writing and arithmetic thus surely it is not enough time to teach about god. Therefore, we limit ourselves. We set boundaries on what makes the cut and what doesn't. We censor in order to provide more of the big picture, hoping that with that in the hands of students they could examine the material as a virtual Where is Waldo? and they will glean the details. Is it this very idea why we have students that know that Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliette, but can not explain the complexity of family and love that it holds within it's renown sonnets? Is there value in recognition without synthesis; without analysis; without ownership?

An unsure teacher sits and considers the value of the surface in the face of sacrificing the depth.