Wounded by School: Recapturing the Joy in Learning and Standing Up to Old School Culture

Another important book about freedom (and the lack of it) in modern education is Wounded by School by Kirsten Olson. It outlines the normal ways in which modern education hurts most children, shows the history of why schools adopt such harmful policies, and suggests real solutions.For example, Olson writes:"Many theorists suggest that the purpose of schools is to mold and shape individual self-concept so that pupils will accept a particular place in society..." Is this really what you want for your children?"On a larger scale, what is the impact on freedom of raising a generation of youth to "accept a particular place in society"? This is a class system, pure and simple.Olson points out that "Schools are deliberately designed to sort and track" students into order to promote the class system. Olson also suggests that among the key ways modern schools wound students are things like the following:* I felt sick in school.* I'm in the middle.* I must comply.* I can't measure up.* I am better than those below me.* I must impress my superiors.* What I want isn't as important as what my betters want.* Creativity must be secret--my focus must be conformity.* Learning isn't fun.And for parents: "I feel helpless about saving my child," and "The experts know what my kids need more than I do."Olson's solutions center around bringing freedom back into schooling. Indeed, this is the focus of a lot of cutting-edge books and research on education.Above all, we need to be clear about one thing: Freedom works. It does. Freedom is the best choice in society and also in education. If you are a parent or teacher, you have more power than you know. I highly recommend this book.

In this problematic book, Kirsten Olson argues not only that the ‘factory model’ of education is ineffective and even injurious to students, but that it is incapable of producing the kind of creative minds that our contemporary American workforce demands. Underlying her thesis is the notion that the emotion of joy, specifically the “joy of learning,” is the single most essential component to education, and that the experience of joy has been lost in the soul-crushing, day to day routine of America’s schools. Old School Culture, as Olson defines it, “is a set of old-fashioned ideas and attitudes in school that construct teaching as hierarchical, learning as passive, and the bureaucratic structures of school as about adults, not kids.”Olson makes some very strong claims, accusations, and generalizations, which normally would require a foundation of objective evidence to support. If Olson had prepared a court case in which she sought to convict the public school system of wounding its students, her case would rest predominantly on personal anecdotes and circumstantial evidence. Her interviewees, some of whom had been out of school for decades, would parade up to the witness stand to tell their stories of being wounded by school, as well as their road to recovery. Then, dramatically, Olson would take the stand as an expert witness, telling about her work as a school consultant and how she observed the attitudes of students in many different types of classroom environments, and how, in non-traditional school settings, “learners” respond in an entirely positive way.Olson draws broad generalizations about the American education system based on roughly two dozen interviews, which is hardly even a statistically significant sample. In one of the few times she does cite a survey, the data does not support her conclusion. In the 2006 High School Survey of Student Engagement she cites at the beginning of Chapter 9, 70.5 percent of the respondents agree or strongly agree with the statement “I care about my school,” and 72 percent agree or strongly agree with the statement “I am engaged in school.” In one of the responses Olson chose to include, only 31 percent of high school students said they have virtually no interaction with teachers on a day to day basis. That means 69 percent do. Yet she concludes that this survey “indicate[s] that a vast majority of high school students dislike their course material and have inadequate interactions with teachers, and a third of students sit in classrooms every day in which they feel completely unseen and unengaged.”None of this is to suggest that Olson does not offer any useful criticism or propose some thought-provoking alternatives in Wounded by School, but there are serious problems with her work. Even when it comes to alternative educational models, she leaves out the one that has existed alongside the factory model for nearly a century: the Montessori Method. According to one website, “Montessori practice is always up-to-date and dynamic because observation and the meeting of needs is continual and specific for each child. When physical, mental, spiritual, and emotional needs are met children glow with excitement and a drive to play and work with enthusiasm, to learn, and to create. They exhibit a desire to teach, help, and care for others and for their environment.” Those are all qualities that Olson claimed are not being promoted by our current school system, yet she only mentions Maria Montessori in a single footnote. This omission is even more glaring because the method is practiced in around 5,000 schools in the United States. Why would Olson ignore the most widespread alternative education model in the United States today?Ultimately, the purpose of K-12 education—hand in hand with parents, friends, and social and religious organizations—is to help a child survive and flourish when they reach adulthood. But a school is only one small piece of the puzzle. Ultimately, the individual must decide what he or she will take out of his or her own educational experience. In the mad rush to create the best employees for the 21st Century workplace, nurture un-wounded, happy technocrats, or “produce the kinds of minds and thinking that society really needs” (whatever that means), we forget that there are many ways of obtaining knowledge, and the school is just one means to that end—not the end in itself.

The book addresses a difficult and elaborate topic, but a very important one to explore and reflect on.

I understand that schools and school systems are at times stupid and uncaring. However, on the basis of my experience (long, long ago), those of friends, those of our five children, and those of several of our grandchildren, I found it difficult to recognize the very grim picture of our schools which the author paints. I work as a volunteer with public school teachers on various science activities, in-class and in the field, and have been impressed, by and large, with these teachers' ability and dedication. In my opinion, the author's description of our public schools paints a much blacker picture than is warranted. And it shows little understanding of the serious problems many schools face in terms of financial support, inappropriate interference by government at all levels, the educational bureaucracy, the unions, and a host of social problems over which the schools have little or no control. I get the impression that the author feels that our public school system is hopelessly and culpably flawed. Despite its obvious problems and faults, I cannot agree, although I must admit that some substantial changes are in order.

Everything is fine