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Idealism, Pragmatism And Realism
Idealism vs realism philosophy in education
Idealism, Pragmatism And Realism
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Having expectations for others is a normal thing, however, when these expectations reach an unrealistic level, it becomes harmful to the person on the receiving end. In the story "I Just Wanna be Average," unrealistic high or low level of expectations are shown to have negative effects on students. These expectations when low can drive the students to have low self-esteem and suck away their motivation to succeed. If anything the students acts out on how they're expected to. When they are bullied on how stupid they are, these students start behaving that way because that’s the only thing they’re told that they’re good for. This is shown on page 318 when Rose says "you'll have to shut down...and have to cultivate stupidity." It’s the same result when these expectations are set high, they harm the students because sometimes high expectations causes a lot of stress as they can be hard to reach. These students end up wanting to be like "the average student" or "the …show more content…
common Joe." Unrealistic expectations can harm students performances when its too low because it can lead to the students having no motivation to learn. Sometimes people just need one person to believe in them, having a low expectation of someone shows a lack of belief in them and that may bring the person down and make them feel like failures. Making a student or anyone believe that they are nothing will eventually lead to that person becoming nothing, as Rose himself said on page 315, "students will float to the mark you set." Telling a student that he is stupid and will amount to nothing makes that student not want to try harder as a destructive path is already set for them, so they walk down that path. Rose recalls what happened to him when so many teachers had been bullying him and some other students on page 316, " During my time in Voc. Ed., I developed further into a mediocre student and a somnambulant problem solver..." When teachers have low expectations of their students, the students tend to meet those expectations. When teachers have unrealistic low expectations of students, these students go to extreme measure to actually fill those expectations, whether consciously or unconsciously. Although it is a negative thing to do to try and meet low expectations, this was what the student in " I just wanna be average" did to try and cope with the hardships they faced under an underprepared teacher who often undermined the students. Rose said " the tragedy is that you have to twist the knife in your own gray matter to make this defense work. You'll have to shut down, have to reject intellectual stimuli or diffuse them with sarcasm." (pg 318). The students did this as a form of defense to ease the hurt and the insult that they received from being a vocational kid. The pain that was brought on to them by their teachers who were supposed to help them instead. As rose mentions on page 318 " it is a powerful and effective defense-- It neutralizes the insult and the frustration of being a vocational kid." These teachers may not have realized what they were doing to the students were harmful but it was and it brought pain to these kids. Having unrealistic high expectations on students can also cause harm, but that harm will most likely be on the students' emotional and mental well being. Students who have high, unrealistic expectations on them often try to meet these expectations by going beyond and trying their best to succeed at everything. Sometimes, these students want a break and they just want to relax and not disappoint their teachers. The title of the story and the quote from Rose's classmate "I just wanna be average" proves that sometimes these students just want to relax and not have so many high expectations to meet. School can be stressful with it all that it entails but having high expectations on you only makes it harder. It's good to have expectations of students but when the expectations are unrealistically high, It may stress out the students to the point of tears. Sometimes, these students may be straight-A students or students who try really hard to meet these high expectations while wanting to be like the average students, happy and carefree. sometimes students just want to be " the common joe" (p318) and be able to say "fuck this bullshit" (p 318) and relax. Nothing about having expectations for people is wrong but there it is clear that unrealistic expectations can be harmful to students.
When expectations are unrealistically low or high, they hurt the person on the receiving end by making them feel like a failure and making them stressed. When these expectations are low, they can be detrimental to a person's self-esteem and learning outcome. This is exactly what happens in " I just wanna be Average." Healthy expectations are met when the teachers are understanding and help the students, as Jack MacFarland did in the story. On the other hand, unrealistic high or low expectations keep students from reaching their true potential and stress them out. It makes them want to be "the average student" (pg 318) when these expectations are set high, and makes them unwilling to learn, and "cultivate stupidity" (pg 318) when they’re set low. Overall, expectations should be healthy, they should be within reach and match the potential of the person on the receiving
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The “push to be perfect” (Thomas) is at an all-time high. Pressure for perfection from peers, parents, teachers and coaches is so unreasonably high that many students don’t think that they will ever be able to achieve it. A student feels that it is impossible to get good grades, be athletic, in multiple organizations, and most of all appear to be happy. Students have turned to cheating, drug/ alcohol abuse, and even suicide to try and cope. They are competing with friends for top spots, and believe that if they don’t beat them, they are a failure. Not only other students, but parents play a big roll, too. Their own parents and the parents of their peers will compare kids. New Trier High School’s Jim Conroy said that the biggest problem about pressure comes from the parents who compare (Robbins). With all...
I had read an essay called, “I Just Wanna Be Average” by Mike Rose. The essay was about Rose revisiting his high school experience. He explains his adventure through school reflecting on his education, learning environment, & behaviors of students/teachers. Also he talks about the motivation or lack thereof in him and his fellow peers reflecting on them just wanting to be average.
Expectations are define as personal belief that something will happen. It’s similar to judgment or assumption people made to a certain person or group of people. It may not be true and it could be different from what is expected. People can also change how they live their lives based on their own expectations just like how the Greasers and the Socs had different expectations. These two groups have contrast expectations that caused bad actions to come up or lead them to benefits for their own group. Expectations may force people into something they are not, even if it is to become a hero or the opposite.
...ild, when he would hide and daydream, up until his first years of college, when he would avoid areas that were difficult, the author recognized that there was important link between challenging the student on a meaningful level and the degree to which the student eventually produced. “I felt stupid telling them I was… well – stupid.” (Rose 43) Here, Rose shows an example of how poor preparation and low standards in the classroom can make a student feel inadequate. Indeed, one can see how many things seemingly unrelated do affect a student’s ability to learn.
In “I Just Wanna Be Average”, Mike Rose recounts his experiences in vocational program in high school, which known as bottom level. When he was a freshman, he accidently was placed in these classes but he decided to stay. Rose goes into details describing some of his teachers and classmates. Certain teachers he introduced were not enthusiastic about their jobs and they don’t believe their students can make good achievements, and sometime they even treat students violently, which also lead some students of the vocational program to slack off and not care about studying. Rose also focused on some of his classmates, who were seen as troublemakers. He found out that they actually were not always like fighting, being lazy and loafing, and they had some special skills showed their true personalities. There was one boy that very stuck out to Rose was Ken Harvey, who was asked by teacher to give an opinion of working hard to make achievements, stated that “ I just wanna be average” (Rose 335). I was pretty impressive about this quote because that I think being average might like some of students calm down and feel not so stressful to survive in educational system. Later in Rose’s life, he eventually moved out of vocational program and back to typical school system. At this time, his father passed away, which is not so relevant with the main plot. Later, Mr. MacFarland came into Rose’s life as his English teacher in senior year. Rose looked up Mr. MacFarland deeply because he sincerely cared of his students, told the importance of working hard to them and even encourage Rose to pursue further education in college. I can tell that Mr. MacFarland left positive impacts on Rose’s whole life, and helped him found his real potential.
As I read the part on low expectations, I found myself agreeing with Cose. One of his fellow employees of the New York Daily News talked about his career being blocked. His own expectations of himself were causing him no room to grow. Conrad Harper commented that if someone is constantly being told he can never amount to anything better, he will in fact start questioning his own abilities.
Most students go through high school trying to just get to graduation day. They just want to pass all their classes, nothing higher. Only a small percentage of students in high school actually have the determination to excel and be above average on their own. Most people need someone to inspire them to excel. The essay "Tracking" by Mike Rose discusses how he needed someone to point out to him that he shouldn't be in Vocational classes. He put into a whole new different situation, and the classes could actually be a challenge for him. Being a mediocre student are apart of most students lives because they don't push themselves to be better.
In the novel, The Other Side of the Bridge by Mary Lawson, the author capitalizes upon society’s expectation of a character to emphasize the struggle to achieving his goals. Ian, one of the central characters in the plot line, is heavily impacted by these expectations, which hold a substantial influence upon his decision’s regarding his future. To teenagers an expectation: a strong belief that something will happen or be the case in the future, is nothing but a restriction upon them. Ian believes he is contained within these expectations; to the point where he does not wish to follow this given path. In a time of adolescence, teenagers are compelled by the strong desire to denounce that which is expected of them; Ian is no exception to this. Societies expectations create a negative influence upon Ian’s struggles to achieve his goals. These effects are due to the following expectations: to leave Struan for a superior education, to obtain the opportunity to become successful; to strive for a medical career, since he excels at the trade already; and to settle into a happy relationship, to raise a family.
I remember Ali saying I just want to be average and it struck a chord within me. Years later, reading Mike Rose’s article made me remember what Ali said and how true it was that all of us, living in different times, just wanted to be average. Walking to geometry class during my sophomore year in high school was definitely a pain. Our new mathematics teacher, Mr. Lee tried teaching us the basics of geometry and pushed us to do well. With daily quizzes and exams, I, along with many other students, felt the pressure increase to do well. With each passing day, Ali and I felt ourselves gasping and drowning deeper and deeper into the hole of despair. Looking at the test scores, I was guaranteed to retake the class the next semester with Ali. Even though my school was hailed as a very good school, I felt like it was not very welcoming. Going back home on the bus, I would hear many other students talk about how they got that A or how that other teacher helped them get a better grade. Maybe, it was just the environment but Ali and I felt that we were being cheated on by the education system. We had both failed the Mr. Lee’s class and had to take another semester of Geometry to our horror and mutual
There was always going to be pressure on me in one form or another, whether it be from my Mom, a teacher, or even my friends. But, I learned that letting these expectations compromise who I was; letting them get in my way by making me doubt myself, was never good. And I’m not writing this to say expectations are a bad thing. Expectations from others or myself are healthy, they provide us standards to hold ourselves to and present us with attainable goals. However, letting these expectations define you in moments in which you have to step to the plate and “swing” in life is never a good thing.
The children see failure as not being as smart as everyone tells them they are or simply stating the wrong answer to a question the teacher asks (Lahey). From creating this fear of failing comes the hatred of learning. Kids are beginning to learn that “mistakes are something to avoid” and as a result you have students who “are afraid to take risks, to be creative, [and] to be wrong” because they associate being wrong as being a failure (Tugend). Kids understand that mistakes will happen, and from these mistakes you should learn, but are being taught to try to avoid mistakes because it is too big of a risk for their grades and also other students and parent’s views of them. For example, in high-school students have the choice to take general, honors, or advanced placement classes. In the past, more and more students would take the advanced placement classes, which were a lot harder than honors and general and could possibly make lower grades than they would make in the other classes, but would be constantly challenged and learning more than they would in the honors and general classes. In today’s society, more students are being encouraged by their parents and peers to settle for the honors and even general classes, so they can guarantee acceptable grades and not have to try too hard to make those grades. Even though the students in the advanced placement classes may not be viewed as smart
When people have expectations for us we usually become a lot harder on ourselves and bring ourselves down for not succeeding at what others think we should succeed at. It brings us down a lot emotionally and mentally, even though we really shouldn't care this much. But the sad truth is that we value others opinions of us more than what we think of ourselves. In the quote Feynman says that we don't really have to live up to all these expectations that people, and
Does that mean that we always need to lower our expectations? No, but we do need to make sure they are based in reality. Doing this will
There are many things that can help to get good grades in college possible, doing them is the challenging part. In order to be successful in life, college students should get the best grades by staying organized, taking good notes, and maintain an effective study habit.
Are the new standards and expectations the world has for teenagers really creating monsters? The amount of stress that is put on students these days between trying to balance school, homework, extra curricular activities, social lives, sleep and a healthy lifestyle is being considered as a health epidemic (Palmer, 2005). Students are obsessing over getting the grades that are expected of them to please those that push them, and in return, lose sleep and give up other aspects of their lives that are important to them such as time with friends and family as well as activities that they enjoy. The stress that they endure from the pressures of parents, teachers, colleges, and peers have many physical as well as mental effects on every student, some more harmful than others. The extreme pressure on students to get perfect grades so that they will be accepted into a college has diminished the concept of actually learning and has left the art of “finagling the system” in order to succeed in its place (Palmer, 2005). There are many ways that should be implemented in order to reduce the stress on students so that they can thrive because, withoutthem, the school systems will only be creating generations of stressed out, materialistic, and miseducated students (Palmer, 2005).