Nature+Vs.+Nurture+and+Education's+Sunken+Place

Overview
Nature versus nurture provides the old adage that nurturing certain behaviors and ideas in children through social interaction and scaffolding will inevitably cause the child to adopt these behaviors. Nature, in regards of students, is the ability to learn and reproduce certain certain behaviors. Urie Broffenbrenner 1 believed that children develop in a complex system of relationships affected by multiple levels of their environment (Brofenbrenner, 1989, pg. 190). Broffenbrenner’s microsystem is the first and closest level to the child because of their direct contact with others. This level includes the school and home environment. In this first level children become a part of multiple groups and come from diverse family backgrounds that will have a significant impact on their development as a person. Fred French2 (2003) argued that “the issue is not one of nature vs. nurture, but one of how nature and nurture work together to shape our development as individuals.” In the education world students come from a multitude of different backgrounds and each student has an array of different influences that they will experience throughout their academic career. These differences make them all quite unique, and the school environment is responsible for nurturing these unique qualities and assisting students in learning about the world around them.

 According to French (2003) there are two primary implications in the teaching and learning process that should be identified: “First, children are more receptive to learning when they feel wanted and valued and when they are in an environment that is meaningful, accepting, comfortable, orderly and safe.” Geoffrey [|Canada] [|3] has created a school named [|the Harlem Children’s Zone]. The “Zone” is comprised of an elementary, middle, and high school in Harlem, New York. The school model that Canada has created monitors the students in his school from birth (sometimes before), during the student’s formative years while in K-12 education, and even after they leave his school and attend college or begin their careers. His school has extended its hours of operation into the summer vacation months that most American schools release their students for. Canada has chosen to do this because he believes, and has found studies to support, that students lose most of their educational foothold during their summer vacation because they are not using any of the skills that they have learned over the year. He has also collaborated with testing centers to create tests for his students that will provide an ongoing assessment of how they are doing in the classroom. A unique feature that each of his students have it access to healthcare through the Harlem Children’s Zone. His reasoning for doing this is because many of his students, and their families who receive health benefits through the school as well, are not getting proper healthcare in this area of Harlem. Each of these characteristics of Canada’s school are targeted towards nurturing the student’s health needs, their social and community needs, and their educational needs to ensure that they are successful.



 Next, French (2003) says “the nature of the material to be learned needs to go beyond pure content to incorporate a focus on not only the substantive or declarative nature of knowledge, but also the procedural and strategic nature of knowledge.” Ron [|Clark] [|4] is a famous writer and educator. He is well known for his multiple novels about teaching, and for his school [|the Ron Clark Academy]. The Ron Clark Academy houses students from grades 5 through 8 in Atlanta, Georgia. Much like Canada, Clark believes that there is much more to teaching students than instructional standards and standardized testing. In fact, Clark is a strong supporter of fun and excitement inside of the classroom. Clark is famous for dancing on tables while teaching, having students hurriedly write down the answers to above grade level math problems on balloons before they pop them, and turning classroom content into rap songs for the students. One of the most important days at the Ron Clark Academy is properly titled the “Best Day Ever.” One day out of the entire school year, a day chosen at random and not revealed to the students, the entire school leaves their school building on buses to travel to different interactive “classroom” sites around Atlanta. At these classroom sites the students are able to engage with the world around them and learn exciting material while experiencing it in the community first hand. Students are taken to different countries around the world to study abroad during their time at the Ron Clark Academy. In each of these environments Clark is teaching his students about strategically applying what they are learning inside the classroom to life outside of it. Extending the classroom to the entire world outside of it, quite literally, nurtures the students different learning styles and creativity.



 Private schools today are not bound by federal enforcement to subject their students to standardized testing and standards based instruction. Instead, multiple private school institutions are creating their own curriculum and means of assessing their students. These schools are providing nurturing environments by lowering class numbers, providing ongoing assessments to track how their students learn so that their achievement can be increased, and some private schools are even providing healthcare to make alleviate as many hindrances to their education as possible. In recent years, student enrollment in private schools has been surprisingly low. In 2015, about 5.3 million students were enrolled in private elementary and secondary schools combined. 50.1 million students were enrolled in public elementary and secondary schools 5 (U.S. Department of Education, 2016). Private schools are not funded by state government so they do not have to follow the same curriculum requirements that public schools who are funded by the government must follow. Private schools, on average, have much smaller classroom sizes and often have access to more technology and classroom material due to smaller classroom numbers and private funding. The creation of private schools and their success with student testing and graduation raises the question, are public school systems actually providing the necessary tools for students to be successful? Or, are private schools creating their own models that could potentially serve the United States’ school age population better? In 2004, almost 68 percent of all 9th grade students in the United States of America successfully completed high school within 4 years 6 (Orfield, 2004). Since that time the graduation rate of high schools, and the rate of college graduates and employment, has noticeably increased. Education, without question, is imperative for the youth of America to have because the job market demands higher education more and more. Educational philosophers are claiming that the material inside the classroom must be combined with the care and fulfillment of students psychological and physical needs as well. Are public school systems providing a more nurturing environment, or are private schools providing a more nurturing environment for students?

Trend
 Henry Ford, creator of the first automobile, developed an efficient method of mass producing automobiles in his factory called the assembly line. Although Ford did not invent the assembly line idea, he perfected the craft. Using technology and man power, Ford consistently created thousands of the same automobile daily with little to no flaws. Each car was almost identical to one another. As technology advanced, high powered and autonomous machines began to take the place of humans. The production of automobiles per day increased into multi millions around the world over time. Automobiles became significantly more complex. But, the assembly line essentially continued to do the same job. It simply creates multiple identical automobiles.

 Public education is a factory, in a sense, responsible for producing educated and productive members of society once the student has satisfactorily completed their senior year in high school. Throughout their time “on the line,” students are introduced to what is considered basic knowledge and many complex ideas. In recent years, multiple states have begun to adopt standards based curriculum for their public school systems. According to law professor Glenn Reynolds 7 (2014), America has created an assembly line method of teaching that is meant to produce assembly line type workers. The school bell rings, the students are sent to the boxes their classes are occurring in, the bell sounds again, and the students complete mandated tasks. Each student is taught and assessed the same way, and at the end of their time they receive a certificate of quality. This style of education has been trending since 1914 when the National Education Association endorsed standardized testing to bring order to then chaotic schools. After this, standardized tests increased in production as the years progressed so that students could be evaluated for content knowledge and ranked against one another academically.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> This type of instruction caters to the nature of the human capacity for learning. Humans are capable of being repeatedly taught a standard and repeating the standard, on average. Having rigid school environments that focus heavily on standardized test preparation can, and will, yield learning results. There is no argument against this. Maintaining assembly line style methods makes comparing students academically systematic. This will produce comparable results for grouping, which will help facilitate academic placement as a student progresses. Also, data assessment results will detail what areas of the standardized test that the students need improvement in. This detailed information will give parents and teachers factual data, based on the standard, that supports advancement or remediation. Using order and the nature of human understanding to facilitate unwavering data produces numbers, but is simply producing numbers okay when the stock is human life? Are these numbers being produced by assembly line teaching methods the best that can be done? Placing students in straight lines and regulating their participation within the classroom does not create a nurturing environment. Students individual learning needs cannot be addressed if everyone is taught the same way without change. Breaking the assembly line model by using differentiation in the classroom and making the learning environment open to discoverability through consistent catering to learning styles has been proven to benefit students academically.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> Another trend that has been developing at the same rate is the belief that students with special needs can in fact be educated, and that they deserve education in the least restrictive environment. At one point in America’s history, the education system only provided limited education for students with special needs. This was done because educators believed that these students were incapable of learning. In 1975, special education programs were made mandatory in the United States of America after the passing of the Education for All Handicapped Children Act passed into law. From this came the Individuals with Disabilities Act which further protected the rights of students with disabilities to a proper education. Now, schools are mandated to provide all special services to students who have been properly assessed to need them. Students who are thought to possibly have special needs are recommended for testing so that they can perform at their best in the classroom. Students with disabilities must be instructed in the least restrictive environment meaning that they cannot be placed in an isolated room away from students who do not have disabilities if they are capable of performing in the regular classroom. Creating a law that protects the rights of the special educational needs of students is a display of nurture in the school environment. Nature has provided the students with certain disabilities that cause them to have to be educated with certain provisions. Providing aid to the students can help them reach their maximum potential possible as the progress in their academic careers. This method differs from the assembly line model that has been trending as well because these students literally receive personalized education. Now that these needs have been recognized for students with special needs, is it not time to begin developing plans for all the other students in the education system so that they can reach their max potential as well?

In My Opinion
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In my opinion, nurturing in education is essential to a student's learning process. The public school model that I have seen does not work well because it does not cater to what students need to be successful. In the public school model there are far too many students in one classroom. The number of students per class inevitably causes the teacher not to be able to give close individualized attention to everyone in the class. Also, assessment can become overwhelming. Assessment becomes a daunting task when there are 160 to 180 assessments to grade. I personally believe the private school models that Canada and Clark have created are education Utopias. In each of these settings they have created institutions that meet the needs of their students consistently and produce results. The main attribute that each of these educators stress in their learning environment is care and nurture for the students. Canada credits everything that he has done for his students to the fact that he likes kids and wants them to succeed. Clark says the same about his students. In comparison, I believe the Harlem Children's Zone and the Ron Clark Academy are outperforming many of the public schools across the nation. If it were possible, I would fully support using their methods as a standard for all schools in the nation because I believe every student deserves what their students are receiving on a daily basis. The current public school model we have is not consistently performing as a whole and this needs to be changed. The nurturing aspect of private schools through their small classroom sizes, student and teacher care benefits, and differentiated instruction is the best plan we have for all of our students to be successful.

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References

1. <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #222222; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">Urie Bronfenbrenner, "Ecological Systems Theory," in R. Vasta (ed.), Annals of Child Development, vol. 6 (Greenwich, CT: JAI Press, 1989): 187 - 251. This source discusses the different developmental groups that students are involved, and the ways that the people in these groups can impact their development.

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #222222; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">2. Fred French, "Revisiting Nature vs. Nurture: Implications for the Teaching/Learning Process." Education Canada; Spring 2003, Vol. 43 Issue 2, p20-23, 4p This source gives different primary factors for providing instruction to students during their learning process.

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #222222; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">3. Geoffrey Canada, "Our Failing Schools. Enough is Enough!" Ted Talks. Geoffrey Canada discusses the failures of the public school system, especially in New York, and how the model needs to be changed.

4. Ron Clark, "The Ending of Wussification of America's Schools." Ted Talks. Ron Clark discusses his process of creating his own school, and the reasons he teaches students using the method that he has chosen.

5. U. S. Department of Education, "Enrollment Trends." https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=65 This site discusses the enrollment data of private and public school systems in the United States.

6. Gary Orfield et al, "Losing Our Future: How Minority Youth Are Being Left Behind By the Graduation Rate Crisis." Gary Orfield addresses the lowering graduation rate and its causes.

7. Glenn Reynolds, //<span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; vertical-align: baseline;">The New School: How the Information Age Will Save American Education from Itself //(2014). Glenn Reynolds offers a solution for improving the public school instruction and assessment methods.