by I cannot believe that for the third straight year, a piece of garbage masquerading as education “research” is once again being passed around like social media dysentery. Worst of all, well-meaning, yet ultimately gullible educators seem compelled to “debate” such nonsense. Since teachers are terminally nice and all dissent is viewed as defect, it doesn’t take much for people to find the silver lining in this bag of manure.
I hate sharing this article with you because it makes me feel like a hypocrite, but I hope readers will consider not considering such baloney in the future.
They have the audacity to call this child abuse a “theory.” Never mind the scientific standards required for a crackpot idea to rise to the level of a theory..
The Bare Walls Theory: Do Too Many Classroom Decorations Harm Learning? (2014)
- It’s the teacher’s classroom, not the students’ learning environment.
- Learning is apparently equated with being able to regurgitate facts and propaganda on command.
- Kindergartners should take ANY tests, let alone standardized ones.
- The classroom is a factory where efficiency must squelch wonder, whimsy, thinking, or even daydreaming.
- The purpose of kindergarten or any grade is to be taught.
- Learning is the direct result of having been taught.
- Medical science should be ignored. Children need to cast their eyes as far as possible, as often as possible for healthy vision development.
- Racism is OK. No affluent white parent would tolerate their young children spending seven hours each day in a prison cell pretending to be a classroom.
- There is no role for beauty in education. There is no place for celebrating the creativity, ingenuity, and personal expression of children.
- Learning is to be “distraction free.” Schools are to be antisocial. Knowledge is not socially constructed.
- Any kid has ever read a poster to “reinforce learning they can be useful to helping students retain.” (that quote was a comment from a teacher justifying the practice online)
- Kindergartners can or should read any signs.
- NBC doesn’t hate public education.
Veteran educator Gary Stager, Ph.D. is the author of Twenty Things to Do with a Computer – Forward 50, co-author of Invent To Learn — Making, Tinkering, and Engineering in the Classroom, publisher at Constructing Modern Knowledge Press, and the founder of the Constructing Modern Knowledge summer institute. He led professional development in the world’s first 1:1 laptop schools thirty years ago and designed one of the oldest online graduate school programs. Gary is also the curator of The Seymour Papert archives at DailyPapert.com. Learn more about Gary here.