Teaching as a Subversive Activity: A No-Holds-Barred Assault on Outdated Teaching Methods-With Dramatic and Practical Proposals on How Education Can B

by Neil Postman and Charles Weingartner

Book Overview

A no-holds-barred assault on outdated teaching methods--with dramatic and practical proposals on how education can be made relevant to today's world. Praise for Teaching As a Subversive Activity "A healthy dose of Postman and Weingartner is a good thing: if they make even a dent in the pious . . . American classroom, the book will be worthwhile." -- New York Times Book Review "Teaching and knowledge are subversive in that they necessarily substitute...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0385290098
• ISBN13: 9780385290098
• Release Date: July 1971
• Publisher: Delta
• Length: 240 Pages
• Weight: 0.58 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.5" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

Lost in the quicksand of ambiguity

After thoroughly enjoying Postman's book Technopoly, I promptly bought three more of his books. This one was good until around page 40 in the chapter titled "Pursuing Relevance." So it starts out by saying that our teaching methods are outdated. Absolutely. We learn by actively engaging, and the true learner needs to be a willing learner. Agreed. Then the book turns downward. It portrays question asking as the only way to elicit the type of learning that the students will personally claim. From there onward, the authors bow before the idol of subjective knowledge, blindly praising its virtues. There are way too "words" in "quotation marks" indicating the trouble the authors had of communicating an effective message while questioning their every term and motive. It is obvious that they have no qualms about putting language itself to scrutiny. Why is it a bad idea to use solid, objective truths as launching pads for progressive thinking? We will make no improvements by first destroying the foundation. I am eager to read Teaching as a Conserving Activity to see if that books throws the readers of this book a rope to escape from the bottomless quicksands of subjectivity.

The beginning of Education Reform

40 years since Postman declared the need for reformed education and our school systems still look the same today as it did then. A new age is still growing for the next age of education. This is the most excellent book on the nature of teaching and educating I have yet read. Postman articulates the utmost need for asking questions, for children and adults to think critically, to formulate conclusions, discover what they feel is relevant and important to modern life, and that this kind of process should be the basis for our education system. Kids are taught to submit to authorities in school. They learn to answer the teacher's "Guess what I'm thinking?" The student raises his or her hand to offer the "correct" answer. Yet Postman offers ways to challenge and change the K-12 and university systems. Postman explains the way in which the coming age can address relevant problems of today. To encourage students to think and search for new problems we aren't solving, while also being aware of those who've come before us - where things come from, why were things invented, and for what need are certain things used. This book is essential for anyone who is concerned about education, and the allowance for free thought, expression, and to build a society of intelligent citizens. It goes in depth and covers clearly the ways in which we can begin to reform education.

The beginning of Education Reform

40 years since Postman declared the need for reformed education and our school systems still look the same today as it did then. A new age is still growing for the next age of education. This is the most excellent book on the nature of teaching and educating I have yet read. Postman articulates the utmost need for asking questions, for children and adults to think critically, to formulate conclusions, discover what they feel is relevant and important to modern life, and that this kind of process should be the basis for our education system. Kids are taught to submit to authorities in school. They learn to answer the teacher's "Guess what I'm thinking?" The student answers his or her hand to offer the "correct" answer. Postman offers ways to change this about K-12 and university systems. Postman explains the way in which the coming age can address relevant problems of today. To encourage students to think and search for new problems we aren't solving, while also being aware of those who've come before us - where things come from, why were things invented, for what need are certain things used? This book is essential for anyone who is concerned about education, and the allowance for free thought, expression, and to build a society of intelligent citizens. It goes in depth and covers clearly the ways in which we can begin to reform education.

What is wrong + What to do about it

To the positive reviews given so far, I would like to add that the very virtue of the book is that it is not limited to point the failures of the education system. It goes on to propose a way out, reasonably argued and based on results of data evaluating the problem. That is one of the reasons it might be difficult to follow, the solution is not trivial and straighforward.

Brilliant

Quite simply one of the most thought-provoking books I have ever read. However hard it is to get a copy, it is MUST reading for anyone involved in educating people. Heavily influenced by McLuhan, this book is devastating in showing what classrooms REALLY teach - that there is one right answer, that the teacher has it, that memorising facts is important, that fellow students have nothing to contribute, etc etc - and how to construct an environment in which REAL learning takes place - where people learn how to learn themselves. This is one of those books that shakes one's previously-unexamined foundational assumptions of education. I cannot recommend it too highly.

The most profound book on education I have ever read.

When the first chapter of a book on education is called 'Crap Detecting', you know you are on to a winner! Postman's provocative look at the nature of the classroom and how we educate our children is a must read by anyone who has a real interest in education being about more than tests and tick boxes. I have read this book many times and have never failed to be challenged, enthused and uplifted by it. My classroom and teaching style has been transformed by it - read it!!! Your teaching will never be the same again!