City Springs

While watching this documentary, I had a mixed feeling about their education. First, I felt I didn’t want to send my kids to go such school because it looked like teachers are forcing students to follow certain paths and students seemed not having fun in class. However, as I see the change in students’ attitudes and progress that they made over time, I realized that this method also has some positive effect on students.

I noticed that I tend to judge whether a certain method works by the tangible improvements in academic performance and behavior.

The Free School, which we watched in Free to Learn, was also showing students’ attitudinal and behavioral change. Therefore, both schools have positive effects on students. However, depending on the goal of education and learning, people judge these schools differently.

This video reminded me of my elementary school education in Japan. The class size is about the same (one teacher and 30 students). Teachers have the authority to lead classes and students need to follow their instructions. Students are expected to behave well (sit well, listen quietly, use proper language to teachers, form a line when moving classes, etc). When I was studying abroad in China, the teaching method that the teachers used was also similar: authority in teachers, mass repetitions, and well structured, speedy class).

People tend to criticize Japanese education for its heavy focus on rote memorization and test, one-way teaching, providing knowledge, passive learning etc). However, I still appreciate all the discipline that I acquire because I feel that those socially constructed behavioral code is necessary to well fit in society.

However, I couldn’t be really sure whether the City Springs’ education helps students learn behavioral code suited for the society because this film didn’t really show how children interact with each other. The website of City Springs School shows the results of climate survey. What surprised me was the percentage of agreeing students/teachers in regards to the following questions:

1. 
   
   Fighting among students is not a problem at this school 30.2% (students) 53.3% (teachers)


2. 
   
   Students get along well with each other 43% (students) 76.7% (teachers)

http://www.baltimorecityschools.org/cms/lib/MD01001351/Centricity/Domain/80/pdf/8.pdf

This shows that for many students at least, the school is not a place to have fun with their friends. When I conducted interviews at a public school in Orange County, many students, to the question ‘What do you like school about?’ answered friends. I thought that schools teach discipline in order to train students to fit into the society. However, if students cannot get along with their friends and they fight each other, even though they learn disciplined behavior, I doubt they can develop good relationship with other people in society. Therefore, the behavioral education in City Springs might be designed for conducting effective teaching.