Teaching the taboo<\/h2>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\nAuthor:<\/strong><\/td>\nAyers, R. & Ayers, W. (2011)<\/td>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/tesl-ej.org\/ej58\/rpix\/Teaching.jpg\")
<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \nPublisher:<\/strong><\/td>\nTeachers College Press, New York, NY\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \nPages<\/th>\n ISBN<\/th>\n Price<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n \n144\n <\/td>\n 978-0-8077-5152-7\n <\/td>\n $21.95 USD\n <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\nRick and William Ayers\u2019s Teaching the Taboo<\/em> asks educators to question common practices and to challenge the status quo.\u00a0 According to the authors, the educational status quo is disciplinary and adversarial in nature.\u00a0 For example, throughout the book, they point out that no one goes into teaching in order to \u201cdiscipline little miscreants\u201d (p. 24), yet because of the structure of the school system, educators are required at times to put away their passion and zeal for the topic and focus on getting their classes to walk in straight, quiet lines.\u00a0 Ayers and Ayers want teachers to be educators, passionate and zealous in education, not disciplinarians who are tools of the system.<\/p>\nFor the Ayers brothers, the point of teaching the taboo is to move away from the focus of finding the right answers toward the goal of asking the right questions, thus the book is filled with examples of the right questions<\/em> which focus more on: Why learn this at all? Or, Who benefits most from students believing this?, than on the traditional fact memorization who, what, where, when, why and how\u2019s that are often the core of the curriculum, especially in social studies.\u00a0 Four other \u201ctaboos\u201d make up the crux of the content of the book: public education is built on the summing up of knowledge, school is a commodity to be bought and sold (the big business of education), the present moment as the endpoint of history (meaning that all roads led to this moment, that it was almost predetermined), and school is separate from society (as in someday students will have to enter the real world<\/em>).\u00a0 The ultimate goal of the book is to ask readers to reimagine a school system in which the \u201chidden curriculum, mechanisms of control and school boredom\u201d become the objects of study (p. 30).\u00a0 EFL Teachers are especially likely to be teaching students who are affected by the hidden curriculum, even more than mainstream students. The authors cite a proposal by Charlie Cobb, a student at Howard University, to the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) from 1963, in which he describes the classrooms of Negro Mississippi as \u201ca complete absence of academic freedom\u2026that is geared toward squashing intellectual curiosity and different thinking\u201d (p. 18).\u00a0 The Ayers note that this is the same environment still thriving today in many urban areas, especially those with the highest numbers of poor and minority student populations; be they in the United States or elsewhere.\u00a0 Their main point is that teachers must address this problem with their students, teach them non-conformity in the form of asking questions of the system in which they are educated, or in some cases, inculcated to norms of that society\u2019s culture.\u00a0 They implore teachers to teach the \u201cpolar opposite [of obedience and conformity]: initiative and imagination\u201d (p. 21).<\/p>\nThough this book was conceptualized for a U.S. audience, it does align itself with the universal TESOL goals as outlined by the TESOL organization.\u00a0 Teaching the Taboo <\/em>includes information to support teachers all over the world who strive to support students\u2019 rights, provide opportunities to access a high quality education, and promote diversity and multiculturalism.\u00a0 One of the most positive aspects of the book is it addresses concerns that are systemic in education, regardless of the boundaries of country.\u00a0 Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, A Global Education Association, lists in their mission statement that educators value \u201cinteraction of research and reflective practice for educational improvement,\u201d the Ayers do nothing if not call for teachers to do just that: maintain a reflective practice for educational improvement.<\/p>\nThe authors draw upon the work of many of the most renowned international educational researchers to support their theses, among them: Paulo Freire, John Dewey, Neil Postman and Ivan Illich.\u00a0 They encourage teachers to utilize resources such as primary sources, which can shed light upon the inconsistencies between what students are taught in school, from the textbook, and what really happened according to the people who actually lived during the specified time.<\/p>\n
The authors address the issues in the book clearly from a social justice perspective, which urges educators to promote socioeconomic equality and unity among students of varying race, class, language, appearance, sexuality, gender and ability.<\/p>\n
The main fault of this book is that it somewhat targets the wrong audience.\u00a0 For example, the author\u2019s argue that teachers often fail to adequately convey the importance of human sexuality and of student sexual identity, stating that teachers \u201cseldom find ways to give sex-positive messages, to declare that sex is wonderful, delightful, multifaceted, and often precious\u201d (p. 74).\u00a0 However true this statement may in fact be, the Ayers are essentially asking that teachers not only modify their own instructional behavior, but place themselves in the forefront of a reformation of the entire culture of the school system.<\/p>\n
While reformation of the entire institution of education is certainly at the heart of the authors\u2019 thesis, they are addressing the wrong audience to achieve those ends.\u00a0 As they point out, teachers do come to the profession with hopes of leaving their impact on the world in a positive way. However the limitations placed upon educators by school administrations require some level of conformity.\u00a0 The price for continued employment is often subordination to the curriculum guidelines and the political processes that take place at a higher level.\u00a0 These powerful forces are seldom within the control of the individual educator.<\/p>\n
Though the point of the book is to question authority and societal structures, certain assertions by the authors seem to be lacking in application to reality.\u00a0 The Ayers suggest that teachers read over the student code of conduct with the class and engage the students in a Socratic dialogue about the utility of the code (p. 31).\u00a0 The only plausible results of such a dialogue would be that students reject or accept the code of conduct.\u00a0 Students would be inspired to acts of deliberate insubordination against those rules that the class determined to be \u201cuseless.\u201d\u00a0 The end result of such an exercise would not be a paradigm shift in the educational system; it would be a series of disciplinary actions against students for code violations, followed by disciplinary actions against the teacher.\u00a0 Perhaps the Ayers want students to face the reality of standing up for what they believe; certainly a worthy endeavor.\u00a0 However, when dealing with young people teaching them which fights are worth it, is also important.\u00a0 It is also important to recognize the relative impotence of the teacher in challenging the system from within it, something the Ayers at some points fail to appreciate.<\/p>\n
In U.S. and non-U.S. school systems in which administration continually describe themselves as \u201cdata driven,\u201d the Ayers point out that much of educational data is faulty, \u201cridiculous or stupid\u201d (p.70).\u00a0 The push for scientific research to support educational practices is incompatible with the many efforts of researchers who engage in effective qualitative research.\u00a0 Rather than asking how to make qualitative research acceptable to the scientific community, or the data driven administrators, the authors suggest that we should be asking: \u201cHow can we show that qualitative research is poetic? How does it contribute to insight, knowledge, understanding, joy, recognition, justice, empathy?\u201d (p. 70).\u00a0 This suggestion lends itself to those in higher education rather than on classroom teachers, or school administrators, since it requires a shift by researchers to look at the artistry of the research rather than the scientific implications.<\/p>\n
<\/em><\/p>\nTeaching the Taboo<\/em> pays scant attention to how school administrations could be an effective piece in the battle for critical education.\u00a0 Throughout the book, administrations are seen as the enemy.\u00a0 The authors have not looked at the situation through the perspective of teachers, their subordinate relationship to the administrators, and the disparate power relationship between the two.\u00a0 Perhaps this has to do with the grassroots mentality of activists, where the authors owe their intellectual roots. In the case of education, without challenging the system at all levels, the teachers who do \u201cteach the taboo\u201d run the risk of alienating themselves from their colleagues, subjecting students to disciplinary actions, or losing their jobs.\u00a0 By focusing on the teacher and treating the administrator as the enemy, the authors fail to appreciate the power of the administrator to effectively bring about the sort of change they seek, or entirely prohibit it.\u00a0 Nevertheless, since the book itself calls for challenging \u201cthe system,\u201d and the system is governed by the administration, it was most likely intentional.<\/p>\nThough the authors make many powerful arguments that are both inspiring and pertinent for educators the greatest criticism that can be made is that some of the strategies they propose are not always realistic for teachers in the current educational and political climate.\u00a0 However, they use compelling vignettes to illustrate how teachers who are teaching the taboo are creating classroom environments in which students thrive academically, socially and emotionally.\u00a0 One such teacher says he wants to teach \u201ca really good kindergarten class with 18-year-old\u201d (p. 51).\u00a0 I believe that is a goal many teachers can align themselves with\u2014creating a classroom environment that is built around inquiry, compassion, discovery, and connectedness, a worthy goal, especially for teachers of students who are learning, not only a new Language, but possibly a new societal structure as well.<\/p>\n
Reviewed by<\/h3>\n
Cicely Scheiner-Fisher
\nUniversity of Central Florida
\n<cicely.scheiner-fisher![\"atmark\"](\"http:\/\/www.tesl-ej.org\/atmark.png\")
ucf.edu><\/p>\n
\n\n\n© Copyright rests with authors. Please cite TESL-EJ appropriately.<\/p>\n
<\/td>\n<\/tr>\nRick and William Ayers\u2019s Teaching the Taboo<\/em> asks educators to question common practices and to challenge the status quo.\u00a0 According to the authors, the educational status quo is disciplinary and adversarial in nature.\u00a0 For example, throughout the book, they point out that no one goes into teaching in order to \u201cdiscipline little miscreants\u201d (p. 24), yet because of the structure of the school system, educators are required at times to put away their passion and zeal for the topic and focus on getting their classes to walk in straight, quiet lines.\u00a0 Ayers and Ayers want teachers to be educators, passionate and zealous in education, not disciplinarians who are tools of the system.<\/p>\n For the Ayers brothers, the point of teaching the taboo is to move away from the focus of finding the right answers toward the goal of asking the right questions, thus the book is filled with examples of the right questions<\/em> which focus more on: Why learn this at all? Or, Who benefits most from students believing this?, than on the traditional fact memorization who, what, where, when, why and how\u2019s that are often the core of the curriculum, especially in social studies.\u00a0 Four other \u201ctaboos\u201d make up the crux of the content of the book: public education is built on the summing up of knowledge, school is a commodity to be bought and sold (the big business of education), the present moment as the endpoint of history (meaning that all roads led to this moment, that it was almost predetermined), and school is separate from society (as in someday students will have to enter the real world<\/em>).\u00a0 The ultimate goal of the book is to ask readers to reimagine a school system in which the \u201chidden curriculum, mechanisms of control and school boredom\u201d become the objects of study (p. 30).\u00a0 EFL Teachers are especially likely to be teaching students who are affected by the hidden curriculum, even more than mainstream students. The authors cite a proposal by Charlie Cobb, a student at Howard University, to the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) from 1963, in which he describes the classrooms of Negro Mississippi as \u201ca complete absence of academic freedom\u2026that is geared toward squashing intellectual curiosity and different thinking\u201d (p. 18).\u00a0 The Ayers note that this is the same environment still thriving today in many urban areas, especially those with the highest numbers of poor and minority student populations; be they in the United States or elsewhere.\u00a0 Their main point is that teachers must address this problem with their students, teach them non-conformity in the form of asking questions of the system in which they are educated, or in some cases, inculcated to norms of that society\u2019s culture.\u00a0 They implore teachers to teach the \u201cpolar opposite [of obedience and conformity]: initiative and imagination\u201d (p. 21).<\/p>\n Though this book was conceptualized for a U.S. audience, it does align itself with the universal TESOL goals as outlined by the TESOL organization.\u00a0 Teaching the Taboo <\/em>includes information to support teachers all over the world who strive to support students\u2019 rights, provide opportunities to access a high quality education, and promote diversity and multiculturalism.\u00a0 One of the most positive aspects of the book is it addresses concerns that are systemic in education, regardless of the boundaries of country.\u00a0 Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, A Global Education Association, lists in their mission statement that educators value \u201cinteraction of research and reflective practice for educational improvement,\u201d the Ayers do nothing if not call for teachers to do just that: maintain a reflective practice for educational improvement.<\/p>\n The authors draw upon the work of many of the most renowned international educational researchers to support their theses, among them: Paulo Freire, John Dewey, Neil Postman and Ivan Illich.\u00a0 They encourage teachers to utilize resources such as primary sources, which can shed light upon the inconsistencies between what students are taught in school, from the textbook, and what really happened according to the people who actually lived during the specified time.<\/p>\n The authors address the issues in the book clearly from a social justice perspective, which urges educators to promote socioeconomic equality and unity among students of varying race, class, language, appearance, sexuality, gender and ability.<\/p>\n The main fault of this book is that it somewhat targets the wrong audience.\u00a0 For example, the author\u2019s argue that teachers often fail to adequately convey the importance of human sexuality and of student sexual identity, stating that teachers \u201cseldom find ways to give sex-positive messages, to declare that sex is wonderful, delightful, multifaceted, and often precious\u201d (p. 74).\u00a0 However true this statement may in fact be, the Ayers are essentially asking that teachers not only modify their own instructional behavior, but place themselves in the forefront of a reformation of the entire culture of the school system.<\/p>\n While reformation of the entire institution of education is certainly at the heart of the authors\u2019 thesis, they are addressing the wrong audience to achieve those ends.\u00a0 As they point out, teachers do come to the profession with hopes of leaving their impact on the world in a positive way. However the limitations placed upon educators by school administrations require some level of conformity.\u00a0 The price for continued employment is often subordination to the curriculum guidelines and the political processes that take place at a higher level.\u00a0 These powerful forces are seldom within the control of the individual educator.<\/p>\n Though the point of the book is to question authority and societal structures, certain assertions by the authors seem to be lacking in application to reality.\u00a0 The Ayers suggest that teachers read over the student code of conduct with the class and engage the students in a Socratic dialogue about the utility of the code (p. 31).\u00a0 The only plausible results of such a dialogue would be that students reject or accept the code of conduct.\u00a0 Students would be inspired to acts of deliberate insubordination against those rules that the class determined to be \u201cuseless.\u201d\u00a0 The end result of such an exercise would not be a paradigm shift in the educational system; it would be a series of disciplinary actions against students for code violations, followed by disciplinary actions against the teacher.\u00a0 Perhaps the Ayers want students to face the reality of standing up for what they believe; certainly a worthy endeavor.\u00a0 However, when dealing with young people teaching them which fights are worth it, is also important.\u00a0 It is also important to recognize the relative impotence of the teacher in challenging the system from within it, something the Ayers at some points fail to appreciate.<\/p>\n In U.S. and non-U.S. school systems in which administration continually describe themselves as \u201cdata driven,\u201d the Ayers point out that much of educational data is faulty, \u201cridiculous or stupid\u201d (p.70).\u00a0 The push for scientific research to support educational practices is incompatible with the many efforts of researchers who engage in effective qualitative research.\u00a0 Rather than asking how to make qualitative research acceptable to the scientific community, or the data driven administrators, the authors suggest that we should be asking: \u201cHow can we show that qualitative research is poetic? How does it contribute to insight, knowledge, understanding, joy, recognition, justice, empathy?\u201d (p. 70).\u00a0 This suggestion lends itself to those in higher education rather than on classroom teachers, or school administrators, since it requires a shift by researchers to look at the artistry of the research rather than the scientific implications.<\/p>\n <\/em><\/p>\n Teaching the Taboo<\/em> pays scant attention to how school administrations could be an effective piece in the battle for critical education.\u00a0 Throughout the book, administrations are seen as the enemy.\u00a0 The authors have not looked at the situation through the perspective of teachers, their subordinate relationship to the administrators, and the disparate power relationship between the two.\u00a0 Perhaps this has to do with the grassroots mentality of activists, where the authors owe their intellectual roots. In the case of education, without challenging the system at all levels, the teachers who do \u201cteach the taboo\u201d run the risk of alienating themselves from their colleagues, subjecting students to disciplinary actions, or losing their jobs.\u00a0 By focusing on the teacher and treating the administrator as the enemy, the authors fail to appreciate the power of the administrator to effectively bring about the sort of change they seek, or entirely prohibit it.\u00a0 Nevertheless, since the book itself calls for challenging \u201cthe system,\u201d and the system is governed by the administration, it was most likely intentional.<\/p>\n Though the authors make many powerful arguments that are both inspiring and pertinent for educators the greatest criticism that can be made is that some of the strategies they propose are not always realistic for teachers in the current educational and political climate.\u00a0 However, they use compelling vignettes to illustrate how teachers who are teaching the taboo are creating classroom environments in which students thrive academically, socially and emotionally.\u00a0 One such teacher says he wants to teach \u201ca really good kindergarten class with 18-year-old\u201d (p. 51).\u00a0 I believe that is a goal many teachers can align themselves with\u2014creating a classroom environment that is built around inquiry, compassion, discovery, and connectedness, a worthy goal, especially for teachers of students who are learning, not only a new Language, but possibly a new societal structure as well.<\/p>\n Cicely Scheiner-FisherReviewed by<\/h3>\n
\nUniversity of Central Florida
\n<cicely.scheiner-fisherucf.edu><\/p>\n\n
\n \n© Copyright rests with authors. Please cite TESL-EJ appropriately.<\/p>\n