How to achieve good life through education?
I will discuss what is the good life (ideal society and real society). And how does
education help us to achieve our goal to get good life, the importance of education. I
also want to talk about the different between pedagogy, curriculum and policy a little
bit, and discuss what is the best pedagogy in my opinion, what is the best curriculum
in my opinion, what is the best policy in my opinion. I also want to talk what kind of
problems of education we may face and how to solve them in the process of getting
good life. And what is the good life we will have through education.
1. What is the good life for us, for society?
a) In my opinion the good life for us should be we do not need worry
something. Such as, money, power and right. So we can have a happy life,
that is can also called good life.
b) The good life for society should be autonomy (Appiah, 2011) and equality
(Li & Yang, 2013 )
2. The real society’s problem
a) Not everyone have chance to be educated. For example, some minority of
China (Ryan, 2019) and people cannot be educated because tuition (video
“Sen. Bernie Sanders on college tuition).
b) The economic inequality of the urban and suburb in China (Li & Yang,
2013).
c) The racism inequality of the people. White people have privilege position of
the education (Mclntosh, 1998)
3. Why we need education. The importance of education.
a) Everyone should be educated because “education helps us earn knowledge
of the world and helps us have opinions on things in life” (peer view from
Helen Chen) and “education is crucial to participating in the society,
whether it be politically, economically or in day-to-day interactions” (peer
view from Carina Chan).
b) Better education often can give us better job for making more money and
salary, that can cancel the money worry. And when people all can have
good education, they may do not need worry about the inequality of power
and right. If we can realize a assumption, the education will help to solve
some economic problems (Anyon, 2011)
4. The best pedagogy
a) Children can learn what they want. Happy is important to the children (Neil,
1960). And a example from the video “Boy who did not want to learn to
read- Children of Summerhill 1998”.
b) Education in Finland and Education in Singapore are different. The
education of Finland shows more freedom and less pressure of students, but
this pedagogy may cause some problems like some students may not study
and they will lose competitive in their future. The Education in Singapore
give students more pressure and more work they need to do. They have a lot
of homework, not much vocation and they need go to tutoring after school,
But the good thing is they can learn actual skills they need for their jobs in
the future (video “Why Finland has the best education system in the world”
and “inside Singapore’s world-class education system”).
c) The pedagogy should not be bank system. Should not be like the students
can only learn what teachers taught. What kind of knowledge the student
will learn should not depend on teachers (Freire, 1968).
d) The children need to do some handwork such as, make the net for studying
Saanich culture. Using their hands help them can remember better and
actually feel the knowledge (Claxton and de France Roots, 2018).
e) The pedagogy in UW should be best, we have some freedom, different
cultures and we can choose what we want to learn.
5. The best curriculum
a) Multicultural: less racism and more pluralism. More pluralism can make
education fairer and adapt for many students who has different background.
For extending pluralist, that needs CSP’s help to demand “pluralist
outcomes that are not centered on White middle-class” (Alim & Paris, 2017,
p. 12). For example, “When instructing select readings, they should include
selections of reading from diverse authors” (peer view from Qin Chen).
b) Mental health: teaching students and keeping their mental health is
important. Generally speaking, the healthier a student is psychologically,
the better his study will be. (Hooks, 1994).
c) Learn what students are interesting: students can choose what they are
going to learn and what they do not want to learn. (Neil, 1960)
6. The best policy
a) Chinese contemporary policies are becoming increasingly inappropriate in a
transition from redistributive to market economy. So Chinese policies have
some problems right now. If the problems can be changed, the policies will
be good (Li & Yang, 2013).
b) The policy to realize the assumption of education (Anyon, 2011). The first
is “the U.S. should fully fund and otherwise support all low-income
students who are accepted by a college or university” (Anyon, 2011, p. 79).
The second way is we should provide meaningful vocational options for
these students who cannot go to college while they study in high school
(Anyon, 2011).
7. What is the barriers and how to eliminate these barriers
a) Racism – the purpose of schooling is closely making youth perform white
middle- class norms is the most common problem. It is kind of unfair issue
for youth or communities of color. “White skin people have more education
than other racial groups” (peer view from Sophie Guan). For solving these
problems can extend pluralist (Alim & Paris, 2017). “The CPS can decenter
white gaze in the curriculum by having curriculum based on the students”
(peer view from Becky Chanthaphone).
b) Education do not improve — In China, although its recent economic
increase fast but that doesn’t led to equal improvements in education. The
increasing of economic even makes some get disadvantage. For example,
minority is poor and many left-behind children, more private education and
international schools (Ryan, 2019).
c) Government intervention (video “ban of Muslim headscarves in French”)—
The ban in French does not give freedom to the children and people, and
that may make parents to pull their children out of school. “ Given this
predicament, justification of the ban on religious symbols based on the
principle of protecting individual basic rights may have the unintended
consequence of creating worse circumstances for those girls’ future
autonomy” (Gereluk, 2005, p. 267). The French legislation of this is too
tough, that may oversteps. For solving this, government should give
freedom to the people and step back. For example, only ban it in public
school without a tough altitude (Appiah, 2011).
8. Good life should be no worry, and we can live in a no racism and equality society.