Real-life learning

We love debates in America; it's part of the democratic republic. I think, however, that there ought to be some checks and balances when it comes to the subject of "relevance" in schools.

Today, leftist educators teach students that Relevance, Rigor and Relationships are more important than the old, right-wing "Three Rs" of Reading, Writing and 'Rithmetic.

But relevance without rigor means that we will discuss science without math and physics. Someone has to teach kids their times-tables (and by third grade at the latest). Relevance without rigor will lead to social studies teachers bemoaning the war in Iraq without teaching Physical Geography, the Economics of Oil, and World History.

Similarly, relationships without rigor and the original Three Rs will end with kids sitting in circles discussing their feelings about their families, or issues such as gangs, without any grounding in the great thinkers of psychology, sociology and anthropology who help us frame these debates. Structure and discipline are not the enemies of relevance.

Kids need to develop critical thinking skills, but the search for relevance and relationships without rigor will end up with teachers and students picking and choosing their topics like morsels in a cafeteria or items for sale on EBay.

Granted, the narrow-mindedness of Sacramento politicians and Washington reactionaries drive curriculum toward requirements rather than electives. Nonetheless, teachers can teach the standard curriculum -- which today is rather strongly driven by multicultural voices and bottom-up relevance in science and social studies -- and still cover all Six Rs at once.

Everything in our debate this week comes down once again to great teaching. This naturally requires teachers to develop relationships with students and their communities. Great teaching implies teachers framing and even leading discussions of relevance without making every topic link to MTV or the Disney Channel. Only rigorous work, involving research, discovery, imagination and discipline, drives young people to value their efforts.

Can you imagine the head football coach at Fremont High having his players sit around and discuss their feelings about upcoming games, without any drill-and-skill activities such sit-ups, bench presses, blocking and tackling? Can you imagine the musical instructor at Washington Prep High just sending the kids on stage without rehearsals? I imagine the repetition of rehearsals will indeed work to strengthen the weaker scenes, rather than happily repeating the most popular scenes to the detriment of the musical as a whole.

Many teachers in America don't relish engaging students. This good work is tiring and undervalued. Additionally, the state and national standards too often become the catechism of autocratic discipline; thus instruction degrades the very meaning of the word "discipline."

Didn't "discipline" derive from the same root as "disciple"? Isn't a school really a place for the teaching of schools of thought, and not just some widget factory named PS 1, PS 2, or Public School No. 3? We give our schools separate names; our Bill Gates-funded schools-within-schools have separate identities of their own.

Still, students can smell form without substance. By high school, students almost instinctively know that calling a school a "social justice academy" does not mean that they will become fluent in the history of social justice. If they are not taught the basics -- if they do not know history, and don't read the seminal writings about justice, peace and community -- the students will only be able to mimic some ranting newscaster on Fox News. Discipline matters; relevance reinforces. Reason ultimately requires passion, but also knowledge and structure.

David Tokofsky is a former board member of the Los Angeles Unified School District.

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Like Amandla and Mr. Tokofsky said, not teaching students what they need to learn in order to go to college and be critical thinkers is oppression, too.