Gerald Graff Hidden Intellectualism Analysis

However, too many students are so self-focused that they cannot unlearn their selfish behaviors for the sake of finding the best-suited solution that can be achieved through collaborative thinking. In addition to Davidson, Jean Twenge also notices this pattern and she labels it as “narcissism”. As Twenge explains, “Because the school programs emphasize being ‘special’ rather than encouraging friendships, we may be training an army of little narcissists instead of raising kids’ self-esteem” (Twenge 504). Twenge obviously believes that school programs are trying too hard to preserve a child’s self-esteem instead of actually helping them to build skills that would help them. Twenge mentions that instead of making them feel “special”, schools should focus more on “encouraging friendships” so that they can be a little less narcissistic and self-focused.

The students just need to get the help. As long as the students are getting the help, there’s no point in the no pass, no play rule. For school teams, the coaches are typically teachers. The teachers understand the struggle students are going through, “Coaches are very understanding about a student putting schoolwork ahead of sports. They will be understanding if a student needs to attend extra help after school before coming to a practice.”

I think that the man was doing the right thing by going out and following his owns ways. The teacher could have been wrong and by listening to the teacher he has conformed to society and what they think instead of thinking about his own ideas and how he really feels about the topic. This would lead them all into the wrong path. If you keep doing the wrong thing you can never reach the peak in knowledge ,which is supposed to help a person strive to be unique and break out from that bubble of conformity. Why should people always the the same thing instead of keeping an open mind and expressing how they feel not how everyone feels and that topic?

We are told that we are the land of the free, but in school we are taken many rights. We’ve been told to put our trust into the government, but only to realize false hopes. We are told to follow the books, but realize that they too are filled with mistakes. We are told to help the school by fundraising to grow our education, but then get fined because it’s illegal to sell during school hours and to strangers. Even though they do their best to educate us, they too are restricted on teaching us too much for it “doesn’t go with the school’s study plan,” we seem to have liberty to know all but at the end we are left empty.

She believes the syllabus provided to students do not include any challenging books, and her belief toward high school teachers becoming too lazy to examine thoroughly if the book the education system provides them with represent any true and significant value is a recurring concern of hers’- therefore ineffective to students. All in all, Prose used ethos, pathos, logos and the usage of specific words to help her argument. She successfully persuades her point of view and makes it clear that if schools want their curriculum to improve, they must change their way of teaching and push their students to view literature in a new

The Other Education written by David Brooks identifies how society lacks the studies of non-scholastic curriculum. Yet, he defines curriculum as a broad term in this article. When thinking about scholastic aspects people ponder the thought of school subjects, however Brooks wishes that society would look past the direct studies. Brooks himself writes, “…Such and such classes, such and such grades, and amassed such and such degrees.”

Why else are we here but to

“Learning how to think,” means that people can think independently, originally, and abstractly. People are beginning to question the way people think in today’s society. The reason we are failing to formulate new ideas or think, is because young adults are educated to be disciplined at a specific area of study. They are not taught to be unique or to stray from the teachings of the professor, instead they are trained to conform. Students take the views of teachers to suck up to them, which causes them to get lost in their own thought and opinion.

Gerald Graff’s essay “Hidden Intellectualism” contemplates the age-old idea that street smarts are anti-intellectual. However, as Graff points out, “schools and colleges are at fault for missing the opportunity to tap into such street smarts and channel them into academic smarts.” (244). What Graff means by this is that being street smart does not mean a person lacks intelligence. Rather, educational institutions need to find a way to effectively ‘tap into’ this different format of intellectualism to produce academic intelligence.

In school, the teachers are focused more on our academics than our life problems. Although the school does teach us some of the basic life skills that we need, they do not teach us the most important ones that revolve around our lives every single day. “Though high school and college are excellent in

Yes, you are right that teacher’s job is to provide the tools necessary to succeed. However, those tools are the knowledge that they provide, and, as you said before, it is the

Many people disregard the idea of young people being able to learn aspects of intellectualism through worldly experiences. When it comes to the modern idea of being intellectual, most people believe that subjects such as history or science, have more value than fashion or sports. Few people are able to realize the connection between academic intellectualism and street smarts. Students who have a hard time learning general concepts in classrooms tend to have an easier time recognizing, and learning those same concepts in the real world often without even realizing it. For example, take a child who has a difficult time focusing on history lessons in the classroom, but enjoys learning about the background of football teams and their players;

The Dead Poets Society is an American Drama film that was directed by Peter Weir and with much acclaim received an Academy Award for the best original screenplay of 1990. The movie struck an amazing story with its talented actors and great uses of archetypes. One of the main characters, Mr. Keating was a previous student at Welton Academy located in Vermont, an astute private all-boys prep school. As a teacher from London he now returns to teach English and Literature at the school he once learned at. He approaches teaching in a different manner from the other militant professors and inspires his students through the art of Poetry.

In the article, “Anti-Intellectualism and the “Dumbing Down” of America” Ray Williams discusses the increasing trend of anti-intellectualism in American culture. There is an anti-intellectualism that exists in American culture that is the result of the unpopularity of being smart in High School, the lack of the importance of teachers in the U.S. compared to Japan and the effect of reality TV and pop culture. Williams indicates that one of the reasons that anti-intellectualism exists is that education in the United States is not as strong as it once was. Williams says, “After leading the world for decades in 24-34 year olds with university degrees, the U.S. is now in 12th place. The World Economic Forum ranked the U.S. at 52nd among 139 nations

Gerald Graff’s argument on how educational systems are missing a great opportunity to tap into “street smarts” and focus them into a path of academic work is indeed convincing (Graff, 198). After all, anyone who’s been through the American educational system knows odds are often stacked against the “street smarts.” This is especially true in english classes, where one is often required to read boring and somewhat heartless books like, 1984, Beowulf, and the majority of Shakespeare’s classics. This is not to say these books are bad or shouldn’t be read during one’s schooling years, instead, the problem is one of apathy. For instance, in my high school years I never even remotely liked to read books Othello, but I loved to read magazines and