Gerald Graff's Essay 'Hidden Intelligence'

Every child deserves a proper education. Banned books are depriving students of a well rounded, culturally aware, literary education because of the culture that is discarded, the history that is being withheld, and the education that young people could get through these banned books. The point of history is to learn from it and learn from others mistakes, but how can we do that if we are not allowed to learn it. As teachers shouldn’t you be teaching us how to make judgment calls like understanding that Mark Twain was a racist, but a man of his time and that doesn’t change him being an amazing writer. We cannot learn things such as that if we cannot even read most of Mark Twain’s books.

In Gerald Graff 's essay “Hidden Intellectualism” starts of by talking about the stereotype of being so called “street smart” and and being “book smart” and how in school when you see someone who is street smart but doesn’t do go in school get a bad wrap. People look at them as a waste because they can’t apply there intelligences that they have and use it towards school, so people view them as not the right kind of smart because they are not a A student in school. Graff then goes on to say that maybe it is not the students that are the problem with how they do in school but maybe it is the school that have missed or overlooked the intellectual potential that kids with street smarts have. Graff also says that we only view the educated minds through schooling as the right way and schools and colleges look at kids who do not like school and don’t do well as anti-intellectual people.

Graff says street smarts offer more life skills than the education provided in school. In other words, you can be smart without being highly educated because knowledge goes beyond academics. He grew up thinking he was anti-intellectual because his writing skills were not great about the topics he’s expected to write in school. Graff describes how sports helped him excel in academics and discover his hidden intellectualism. He believes ‘’Making students’ nonacademic interests of an object study is useful, the, for getting students’ attention and overcoming their boredom and alienation, but this tactic won’t in itself necessarily move them close to an rigorous treatment of those interests.’’

Hidden Intellectualism In Hidden Intellectualism, Gerald Graff begins with the age-old argument of difference between “book smart” and “street smarts.” He explains that in many cases, these book smarts, are “hidden” intellectualism. He states that current society is still focused on textbook, and classroom intellectualism. Moreover, the form of intellectualism is concealed under the mask of usual discussion about fashion, sport, co-star and many more. And it is also true that some young generation are not good on classroom but extra ordinary on other aspects of extra-curricular activities.

In any school you have attended, plagiarism is a situation that a writer should not put themselves in under any circumstances. When reading the essay “Something Borrowed,” Malcolm Gladwell gave insight into the flaws of plagiarism that writers may not have thought about before. The first being that plagiarism is never acceptable (927). The second issue with plagiarism is recognizing the differences that can or cannot “inhibit creativity” (931). Being inspired by another person's work can help and guide you to build your own ideas, but simply taking their work and claiming it as yours is not permitted.

The audacity of whites came their various oppressions before landing in America, Douglass states, “that they had conquered the sea, and had conquered the land, but that it remained for them to conquer their prejudices,” (Douglass, 568). Educated philosophers preach the Negro inferior to the white man, Du Bois states, “Many Americans social philosophers still persist in ascribing to Negro inferiority,” (Du Bois, 42). In today it is not directly stated, but rather suggested. White is still ideal, from personal experience, some private schools in Washington D.C have a minority cap to only allow an exact number of students of color. The schools where more students of color were allowed had funding issues, thus making it difficult to have the latest tools and labs to teach in.

I believe that in doing this, teachers are distracting students from the writing’s content and structure. Teachers should teach literature for what it is, not for what values they can loosely connect to it. When I was a freshman in high school, we read The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger. The book centered around a mentally unstable, socially isolated teen named Holden Caulfield.

Thanks to Michael, I found that the concept of I have had is wrong,I just want to be a good student in my life,however, what we said about the good student is wrong because we only pay attention to their study but not all the people around them. For example, I only pay more attention to the hygiene of my desk and I seldom clean the rubbish for my roommates. To some extent,although my GPA is higher than my roommates, they don’t like me at all for my selfishness .Through this essay and our project, I gradually find that, maybe my performance is best in study but I seldom get praise by my roommates because I seldom give their hands to them.

The student retorts, “we talk about what’s true, what’s important, what’s good. Well, how do you teach people to be good?” (p. 2). She also wonders whether Emerson would have “any ideas about what to do about what was worrying him-or did he think he’d done enough because he’s spelled the problem out to the Harvard professors?”

Cultural factors / values: Our values and our cultural aspects of life influence a, rather shape and refine our thinking , which is considered to be essential component of reflection. Often our deep rooted values, biases, hinder with the process of reflection and leads to the adherence to traditional ways of teaching and classroom management. An example may be quoted here. The teacher owing to her own cultural brought up persuades children to form groups for an activity on the basis of gender.

He says both students and professors need to work together in order to keep the true meaning of college, according to him is to nourish a world of intellectual culture. Edmundson states in his essay that students lack intellectual curiosity. He blames the schools by saying colleges in America are using the consumer mentality to increase their enrollment, but this is affecting the quality of education students are receiving. But he also blames the students for not challenging their conventional thought in fear of being invalidated.

Two or three radical scientists have out and out rejected the money related structure is to blame. Preparing, or more especially alluring aptitudes, is logically a fundamental for finding a professional class work. Be that as it may, according to business investigator Joseph Kennedy, our present structure makes a not as much as noteworthy show with respect to of giving the most legitimate getting ready to negligible measure of money, the common limit of a market. He communicates that various review schools, especially in the poorest neighborhoods, disregard to train the fundamental capacities of examining, forming, and number juggling. Auxiliary schools in like manner encounter the evil impacts of poor execution, even as a bit of the brightest understudies spend their lesser and senior years in a holding configuration sitting tight for colleges.

It may make more students aware of affirmative action and help them maintain their rights. Abigail Fisher opened they eyes of many when it comes to applying for colleges. This case may help fight race-based policies all over the country. Conservative activist have worked to make Abigail Fisher the leader and symbol of racial victimization in

They’re not taken seriously or listened to because they’re not academically educated. Street smarts is overlooked by teachers and undervalued by parents. Graff’s argument is that these street-smart kids are just as valuable as those who are academically gifted because within the “street-smarts” can be found “book-smarts”. There are different types of intelligence but they are not unequal in importance. I strongly agree with Graffs argument since I can relate on a personal level.

The teacher should make sure that each student is involved in the lesson, ask process questions, open-ended questions, be patient when waiting for answers to these questions, and ultimately never say anything a kid can say. This method is something that I would like to implement in my future classroom. I know that it will take practice and perseverance, but it is something that I know I can