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Brett ButlerProfessor Jan RiemanEnglish 1101XNovember 17, 2009 John Taylor Gatto for President 2012!In the essay “Against School: How Public Education Cripples our Kids,and Why,” John Taylor Gatto tries to explain to readers how he believespublic education affects the lives of the children of this nation. Gatto hasmany effective and smart arguments in his essay, and if you really try tothink the way he does, you will begin to believe what he says. Some of Gatto’s best arguments in this essay are: not only are students bored inschool, so are their teachers; many greats in history did not need 12 years of schooling, so why do we have it now?; and school is only brainwashingchildren into becoming servants. If these statements that Gatto has madeare true, what will become of the future of the United States? We havealready begun to see changes, and people like Gatto are only trying to provethat we are headed downhill.One of the first arguments that Gatto presents in his essay is theargument that students as well as their teachers are bored in school. Gattosays, “They [students] said the work was stupid, that it made no sense, thatthey already knew it. They said they wanted to do something real, not just
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sitting around. They said teachers didn’t seem to know much about theirsubject and clearly weren’t interested in learning more” (1). Basically, Gattohas asked children how they feel about the way their teachers teach, andwith what Gatto says in the text, the children want to be more hands on andto be taught about an interesting subject. Children are easily bored,especially at a younger age, and if teachers are not able to teach and keepthem interested, they will not pay attention. The teacher also has to be wellinformed on the subject they are teaching and they have to be interested inlearning more, because if the teacher doesn’t care to learn more, neither willtheir students. Going through school, I have always blamed the teacher forthe class being boring. It is not the fault of the student. My junior year of high school I had a great U.S. History teacher. He involved the class all of the time, and he had a great sense of humor. I ended up making a B+ in hisclass and before that class I hated history. The teacher makes thedifference, not the student.Also, in his essay, Gatto makes it very evident that some teacherssuffer from boredom themselves, which also can prove it is their fault thattheir classes are boring. In the essay Gatto says, “Boredom is the commoncondition of school teachers, and anyone who has spent time in a teachers’lounge can vouch for the low energy, the whining, the dispirited attitudes tobe found there” (1). Teachers choose their presence and attitude. If ateacher comes in with a cup of coffee, a frown on their face, and beginsteaching in monotone, no one is going to be interested. Teachers have to be
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excited when coming into a classroom or they will get a terrible responsefrom the students. In my schooling so far, the most recent teacher I canthink of that was really boring is actually a professor I have right now. Theclass is American Politics. He comes in everyday wearing about the samething, and he gets up on the stage area and stands there for an hour andfifteen minutes, and flips through powerpoint slides and talks the entireperiod. It is because of teachers like him that I, and many others, struggle inclass. It is almost impossible to pay attention to this guy! But what effectdoes this have on bored students. There are many consequences to studentboredom. The main consequences are: students are not learning anythingbecause they are having a hard time paying attention; students that don’tlearn anything in the class will not be able to pass; and students that cannotpay attention soon lose interest in the class. If this were to happen it wouldincrease learning suffering. Learning suffering is where students stoplearning and don’t get anywhere in life. They begin to lose interest inlearning, and are greatly hurt. There really needs to be something doneabout this. The teacher really makes the difference here, and I believe thatteachers should be required to be able to keep a class interested. I believethis because of my own experiences. I am happy to say that I have notencountered too many boring teachers. Let’s hope that my luck continues!Also, in this essay, Gatto tries to explain that maybe we don’t need 12years of schooling and/or more. His best argument for this is that some of the greatest inventors, and greatest Presidents in American history never
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