Tao-Centered Schools

By Teri L Hooper

Do you feel like our schools only meet the needs of the compliant, middle-of-the-road child? Do you feel like our schools only value certain talents and strengths? Many of the cookie-cutter policies come from politicians who are more concerned about getting re-elected and less concerned about the thousands of teachers trying to make the best of a bad situation.

Using the principles of the Tao De Ching could dramatically change the climate of our schools. Applying those ideals could change the way we look at education and could alone produce remarkable results.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Balboa Press
• Release date: Jun 1, 2012
• ISBN: 9781452551234

Teri L Hooper

As a public school elementary teacher for twenty-five years, Teri watched as politics and money started to have corrupting effects on her students and her school. She struggled daily to provide quality instruction while having to meet the ridiculous, time-consuming requirements of the bureaucracy outside the classroom walls. While reading about the Tao De Ching during one summer vacation, Teri felt frustrated and optimistic at the same time. She set out to change the environment inside her four walls using the principles of the Tao. Teri unexpectedly found herself on permanent disability. She began journaling as a way of coping with the huge life change. The words of the Tao kept coming to mind when Teri wrote about what she dreamed would be the perfect school situation. Teri has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Nebraska Lincoln in elementary education, with a minor in human development. She also has a master’s degree in curriculum and instruction from Chapman University. Reading metaphysical, spiritual, and inspirational books has been her passion for over twenty years. Teri is married with three adult children and two grandchildren. She has lived in Southern California for twenty-four years.

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Copyright © 2012 Teri L Hooper

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Balboa Press rev. date: 11/15/2012

CONTENTS

Chapter 1 Service Vs Business

Chapter 2 Laymen Controlling Education

Chapter 3 Competition And Schools Don’t Mix

Chapter 4 Public Schools’ Needs Of Today

Chapter 5 Using The Tao De Ching In Schools

Chapter 6 Applying The 81 Verses Of Tao De Ching

Chapter 7 What Would A Tao Centered School Look Like?

To Xiomara Wilson who believes in me and

who is my biggest inspiration.

CHAPTER 1

SERVICE VS BUSINESS

When did our schools turn into a business? When did professionals with business degrees, looking like they are straight from Wall Street, briefcase and all, take over our schools? When did the focus of schools change from educating our children to running an efficient business based on the corporate business model of input and output?I can’t specifically give you a date, but I can tell you that when it happened, it changed the climate and feeling of our schools dramatically . . . and not for the better.

I’m going to go way back to first grade Social Studies and review a basic (very basic) concept. There are goods and services in our society. There are companies where the main purpose is to provide a good to our society. Those companies use the business model already mentioned and widely taught in all our university business departments. Those companies operate on a capitalistic philosophy.

Services are something that is done for another person or for the population as a whole. If the service is not a necessity, it can be a capitalistic operation. However, many services are provided as a necessity and many or most of those are paid for with taxes. Those services are not intended to create a profit.

CHAPTER 2

LAYMEN CONTROLLING EDUCATION

Most people will agree that the HMO experiment of health care has turned out to be a huge failure. HMOs operate with the profit as their priority at EVERYONE’S expense. Doctors no longer get to make important decisions about the care of their patients. They usually have to get approval from an HMO or an insurance company to perform tests or procedures they deem necessary. Doctors went to school for years to hone their knowledge base or expertise only to have some layman (usually without a medical degree) telling him/her what is the allowable thing to do with the profit of the company being the driving force in that decision.

That is similar to what happened to our schools. Politicians have learned that education is a hot ticket item during election seasons. Because education is funded by tax dollars, politicians have the power to banter it around for their political gains. Unfortunately, this is at the students’ expense.

It is stupid to have laymen making medical decisions for doctors. It is also stupid to have laymen (i.e. politicians) making policy and program decisions for schools. Educators (like doctors) spend years training and getting higher degrees specializing in educational issues only to have no decision making power. It’s just plain stupid!

Educational policy needs an understanding of many things. Child development, child psychology, curriculum development, assessment needs, learning styles, social and economic factors, and marital and familial factors are just a few things that educators have to take into consideration when making educational decisions. A one size fits all mentality cannot work and true educators know that. Unfortunately politicians do not!

When politicians or laymen try to make policy for our schools, they have to create laws or policies for the masses. This does not take into account the differences in culture, neighborhoods, communities, towns, cities, states, and regions of the country.

This puts schools in a terrible bind. They have to attempt to uphold a policy or law that may not fit their school community. This causes wasted time, energy, and money. Schools have to try to fit their square communities into a round law!

The No Child Left Behind law is a perfect example of a law created with a one size fits all mentality that has done more harm than good. The intent of this law was honorable at the onset. However, the devil was really in the details. Who didn’t want all children to learn? Who didn’t want schools to be responsible for their students? Who didn’t want a way to assess if our kids were learning? Sounds so simple, right? The details produced NONE of these goals.

NCLB created the opposite results it hoped for because of the details and because of the flawed hypothesis that everything in schools are black and white and that we could create a one size fits all solution. The first part of the problem was trying to set standards that everyone should master. Unfortunately, not all students develop at the same pace and so trying to develop a specific set of things to learn by a certain age will inevitably set up some children for failure, hence LEAVING THEM BEHIND!

Most teachers (and there will always be some exceptions to the rule) are more than comfortable with being held responsible for teaching a set of standards. I always said, Tell me what you want me to teach, let me use my expertise and knowledge to find the best materials and resources to do that, and get out of my way! However, NCLB has tied the hands of most teachers in how they do their jobs.

In the past, school districts provided textbooks and materials for the teachers’ use if they wanted to use them. However, teachers were free to search the vast array of curriculum resources available and choose the ones that best fit their students’ needs, individual preferences and teaching styles.

This is the first time in MY lifetime that we’ve been dictated what materials we will or will not use. Never before have I been told I could not use a resource that I deemed effective in teaching a particular standard or concept, even if I had had years of successful results with the said resource. Never before have teachers had their teaching so controlled and scripted by publishing companies and school districts. There are pacing charts that tell teachers what to teach and when. Teachers no longer have the flexibility to teach at a pace their students need. They must now teach lesson 4 on Tuesday and lesson 5 on Wednesday, damn the torpedoes (and the children)! It doesn’t matter if the kids got it or not, they can’t fall behind the pacing chart or everything won’t get