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The arts and humanities are just terribly taught. People notice it more with regard to English than art or music class, because you have to take English every y

The arts and humanities are just terribly taught. People notice it more with regard to English than art or music class, because you have to take English every year pretty much anywhere, while usually you stop taking art or music before you realize how bad it is. I had a lot of great science and math teachers and a few great history teachers. I had some good English teachers but none who were really great. I think that's because people with math and science degrees have plenty of job opportunities, so only the ones who really want to teach high school even consider it. Probably the best English teachers I had were baby-boomer or older women who would have done something else if not for workplace misogyny. As they retired they were generally replaced by ignorant young women. I love reading and I can write lucidly, but I knew people in college who had had really strong English instruction and can analyze a novel on first reading in ways that wouldn't even occur to me after a month of full-time study.

ia 18y ago
I think part of the issue here is the nature of the beast--for most English teachers, teaching is less about showing their students how to successfully parse the symbolism and subtext, and more about clubbing them over the head with the teacher's own interpretation. I imagine it's easy to fall into that trap. If you give a student the tools to find the answer instead of just giving the answer, you risk the possibility of the student coming back with something you deem "incorrect". In quantitative subjects, it's easy to say, "Nope, that's wrong. The answer is this..." In the arts and humanities however, one can almost always argue for the validity of his/her interpretation. So, an English teacher has a difficult job. On the one hand, you can give your students methods to come up with their own interpretations of the readings (which will inevitably result in "incorrect" interpretations and conflict as the students fight with you over the validity of their ideas). On the other hand, you can teach your own answers, and encourage your students to lightly reinterpret and regurgitate them. In keeping with that old saying about teaching a man to fish, many (if not most) English teachers simply give their students the fish. So, when the pupils come upon a teacher that assumes they already know how to fish, they starve. Disclaimer: I was an English major in college, so this is based on my own experience.
- HeyLaughingBoy 18y ago
  This is perhaps why I went to grad school for Software Engineering instead of Computer Science: the mix of objective and subjective interpretation in the same course. e.g., one of the reasons I enjoyed my Patterns and Architectures course was the discussion around popular, useful patterns and when they fail, or when doing something generally considered the "right way" is a really bad idea. I hate being told "X" is the right answer in all situations.

ia 18y ago

I think part of the issue here is the nature of the beast--for most English teachers, teaching is less about showing their students how to successfully parse the symbolism and subtext, and more about clubbing them over the head with the teacher's own interpretation. I imagine it's easy to fall into that trap. If you give a student the tools to find the answer instead of just giving the answer, you risk the possibility of the student coming back with something you deem "incorrect". In quantitative subjects, it's easy to say, "Nope, that's wrong. The answer is this..." In the arts and humanities however, one can almost always argue for the validity of his/her interpretation. So, an English teacher has a difficult job. On the one hand, you can give your students methods to come up with their own interpretations of the readings (which will inevitably result in "incorrect" interpretations and conflict as the students fight with you over the validity of their ideas). On the other hand, you can teach your own answers, and encourage your students to lightly reinterpret and regurgitate them. In keeping with that old saying about teaching a man to fish, many (if not most) English teachers simply give their students the fish. So, when the pupils come upon a teacher that assumes they already know how to fish, they starve. Disclaimer: I was an English major in college, so this is based on my own experience.

HeyLaughingBoy 18y ago
This is perhaps why I went to grad school for Software Engineering instead of Computer Science: the mix of objective and subjective interpretation in the same course. e.g., one of the reasons I enjoyed my Patterns and Architectures course was the discussion around popular, useful patterns and when they fail, or when doing something generally considered the "right way" is a really bad idea. I hate being told "X" is the right answer in all situations.