 Anyone who thinks the present curriculum makes sense is invited to explain to an intelligent fourteen-year-old why algebra or French or any other subject is essential for him. Adult answers are almost always evasive. The reason is simple: the present curriculum is a mindless holdover from the past.
Why, for example, must teaching be organized around such fixed disciplines as English, economics, mathematics, or biology? Why not around stages of the human life cycle: a course on birth, childhood, adolescence, marriage, career, retirement, death? Or around contemporary social problems? Or around significant technologies of the past and future? Or around countless other imaginable alternatives?
Alvin Toffler, Future Shock (1970)
| Welcome to RAUSER BEGINS, the official online home of Richard J. Rauser ("Rick" to most folks), professional high school teacher, madly-in-love husband, and ridiculously doting parent. I can be easily contacted at rauserbegins@gmail.com.
This site contains the following elements:
(my list of upcoming homework, tests, and assignments)
(my philosophy of education blog)
(my teaching portfolio)
(my life in progress)
(my professional qualifications)
 |
|
Rick Rauser
I am a 41-year-old high school humanities teacher. I teach courses in English, Social Studies, film and media studies, psychology, and religious education. At the present time I teach at Kelowna Christian School, an independent parochial school in Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada.
For the past twelve years I have been married to the girl of my dreams, and we have a 9-year-old daughter who is the light of our lives. The only thing I think is worth doing in my spare time is spending time with my wife and daughter, and I do this with unrelenting enthusiasm.  |
rethinking education . . . |
