John Taylor Gatto, een gerespecteerd criticus van het verplichte onderwijs, biedt een diepgaande analyse van het onderwijssysteem. Zijn werk daagt de heersende onderwijsdiscours uit en onthult de beperkende aard van conventionele pedagogische benaderingen. Gatto pleit voor een radicale heroverweging van hoe we onderwijzen en leren, en zet lezers aan tot het bevragen van de werkelijke doelen van scholing.
John Taylor Gatto's radical treatise on public education, a bestseller for 25 years, continues to advocate for the unshackling of children and learning from formal schooling. Now, in a changing world with an explosion of alternative routes to learning, it's poised to continue to shake the world of institutional education for many more years.
Argues that compulsory education is a detriment to developing critical thinking skills and trains students to become subservient to the government.
Gatto reveals the deadening heart of compulsory state schooling: assumptions and structures that stamp out the self-knowledge, curiosity, concentration, and solitude essential to learning. In his 26 years of award-winning teaching in New York City's public schools, Gatto has found that independent study, community service, large doses of solitude, and apprenticeships with adults of all walks of life are the keys to helping children break the thrall of our conforming society. Gatto urges all of us to find ways to reengage children and families in actively controlling our culture, economy, and society.