"Thought of the Week" for
Objectivity makes an object
of all it observes—even children
The empirical method is the basis for all
logical positivism, and is responsible for incalculable developments
in the physical and biological sciences. But objectivity can be
concerned only with objects; it must transform into an object
anything it observes. It assumes that it is possible to separate the
subject observer from the object he observes. ...perceptions
(observations) are determined by needs; they involve a subjective
shaping of experience. The idea of "total objectivity" is thus
patently ridiculous; objective observation will a priori
limit its conclusions by asking only questions whose solutions can
fit within measurable parameters. Such scientific observation is reductionistic,
directed toward analyzing the whole into its component parts.
David McCarthy, "Gestalt as Learning Theory",
The Live Classroom: Innovation through Confluent Education
and Gestalt
Comment:
Turning Children into Objects
by Reg Harris
Copyright © 2001 by Reg Harris. All rights reserved. Revised October 2007. All rights reserved. Apart from properly cited quotes and short excerpts, no part of this article can be copied or used in any form without written permission from the author. For permission to use, please contact me.
We do not perceive the "outside" world
directly.
For us to measure something objectively (as in
an objective test), that something must be made into an object
(i.e., a response) which can be measured by the test. In the case of
a test, students must be able to understand and express their
learning and growth in ways that the test can measure, so the test
actually shapes the learning, the way children perceive and
understand the world.
How do you measure insight, growth and
understanding objectively? How can one turn the process of living
and being into objects which a test can measure? We can't, and if
there is one indictment of the high-stakes testing which is sweeping
the country in the name of "accountability" (corporate profit and
political power are the real motives), it is that they are
dangerous. They will shape our teaching. They will shape our
children's understanding.
This is done in the name of an ideology, of
education, of the need to compete in the world market place. In
fact, it has very little to do with that. Power shapes the world and
the people in it to perpetuate itself, and we, by acceding to its
demands become the tools of that power.
"I do not believe that what has taken place can
be said to be ideological. It is both much more and much less than
ideology. It is the production of effective instruments for the
formation and accumulation of knowledge -- methods of observation,
techniques of registration, procedures for investigation and
research, apparatus of control."...power, when it is exercised
through these subtle mechanisms, cannot but evolve, organize and put
into circulation a knowledge, or rather apparatuses of knowledge,
which are not ideological constructs." (p. 102)
High-stakes testing, standardized curriculum,
and measurable outcomes are the tools of the mechanistic,
reductionistic, pseudo objective power which has controlled (and
exploited) our world for more than 300 years. In the name of
education and fairness, it demands "objectivity", yet what it wants
is compliance, control and order. It wants a standardized product
(graduates) who will fit the system which power has created.
Unfortunately, the media, the parents, and even
most teachers seem to have bought into the program. This is most
unfortunate, for if there is any hope for regaining our humanity in
the face of technological conformity, it is the public schools and
their original goal of being the great equalizer in a democratic
society.
References
Foucault, M. (1980). Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other writings. New York: Pantheon.