John Taylor Gatto: The Hidden Agenda
J. T. Gatto interviewed by Lennart Mogren, Sweden, March 2003
John Taylor Gatto is an American retired school teacher of 30 years experience in the classroom and author of several books on education. He is an activist critical of compulsory schooling and of what he characterizes as the hegemonic nature of discourse on education and the education professions. In this interview he exposes the hidden agenda that makes most of us hate regular schooling. He exposes the dark and terrifying machinery behind the scenes. Mr Gatto gíves us hope and tools to start dismantling this hideous institution. Parents need to get in charge of their kids’ education in new loving and nurturing ways. Mr Gatto is a great inspiration for those of us who realize this…
What does the school do with the children?
Gatto takes this in “Dumbing Us Down”, the following propositions:
1. It makes the children confused. It presents an incoherent ensemble of information that the child needs to memorize to stay in school. Apart from the tests and trials that programming is similar to the television, fills almost the whole, “free” time of the children. One sees and hears something, to forget it again.
2. It teaches them to accept their class affiliation.
3. It makes them indifferent.
4. It makes them emotionally dependent.
5. It teaches them a kind of self-confidence which requires constant confirmation by experts (provisional self-esteem).
6. It makes it clear to them that they can not hide, because they are always supervised.[
Tags: compulsory schooling, Dumbing Us Down, John Gatto, Lennart Mogren
