Evaluative Thinking Told as the Story of the Progression of the Kung-Fu Master

So, in my limited exposure to education, both in teacher school and in an actual student school, it seems like a person will not meet much vocal resistance if they affirm in their day-to-day interactions with fellow teachers:

1) most of the things you learn in classes like Educational Psychology are useless and a complete waste of time

and

2) trying to get students to "pay attention" to "important concepts" is like beating your head against a brick wall..

So, having said that, the rest of this post runs the risk of being extremely uncool and naive. This is a post about something important I learned in Educational Psychology that I want my students to know about.

And before I elaborate, I just want to say a word in defense of the teenagers before I truly embark on this teaching odyssey of mine. This is me tying myself to the mast of my boat and stuffing wax in my ears before the siren song of exhaustion and obnoxiousness and disappointment turns me into the kind of teacher who sees himself as savvy because he can determine who is enemies are (children, fellow teachers, parents, almost all administrators) and the best ways to crush them over petty things. This is the sign I'm hanging around my neck, written in a fleeting moment of clarity, before I stumble into the darkling plain.

In defense of teenagers: it's their job to fight you over everything you say, especially important things. It's an important part of becoming a person. Here's what I see happening all the time--here's a verbatim retelling of a moment this Thursday,

My cooperating teacher is reading to her class of seniors about Shakespeare off a worksheet purchased from a textbook company: "Reading Macbeth is very exciting. However, one important element from the play is always missing from a reading--"

A senior in the back of the class says under his breath, not missing a beat: "Yeah, the excitement."

And then I, and the three or four students sitting in the back , started laughing quietly.

HYPOTHETICAL TEACHER VOICE: Oh HA HA! Very funny! You just think everything is a joke, don't you? Just wait til' you get out in the real world, buddy! I'm trying to help you out and all you want to do is crack jokes in the back. Get out of my classroom!

And then the imaginary voice picks up the student and throws him through the second story window and asks, "Who else want some!?"

What's the conclusion reached? Teenagers just think everything is a joke and they'll cut you down no matter what so you better show them who's boss and never show them any weakness or they'll run right over you.

OR

From a teenager's perspective: Hey, my body and my brain are telling me that I should start acquiring power and wealth and security and a mate. Wait a minute, I don't have any of those things. I'm still doing what I did when I was seven. There's all this authority around me telling me what to do and when to do it. But what if...what if...I mock that authority! I can tear it down and prove it wrong! "Yeah! The excitement!" I've undermined the power and now I am more important than authority. I can undermine anything. I AM THE MOST IMPORTANT PERSON IN THE WORLD!

And that's a normal, healthy mindset that a person (or most people) have to have. How are you going to provide for other people if you don't acknowledge first that you are important? It is easy and fun and addictive to tear things down but it's also the first part of building things up again.

What I'm trying to say is, I get it, teenagers. You have to be like this. Both to cope with everything around you AND as a search for something authentic. Because I think it's also true that anything that can get through that bristly layer of "I don't care" and "this whole planet sucks", becomes a really really important part of that person later on.

And that's why any of this is worth doing. I walk into the classroom and I just see human-shaped molds of dirt wrapped in barbed wire that I have to chuck seeds and kernels at for 90 minutes and pray that something sticks and grows into a flower or a hotdog tree in three to five years.

That's not entirely true. But I'm trying to say that I don't think teenagers hate learning. They're just trying to manage taking in information while also carving out space to be a person. And you better not come at them with anything inauthentic like reading off a piece of paper "Shakespeare is very exciting".

Ideally they would bring in their own seeds and kernels or choose the ones that matter to them and put them in their dirt heads of their own volition.


But anyway, that's where I am with teenagers for now. Moving on!

Evaluative Thinking Told as the Story of the Progression of the Kung-Fu Master.

So, at some point in everyone's life they're going to start having ideas about ideas. And the kind of thoughts you can have about those ideas follow a particular progression. But that's kind of boring to talk about in terms of thoughts. Let's talk about it in terms of punching things.

Stage One: Absolutism.

In the first stage, there is one punch that must conquer all other punches. The Great Flaming Chicken Red Punch. And the young student learns this punch and is determined to master it. Every obstacle is a test of his mastery and every alternative punch or kick is insufficient. He chicken-punches all his foes. He chicken-punches all mountains and seas and trees and beasts. He is trapped between pity and contempt for all those who practice any other move and over time he becomes one with the art of this crimson poultry fire hand blow. It is the only answer and the world is his pizza for the taking.

Stage Two: Relativism.

But then, one day, the young master-to-be has a revelation that shakes him to his core. Some tragic accident, some epiphany like lightening, some crushing defeat causes him to lose faith in the Great Flaming Chicken Red Punch. And if this punch to crush all other punches can fail, then what is the value of anything? All punches and kicks and spins and headbutts, in the end, add up to a grand total of nothing. No move more effective or useful than any other.

Those poor fools who strut around the way he once strutted--they have no idea of the emptiness of every action. And so the young man wanders the country side for five years, assured in his knowledge that he is no longer living a life of folly. And the young man sits still for three years, assured that his inaction at least carries no pretensions. And then he retreats to the woods for a year.

Actually, he's only in the woods, like, some of the time. The rest of the time he's sitting in the street with a cheap bottle of wine, calling out everybody who walks by for how stupid they all are as he laughs and high-fives himself silly.

Stage Three: EVALUATIVE THINKING!

Who knows what shakes the young master out of his depression-beard, cynical, poo-poo thinking spiral but let's say for the sake of argument that it was a great call to action that he could no longer deny. A hairy monster with fangs like zebras and fists like hardened cakes is attacking Girlfriend Village and, for the first time in almost a decade, he must act to bring about change in the world. But this is not the master who saw every answer in his Red Hot Cock-A-Doodle-Doo Attack. This is a master who fights for values. This is a master who strives to bring about a change because he believes, for his own reasons, that some realities are better or worse than other realities. And no move or idea will ever be completely correct but that the undeniable crises of the world compel us to act with the best solution possible.

That takes thinking, and planning, and judgment calls. The master has returned to the world of things once more with the ability to see ideas as ideas but with the understanding that although these thoughts are just thoughts, they will still have an effect. This is the toughest way of all. Riddled with doubts and regrets and hesitation, the master forges ahead with all manner of uppercuts, face-smashes, and body slams to create a world that is safe for future generations.

The End.

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Maybe that didn't make any sense. But that's something we learned about in Educational Psychology that I really liked. And it's the first thing I think that I could say I feel a moral imperative to teach. The world should have evaluative thinkers. There should be people who can think and argue and reason and act on those ideas. That can't happen with absolutist or relativist thinking. There's either blind action or inaction which are equally dangerous!

The fate of the world aside, English doesn't make much sense without evaluative thinking. With absolutism a book and written assessment are just there to confirm what you already know or confirm what everyone else is wrong about. With relativism, it's all subjective anyway so the readings add up to nothing and a paper is just made-up (everyone's favorite term to describe writing) "bull crap".

If you don't try to teach evaluative or critical thinking, I don't think you can get past these pitfalls. In evaluative thinking, a book can give you insights into your own or someone else's thoughts. Thinking and learning are worthy aims on their own. The evaluation of a paper may be structured by a teacher but because those are ideas, you can seek to understand them and use them to advance your own thinking or get a good grade. Subjectivity isn't a hopeless mess to an evaluative thinker. You can work within that subjectivity to affect real change in the world. And isn't that what we want?! In the words of LetsRun, don't we all want to "make our dreams a reality"?

What I think evaluative thinking comes down to is the ability to improve. If you already know you're right, or you already know everyone else is wrong, or you already know the game is pointless, then you have no need to improve. It doesn't matter. You're either the best there is or no one wins and you're last. But if you acknowledge that you might make mistakes, and you might be right about some things, then you can correct those mistakes and you can improve on what you do well. And improvement feels really good. Are you kidding me? It's like one of the best, most coolest feelings out there. And you can do that with thinking. And kung-fu. And English class.

So that's my argument to you teenagers. And I don't expect you to believe me. But at the very least (in a more cynical view) you can know that's the game I'm playing and that's how I want you to beat it and it's going to keep coming up again and again and again. Or you can play nice and see this as a journey and this is me pointing you to the steep trail and hoping you'll take it.