His explanation of specialization highlighted some concerns I have about some interpretations of classical education. In Sayer's famous essay she talks about the poll-parrot stage as a time when children love to memorize. Some of her followers have taken this "love of memorization" to new heights (or depths) and insist on encouraging young students to memorize many teacher-selected and disembodied facts. The theory is that they enjoy it and later they will have "pegs" for learning when they reach the next stage. Although this may work, it seems to start on the road to specialization - memorizing discrete information as learning or education - early. I am not against helping students to see details and distinctions (as in nature study when you ask them to further describe something that they are observing). Also, I think that kids will naturally memorize things that they enjoy. I prefer the CM approach of laying a feast and exposing students to things worth learning by heart and remembering (as opposed to Pokemon characters or baseball player stats). One blogger I respect, warns against using our kids for "parlor tricks" by which she means showing off how much they have memorized. Weaver's description of our obsession with facts just helped clarify why I struggle with this approach to classical education. It seems that this would be almost exactly counter to the aims of a "traditional" classical education. Am I missing something here?
Weaver warns that being a specialist has dire consequences when political order is upset. "But when it breaks down and he is thrown back upon his own resources, it becomes apparent that these resources have been allowed to diminish." He then continues,
"for a burden of responsibility is, after all, the best means of getting anyone to think straight. If he is made to feel that he is accountable for results, he looks steadily at the situation and endeavors to discover what is really true in it. This is a discipline."Weaver praises an 1850's Vermont farmer as a man of many resources, despite his poverty. He is able to provide for himself, engage with his community and has a full orbed life. This is a stark contrast to our modern era when people purposely decide not to work because the government benefits are better than what an actual job can provide. We as a culture are impoverishing ourselves, especially as we abandon the land. Weaver asserts that "people close to the soil appear to have longer memories than have the urban masses. Traditions there live for generations; what their grandfathers did is real to them." After spending a week in Wyoming and listening to my family talk about crops, chickens and goats and how their Dad did it - I have to agree. This also makes me think of many of Wendell Berry's concerns. We are losing our memories of these things as we all go to the grocery store to get our food. I think the homesteading movement and simple living are modern reactions to this sense of loss and desire to reconnect and reintegrate our lives.
Although Weaver might be extreme in his fear of psychosis as a result of our fragmentation he might not be that far off.
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