After completing some of the prliminary readings, I feel as though many of these writers simply pick a position, and with no exact justification, "go off" on the matter. They simply repeat their opinions over five to fifteen pages, and embelish the few examples that they have to a point that loses my attention. The readings were easy, but lacked content. The points made were good, and I agree with many of them, but the compositional style of these articles leaves much to be desired! it also seems as though everyone either shows an overly positive or extremely pesimistic view of the world of teaching. There does not seem to be enough discussion of the middle ground of teaching, or melding of styles.

I am very interested in hearing other opinions on the matter.

I do see your point. The readings are one sided in many cases. I think what has helped me with all of my reading assignment this semester, is I have tried to put myself as a future teacher in each of the authors realm of writing. This helps me gain different perspectives on various subjects. Just an idea, since we will be reading alot this semester.

I am taking HIS 2201 and the reading from that class is a whole different animal than the reading from this one! Some authors do tend to pose a shallow, drawn-out type of argument for their topic. In particualr, "The Daily Grind" article seemed kindof, well, not true. I think the answer you get to a question about how a kid's day went will depend on the kid. Have you ever asked a 6 year-old about their day?! Some will go on for hours about "Well, Billy got a pencil stuck in his nose, and the glue wouldnt open so Mrs. Thomas had to go get another one just for me, because I had to have glue to start on my snowman, and the lunchlady did this and...." Well, you get my point. Some kids will tell you way more than you want to know about EVERTHING they did that day. Just depends on whether you want to hear it or not. Some kids dont say much. This article seemed to stereotype things like that to me...
And the comparison of the school to a church...well, I thought that was a bit of shakey ground myself...
Do all schools use the same cleaners? I thought that was pretty funny!