Teaching Theory

In Vito Perrone's A Letter To Teachers we are presented with a book designed as a letter to educators about the issues and complexities involved in modern education. The theories revealed in the text take a holistic approach to teaching, one that sees all issues and all subject matter as interrelated. In a sense, the holistic approach is also advocated as one that encompasses administrators, educators, students, curricula, and community. The lengthy letter covers a variety of teaching issues, from purposes of teaching, engaging students and valuing differences to empowered teachers, accountability and the community connection. This analysis will cover the basic ideas and theories posed by Perrone, comparing and contrasting them to the three different teaching styles (executive, therapist and liberationist) illustrated by Gary D. Fenstermacher and Jonas F. Soltis in Approaches To Teaching.

In A Letter To Teachers, Perrone covers many issues and complexities involved in modern education. Perrone's biggest complaint is that modern educators suffer from misplaced concerns that lie at the heart of the larger purpose of teaching. Too much teaching is focused on mechanical, assembly-line learning that is more concerned about passing on information to students who are expected to robotically memorize and regurgitate it as opposed to being concerned about developing students who are self-learners, able to contribute to their own development and that of soc

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to make decisions surrounding such values and commitments. In the world of schools, it was an unusual response. It ought to be the usual" (Perrone 7). One problem with educators is the low expectations they have of students and the lack of demand placed upon them to become continuous, self-motivated learners. Teachers and standards of teaching need designed to teach learners how to be better learners not just how and what they should learn. Included in this process is the need for more developed teachers who are also active readers and writers, and, therefore, more effective communicators. Enthusiasm on behalf of teachers is also needed and focus on the areas where they have the greatest intellectual command of topics and subjects. Instead of presenting children with a limited two-option solution to the complex issues and aspects of life in modern society, teachers need to promote critical thinking that allows for reflection, the weighing of issues and ideas, discovering insights from different perspectives and the ability to gauge the reliability, motives or accuracy of those providing information. Part of this process is engaging students in a curriculum that is build based on the many needs of students, curricula that

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