Oakes

Tracking:Why Schools Need to Take Another Route  is written by Jeanie Oakes.  In this writing piece Oakes talks about the educational method of grouping and tracking and how it can have many negative affects on a majority population of students as well as propose possible alternative teaching styles.  “ One fact about tracking is unequivocal: tracking leads to substantial differences in the day-to-day learning experiences students have at school.”  This can also be the start to the forming of a social hierarchy in which the higher level groups feel and seem more important then the groups of students who were in average classes or classes that were slower than the higher level classes.   As Oakes also writes that based on personal observation that the higher level classes received a higher grade education therefore better preparing them for further schooling that their fellow students in lower level classes.  Jeanie Oakes then goes on to write to teachers directly and give ways in which they can try to ensure that all students are getting the same chance to engage in the learning and obtain valuable knowledge in doing so as not to make groups as in tracking.  Some of these teaching techniques include lecturing, common assignments and exams, along with competitive whole group instruction.  The author feels as though the best way to tech a mixed group of students is to put students in charge of their own learning evaluation which involves putting the students in charge of their own evaluation making sure they know what is being taught and can articulate the skills they were taught.  I think that if students were given the oppurtinty to edit the curriculum taught to them on a mass scale  it may improve their participation and understanding of what is being taught.  I also wonder if society could manage to have most levels of school function like that of college in which students pick the classes they want to take and more classes provided that have have more practical use in life.