Education is an academic discipline whose core knowledge consists of teaching and learning, research into teaching and learning, and the building of new theory based on research. Advancing over the years from basic teaching of “the three R’s” to stresses on science and discovery learning, education remains deeply connected to cultural change and changing societal values. Young people are influenced by teachers and curriculum, but this does not replace personal decision making based on the search for knowledge. Teachers’ values will be revealed to some extent through the relationships they form with students, their teaching methods and classroom behavior. Curriculum will always be value laden in that curriculum developers must choose from a sea of knowledge. But it is never, ever appropriate for teachers to reveal their own personal and political views or for curriculum to espouse a political stance. Rather, we must teach students to read, deeply and broadly, to replace quick scanning of information on cellphones, with reading of books and entire articles, and to think critically about what they read. “Woke” ideas do not replace deep reading, critical thinking and making individual, informed, independent decisions.
Kamal et al. (Sat,) studied this question.