I was just reading about someone claiming that it's because of Mr. Rogers that we live in a "everybody wins!" all of the children are above average society. This observation was based solely on the fact that Mr. Rogers thinks you're special no matter what, which instantly translated in this guy's head to "All children are precious little snowflakes, and we can't allow them to fail!"
I've certainly never thought of the message that way. Yes, you are special just the way you are, but you're growing and you're learning and you're changing. That's why you're special. For every time Mr. Rogers tells us we're special, we're also being told that we're growing up and learning to do new things, and that the things we're doing (tying our shoes, riding bikes, going to the bathroom, going to school), may be scary, and they may be hard, and we probably won't do them right away. Mr. Rogers says that someday you will do them, and I'm here to help you know that it's OK to make mistakes, but you still need to try and do your best, so you can grow up to be the best person you know how to be.
He's creating an environment in which failure is not only possible, it's safe. You won't be loved any the less if you fail. You're going to succeed one day, and until you do, you feel however you need to feel. That's OK, you're an individual, we're all different, we all have different abilities. Trust me: I can help you. Tell me how you feel: I will feel the same for you and keep you safe no matter what happens, or what you do.
That's not coddling. That's love. There's a difference.
Mr. Rogers teaches that you're going to have your feelings hurt, and you're going to lose, and you're going to have a hard time, and it's OK to feel upset or sad when you lose, but that's not the end of the world, and that's important. Tomorrow you might win. No one loves you any the less, you're not a bad person because of that, you're doing just fine even if you do lose.
I know I've met some really dense school counsellors and child therapists in my time, so I can see how this message could plausibly get twisted around into the coddling. But to blame it on Mr. Rogers sounds like looking for a scapegoat.
Check out Adlerian Theory, and the inferiority complex. I think it was that concept thrown out of whack that gave rise to the "everybody wins!" concept. Also, remember the Good Time Gang, Smurfs, and other community-based-everyone-wins-because-everyone-is-always-right-when-we-work-together-because-the-individual-is-always-wrong style of cartoons of the mid 80s. I think that's the sort of thinking that got us to this point.
He goes on to point out that when he was in school, an A was 95 to 100 percent, now it's 90. Apparently, that extra five percent is the breakdown of society wherein we're allowing everyone to succeed.
Yeah. Sure.
The model for the American school system seems to be largely based on catch-as-catch-can agrarian societies. From the Puritans to the Pioneers, the whole country has been living on the edge of society and putting in schooling when possible, a system which could be said to be slap-dash at best. That system was ALSO based on rote memorisation and the concept that children were little adults.
The last big revolutions in the basic format of schooling came with the addition of gym and field trips in the 1900s, when popular psychology decided that children were not automatons. So, not only is the current incarnation fairly useless and undirected (I would know, I was a product of them), it doesn't say much for the previous ones either.
Additionally, if you can boil education down to where you fall on a number chart, there's a problem with the system. If you ask me (and nobody did, but I'm sharing my opinion anyway), the trouble with education is that it ought to be exactly what Mr. Rogers offers. It should be a place to grow and to learn. I don't think it really is, I think it's a place to be evaluated and placed on a number chart.
I don't think that education and schooling ought to be objective. Certainly 2+2 is always going to be 4, and students should be held accountable for that information, but I think that the problem is that the kid who wasn't even aware 4 was a number and the kid who knows that 2x2 is also 4 are being evaluated on that same scale. Is that appropriate for either of those students?
I was always intrigued by the Boy Scout Board of Review. Basically, this is where a Scout has to prove that they actually have the skills needed to earn their merit badge. The Scouts are called up individually and asked by the Scoutmasters to talk about or demonstrate certain skills or procedures. For example, on a bike merit badge, the Scout might be asked to explain how to pump up a bike tire, to demonstrate the appropriate way to wear a bike helmet, and to talk about bike safety, or whatever.
I remember my father talking about a lot of the Scout's reviews. My father always assumed that the boy who came up and recited bike safety right out of the manual and the boy who came up and talked about an accident that occured on a ride (because there invariably was one), and how it might not have happened if so-and-so had done such and such, were both talking about bike safety. Another Scoutmaster would argue this point with my dad, saying that only the first boy was fulfilling the requirement.
I'm with my dad on this; both Scouts fulfilled the requirement. The badge didn't ask that the Scout learn the manual, it asked that the Scout learned bike safety. Both Scouts displayed a knowledge of safe practices when on a bicycle.
Your average public school, however, seems to side with the other Scoutmaster. Never mind what you might think or know otherwise, just remember what the book says so you can pass the test. If I had a quarter for the number of times I've been told that, well, I might have three bucks, but the point is that I don't believe that's educating. I think that's filling in a number chart, and I don't think it's any way to measure knowledge or abilities.
It's like the little games they play with math. You get a third of a point if you get the answer right. You get a third of a point if you show your work. You get a third of a point if you show your work exactly the way you were taught in class. You get an extra third of a point if you stick your thumb up your butt and whistle.
While I know this method was designed to "give points" even if the student missed the answer, it frustrates every kid who doesn't need to follow the method, or for whom the method doesn't work. This was me all over. My math scores on standard tests got worse and worse as I acquired more math. As I was being taught to do the math on the tests, I was doing worse than when left to my own devices. Things finally improved my senior year of high school when I was taking Geometry and we started on proofs.
I will readily admit that whatever the teacher was doing didn't make a lot of sense, but I was lucky because he understood what I was trying to do. He told me that I was simply trying to apply concepts that hadn't been covered yet, so I didn't know how to do it correctly, or I was missing something. If I'd had a teacher that wanted the proof to follow a set path and no other, I'd've failed every test. As it is, I did OK. Not great, but OK. I learned more math in that class than any math class I ever had.
I think that for our public schools to truly be viable learning facilities for all students, they need to be offering something to all those students, and giving them a place where they can grow and learn. To do that, the system has to change. It has to change radically.
I don't know how. I can't even imagine what an ideal system would look like. How can you fit in structure and routine in the same place as growth and discovery in the same place as math and chemistry? The only thing that springs to mind is a system where each student is tested at the beginning of the year, then matched to something, developmental norms, maybe. Then set a goal for each student, someplace that they need to be by the end of the following year.
Let's say ten year old Bobby can't spell, but he's reading at an eighth grade level, and he's writing OK for his grade level. One goal for Bobby is to get him writing and spelling by working on writing about the books he's reading. Let's say 13 year old Susan has an aptitude for science, but sucks at math: start her on Physics. By the end of the year, she should be able to demonstrate several of the mathematical princpiles of classical mechanics- so she'll understand force and gravity and she should be able to manage algebra. (I learned fractions thanks to an archietctural scale rule.)
Unfortunately, that would also require better perpared as well as more teachers who are able to handle a variety of complex subjects and cross curriculum work. The way public schools are funded and staffed, this isn't only implausible, it's impossible.
I doubt that anything wrong with education or the "everybody wins!" concept lay within Mr. Rogers' influence. I also think that most children are wise to the "everybody wins" thing. Truthfully, I've never even seen it. I've only heard people refer to it. Neither do I truly believe that our schools are "being" dumbed down. They're not doing the job we wish they might, but I don't think they ever really have.
If anything, the answer may lie in Mr. Rogers, who managed to inspire and teach and touch so many of his television neighbors just by being himself, and giving himself to the world for half an hour every afternoon.