A+ For All

Personally, I think that the whole idea of this professor giving out A+'s to every student in his class at the start of the year is a brilliant idea. While some may say that its just a new wave, liberal teaching method that will die as soon as its inventor does, I feel that if handled properly, it could change the way that we look at education.

As I've already said, I think that this is a great idea. I know many students that worry too much about marks and what grades they get in school and because of this they limit themselves to one way of thinking. Too many of us just give the teachers what we think they want  to hear, and say what we think they want us to think, instead of voicing our own opinion. This ties back to Ken Robinsons idea of our great fear of being wrong, but we've already gone over that. All I'm saying is that by setting a grade standard, you're automatically limiting students and setting them up to become robots who only spit out the information and opinions they've been told to memorize.  By eliminating the grades, students are more likely to open up and really learn instead of just memorize and try to do what they think the teachers want them to do.

Also, this event took place in the University of Ottawa. Universities are supposed to be places of higher learning where people are allowed to project different views, ideals and methods off of each other, and then study and learn from them. Universities are also supposed to not just tolerate debate, but encourage it. Why is it then, that when a teacher chooses to try out a new teaching method he's automatically fired? Isn't this a bit hypocritical of the University to do this without first discussing with the professor the implications, pros, cons, etc of this new method?

To try and sum up, my thoughts are this: in a school system where the teaching method has been the same for hundreds of years, but within that same system, the concept of new ideas is preached like mad, shouldn't we be more opened minded towards new ways of thinking?