[HPforGrownups] Re: Teaching Styles

[Shaun Hately]

No: HPFGUIDX 147990

On 11 Feb 2006 at 14:25, festuco wrote:

> r what this passage tells us.
>  
> > It's a very good question - because obviously if Neville after two 
> > and a half years is still making the same mistake in potions classes 
> > that he made in his very first lesson, something is wrong.
> 
> Gerry
> Yes, his fear of Snape.

Shaun:

All right - now please explain to me why Neville is the student who 
forgets he is wearing the sorting hat during the sorting ceremony; 
why Neville is the student who needs to be helped into the Gryffindor 
common room the first time they go there; why Neville is the student 
who according to Harry, before their first flying lesson has 'an 
extraordinary number of accidents even with both feet on the 
ground.'; Why Neville is the student who is the only one who manages 
to accidentally take off in their first flying lesson, and to fall 
and injure himself; Why Neville is the student who is found sleeping 
on the floor outside the Common Room because he forgot the password; 
why out of Ron, Hermione, Harry, and Neville, why is Neville the one 
who bolts and runs revealing their location to Filch, when Harry goes 
to duel Malfoy?' Why is Neville the student who is always losing his 
toad? Why is Neville the student who loses the passwords that allow 
Sirius Black to get into Gryffindor tower?

Where is Snape in any of these instances - and I suspect there are 
even more, these are just ones I can think of quickly.

I am not saying Neville isn't scared of Snape - he absolutely clearly 
is, very scared of him. But Neville makes basic mistakes, does silly 
things all the time - especially in the earlier books. The problems 
that Neville has come from who Neville is, not from other people 
around him.

If the problem (for want of a better word) is primarily with Snape, 
we should be seeing this as a widespread problem across his 
classroom. But that is not what we see. We see plenty of students who 
don't like Snape - but they still don't make elementary procedural 
mistakes in their potions classes.

What is it about Neville that makes him react differently in Snape's 
classes than everyone else

Why if a teacher's methods seem to be working for the majority of a 
class, with just one obvious exception where they are not working, do 
people assume that the problem is with the teacher?

To me, it seems obvious that the problem is with the pupil. With 
Neville.

Blaming Snape for Neville's failures in his classes is like blaming 
the teacher of a dyslexic child for the fact that the child has 
trouble reading. Even if there is something the teacher could be 
doing to help that child (and often there is), the issue is with the 
child.

Neville's problems are evident throughout the early books.

Now - does Snape handle this issue particularly well? No, I don't 
think so - but I think it is pretty absurd to blame him for the 
problems Neville has. If I was going to blame anybody for that (and I 
really don't have the evidence for this, but it'd be my gut call) 
it'd be his Grandmother.

> Gerry:
>
> Do we? I'd say we see a boy so paralyzed with fear of his teacher that
> he regularly goes to pieces and makes elementary mistakes. Canon says
> Neville goes to pieces because of his fear, not that he is a careless
> little boy that should be disciplined. Where is the canon that Neville
> is ever careless? why should he be so now? 

Shaun:

Where in the canon is it that Neville is careless?

"Professor McGonagall pulled herself back through the portrait
hole to face the stunned crowd. She was white as chalk.

'Which person,' she said, her voice shaking, 'which abysmally foolish 
person wrote down this week's passwords and left them
lying around?'

There was utter silence, broken by the smallest of terrified
squeaks. Neville Longbottom, trembling from head to fluffy slippered
toes, raised his hand slowly into the air."

(PoA)

And that's just the most obvious example.

We also have these - from Philosopher's stone.

>From our very first encounter with Neville:

"He passed a round-faced boy who was saying, 'Gran, I've lost my toad 
again.'

'Oh, Neville,' he heard the old woman sigh."

*****

Later:

"Nobody spoke much. Neville, the boy who kept losing his toad, 
sniffed once or twice."

*****

Later again:

"When Neville Longbottom, the boy who kept losing his toad, was
called, he fell over on his way to the stool."

(Do you get the impression that JKR is trying to tell us something 
about Neville?)

*****

"Poor, blundering Neville."

Harry's view of Neville when he comes out to warn them about Malfoy 
laying a trap for them.

*****

Neville is careless - the canon for that is quite clear in my view. 
His greatest act of carelessness is leaving the passwords behind but 
it's mentioned all through the text.

> Gerry:
>
> Actually I think the first disastrous lesson may have started the fear
> of potions which rapidly changed in a fear of Snape. And the one big
> mistake Snape makes in this first lesson is giving them a potion where
> a simple mistake will have such huge effects. It was an accident
> waiting to happen, as anyone with common sense could predict. Then
> when it happens, Snape - who is clearly shocked - lashes out at
> Neville. If he had acted differently, reigned in his temper that would
> probably already have made a difference. 

Shaun:

OK, first of all, you're assuming that potions exist where simple 
mistakes don't have major consequences? Personally I think that's a 
huge assumption. Lessons at Hogwarts are dangerous - McGonnagall 
stresses this in her first class that her subject is dangerous.

Neville breaks his arm in his first flying lesson - should Madam 
Hooch have made her lesson safer? Do bear in mind this is at a school 
where the Matron can heal nearly all injuries very quickly, and 
Neville's injuries in the potions class are dealt with quickly.

We are told that the potion in that first class is a 'simple potion'. 
Snape has deliberately given the students a simple potion to do. He 
hasn't given them something difficult to do.

And every single other student in the class - all novices - don't 
have a problem with it.

Whem 95% of a class are able to do something, it seems to me pretty 
odd to suggest the teacher has overestimated the complexity of the 
task at hand.

I don't think Snape's reaction is from shock, personally, but if it 
was, that would actually indicate to me that the mistake Neville had 
made is shocking - ie, something that a teacher with nearly a decade 
of experience teaching this subject hasn't seen before.
 
> Gerry:
>
> I also think we see a teacher here who either does not recognize that
> the way he bullies Neville is actually the cause of the problem or
> does not care about that. In both cases that makes Snape an average
> teacher, not a good one. Neville is obviously perfectle capabel of
> following instructions if Hermione gives them or when Snape is absent.

Shaun:

The first problem with that argument, in my view, is that Neville 
makes his very first mistake before Snape has bullied him. The second 
problem with it that Neville demonstrates careless behaviour out of 
class and in other teachers classes as well - in Chamber of Secrets I 
recall, he accidentally removes the leg of McGonnagall's desk during 
a class, and at the time he's under no stress at all.

> Gerry:
> 
> Now Snape does not have to be nice to Neville. He could have tried to
> leave him alone. Even a completely inflexible person should be able to
> manage that.

A teacher has a duty to teach their students. They can't just decide 
to leave them alone. Abrogation of responsibility for educating a 
student is just about the worst thing a teacher can do.

He has a duty to try and educate Neville. He doesn't get to choose 
who he teaches and who he doesn't - not until fifth year anyway when 
he is allowed to set minimum standards.

> Gerry:
>
> Nothing new. Just another way of bullying and installing fear. Verbal
> bullying did not work, try something stronger. I'm sure Snape wants
> Neville to get it, but I'm equally sure goes about it entirely the
> wrong way. I also believe that Snape is genuinly not able to
> understand how anybody can make elemental mistakes. And that is a very
> bad thing for a teacher. Because what for most is quite elemental is
> for some very, very difficult. It is exactly that attitude - this is
> elemental and therefore you should be able to do it - that makes for
> traumatized students who really, really try, do not manage and instead
> of getting decent help from their teacher get punishments. I know at
> least one case where someone who was dislectic was severely harmed
> because he kept making the same "elemental" spelling mistakes. Now I
> know your opinion on modern teaching methods, but please keep in mind
> that the old methods were just as good in making students suicidal
> when they genuinly could not help their mistakes and got punisment on
> punisment and sarcasm on sarcasm because they had the kind of teacher
> that was not able to understand that for them elemental was not
> elemental but virtually impossible. 

Shaun:

I don't think you do know my opinion of modern teaching methods from 
what you are saying here. I have nothing whatsoever against them when 
they work - and they often do work. I use modern methods in my own 
teaching, all the time, when I find that they have merit. What I have 
a problem with is the attitude (and it is a very common one 
unfortunately) that just because a method is modern it is a good one, 
and which is unfortunately often accompanied by an idea that this 
means old fashioned methods are automatically bad. There's good and 
bad in the modern, there's good and bad in the old fashioned - and 
often what makes something good or bad depends on the precise 
circumstances in which it was used.

If there was any evidence that Neville was suicidal as a result of 
being in Snape's classes, or even that he was suffering some form of 
general depression as a result of being in those classes, I would be 
inclined to agree with what you have said here. But there isn't. 
There is evidence that Neville is frightened by Snape, but that's an 
entirely different matter. Neville is frightened by *many* things.

"'There's no need to tell me I'm not brave enough to be in 
Gryffindor, Malfoy's already done that,' Neville choked out."

But over time, over the course of the books, Neville becomes braver 
and braver - until by the fifth book, he is a genuine hero.

Has Neville reached this stage by being mollycoddled and by people 
removing him from situations that frighten him? 

No, he's faced his fears and he's learned to deal with them.

When Neville reveals to his class and to his teacher, that he is 
scared of Professor Snape (and admitting that in itself takes 
coverage), does Lupin tell him he shouldn't be afraid? No - he tries 
to teach him a strategy to confront his fear.

Does McGonnagall spare Neville from punishment that frightens him in 
the Philosopher's Stone? Not at all. Neville is punished in the same 
way as the others.

This is how students learn to deal with fear at Hogwarts.

Would a Neville who had been mollycoddled have turned into this young 
man?:

"'He's dot alone!' shouted a voice from above them. 'He's still god 
be!'

Harry's heart sank: Neville was scrambling down the stone benches 
towards them, Hermiones wand held fast in his trembling 
hand."

In his trembling hand - Neville is not free of fear here. He is 
afraid. And he has good reason to be.

But he's still standing. He's still fighting. He is not letting fear 
stop him from doing what he has to do.

> Gerry:
>
> Not in this case. It is sadistic, pure and simple. Now I agree that
> Snape would never have let him poison his pet, it is clear from the
> reactions of the class everybody thinks he is capable of it and I'm
> sure he knows it. Otherwise his "incentive" would not have worked. So
> what do we have: do this right or your pet dies. 

Shaun:

I remember a teacher when I was fifteen telling me that if I didn't 
get the next answer right on a test, he'd break my 
legs. Did I honestly believe he'd do it? Logically, objectively, I 
knew he'd never do that. That didn't stop the threat 
from working though, and didn't stop me being scared.

> Gerry:
>
> There is a distinction between that and downright sadism. This was an
> example of sadism. As for negative reinforcement: when a teacher
> favours that he should be sure there is nothing else than attitude
> that prevents the student from performing rightly. Here Snape does not
> recognize the paralyzing ability of fear that prevents Neville from
> doing it right. Therefore his method is wrong and makes the problem
> worse. Do we see Neville doing better after that? No we do not. He
> needs an exam without Snape to show people what he is capable of as
> far as potions are concerned. 

Shaun:

The point is I don't believe it is an example of sadism. I've seen 
truly sadistic teachers in action - and Snape doesn't even come 
close. And I've had teachers who were very like Snape in their 
actions, and they were not sadistic.

I'd give example of what a truly sadistic teacher did to me - except 
I can't even bring myself to write it down. Offering to help me kill 
myself was just the start, though.


 

Yours Without Wax, Dreadnought
Shaun Hately | www.alphalink.com.au/~drednort/thelab.html
(ISTJ)       | drednort at alphalink.com.au | ICQ: 6898200 
"You know the very powerful and the very stupid have one
thing in common. They don't alter their views to fit the 
facts. They alter the facts to fit the views. Which can be 
uncomfortable if you happen to be one of the facts that 
need altering." The Doctor - Doctor Who: The Face of Evil
Where am I: Frankston, Victoria, Australia