Weapons of Mass Instruction

I like it. It's vital to be read and assessed -- very factual and inspiring. This material remains an outstanding source of informative debate for all who desires to know the power of hidden knowledge that will wake many up.

Recommend to every adult.

Very good book about education. While he makes some spurious claims, a lot of what he says about the systems of education around the world are very enlightening.

This school teacher with thirty years teaching experience reveals the inner workings of the school system and will make you seriously reconsider your view of education and how the school system has affected it. His books are a great motivation for anyone considering home schooling, and are handy to loan to skeptical friends & family of home schoolers. In this particular book he "focuses on mechanisms of compulsory schooling which cripple imagination and discourage critical thinking. Here is a demonstration that the harm school inflicts is quite rational and deliberate. The real function of pedagogy is to render the common population manageable, remove the obligation of child care from adult workers so they are free to fuel the industrial economy and to train the next generation into subservient obedience to the state."His books have helped me to rethink my view of education- what it can be, what it should be, and what it isn't in America. I've found this to be of great help as my husband and I have decided to educate our own children, so that rather than bringing "school" home, we instead incorporate education and real-life learning experiences into our life, and seek out apprenticeship opportunities for our kids. This is not a home schooling book though. Those who don't home school will benefit by realizing how deficient schools are, so that they can take up the task of filling the void in non-school hours.I also highly recommend reading his other books:Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Schooling(which shows the deliberate dumbing down of the American School System, and displays "how the U.S. educational system cranks out students the way Detroit cranks out Buicks. He contends that students are more programmed to conform to economic and social norms rather than really taught to think.")The Underground History of American Education: A School Teacher's Intimate Investigation Into the Problem of Modern Schooling(a huge work in which he exposes the errors of short-answer tests, bells, uniform time blocks, age-grading, standardization, and all the rest of school religion. This groundbreaking, revolutionary work will change the way you look at the process and even the very concept of public education. Every parent should read this book! It shows how compulsory schooling came to be as it is in America with a lure of utopia and a very strong Prussian connection (which should be cause for much concern). It also exposes the affects of compulsory schooling on America, drawing both from history (showing alarming drops in education, literacy, and much more) and 30 years of school-teaching experience. You can read this one online for free from his website. (Amazon won't let me put in a link, so just google his name and you'll find it.)**Although I can't give a direct link in this review, you can find my website by accessing my profile. I mention that because I have a LOT of great resources on my site for those who are in the process of rethinking education and determining what that means for them and their children.**

Great analysis and debunking of one our society's Emperor's New Clothes myths - which it takes someone fearless and intelligent to reveal. We have to deconstruct the partial and skewed structure of the system as practiced to allow real change in society and the future to happen - to allow creative and rebellious energy to overthrow the creaky old white corporate apparatchiks that have been running the show for a century. JT Gatto does this, and makes you angry and inspired not to be fooled again, in equal measure. I'm a teacher teaching other things now, and I can't go back into the system before a move to break this hegemony is made. I'm adding my small part to this. Buy this book. It will change how you view schools, what education is for, and life in general.