It's All a Wash
Practitioners are, for the most part, taught to pick one side and they overwhelmingly choose that one side . . . obediently.
From Teaching and Its Predicaments:
Schoolteachers and academic experts regularly disagree about the purposes of practice. Many argue that teachers should instill obedience and respect for authority in students, but others insist that they should cultivate critical intelligence and the disposition to question authority. Some contend that students should learn the basics, while others argue for much more intellectually elevated work. There is no scientifically conclusive way to decide such disputes; indeed, these disputes thrive in social science, as well as in popular discourse.
Education thinking is fond of ignoring imbalances when it is convenient to do so—making it appear as though there are equally powerful forces aligned on each side of an issue. But the truth is obvious: those inside (and outside) education arguing for cultivating "critical intelligence" vastly outnumber those arguing for "obedience and respect for authority." Similarly, a "basics" message—even at those times when it is ascendant—is always a fringe position in education, whereas pushes for "intellectually elevated work" always occupy the center.
Practitioners do not grapple with these opposing ideas. They are, for the most part, taught to pick one side—critical and elevated good, obedience and basics bad—and they overwhelmingly choose that one side . . . obediently. Anyone arguing for equality between these two positions is either totally unaware of reality or is being dishonest.
And the notion that "there is no scientifically conclusive way to decide such disputes" is completely wrong—a fact evident to anyone who reads the literature as a collection of findings rather than one article at a time: Basics supply the fuel for "intellectually elevated work" in very much the same way as "respect for authority" (and, thus, understanding authority) supplies the initial conditions for properly questioning it.
