Coal Mountain Elementary: The Lessons Plans Goals

Even though Coal Mountain Elementary consists of three lesson plans, where the curriculum relies on excerpts from American Coal Foundation, this book is not what it seems to be. Mark Nowak’s purpose in the book is not to teach a lesson nor wants his book to be praxis of teaching methodologies. The book implies how horrible curricula are, especially those curricula that are agenda-oriented, which serve a certain class of people. When tracing and introspecting the objectives of the three lessons plans, the aims reveal their bias in favor of the upper-class beneficiaries of mines’ productions. Nowak points out that the educational goals are deviated through their implication in class bias. The educational goals, in the book, completely neglect giving a realistic learning experience because they aim at teaching how coal mines are sources of prosperity and development for the upper-class; moreover, it occurs simultaneously that the goals are not designated to educate students how the same coal mines are sources of hell and abyss for the working class and their families. However, Nowak reports information, in different places, about the miserable situation and suffering of the working class, but the lessons’ goals are not allocated to serve this purpose. Nowak’s concerns extend to all information in all curricula. He implies that some oriented curricula are devilish and disgraceful because they only serve capitalism through misleading humanity. The lessons plans makers dehumanize the working class and consider them as an ingredient part of the coalmines. Moreover, Nowak refers to the high percentage of information inaccuracy in curricula, and the book should raise questions such as, who are the beneficiaries of creating such educational strategies?

Nowak explicitly mentions that the working class members sadly choose their fate because they are compelled, and they have no other choices. He says: “most miners were peasants desperate for work. ‘They know the danger but still want to be coal miners because they cannot make a living on the land’” (43). Readers find that the goals of this lesson, for example, were not designed to deliver this information. The goals want students to “re-create the historic process of making coal flowers” (4), and  to “participate in a simulated ‘mining’ of chocolate chips from cookies, using play money to purchase the necessary property, tools, and labor” (69). Nowak wants educators to consider the following suggested goals when teaching about this issue, so their curricula demonstrate realism:

The missing educating goals in the curriculum:

After studying this lesson, the students are expected to

• Know the preventive measures and safety measures that must be taken by coal miners.
• Realize that mining is double-edged sword: Coal mines are a grace, filled with lots of treasures and riches that revive the economy; the other face of the coin, mines can be a curse for workers.
• Recognize the environmental hazards to workers, such as humidity, high temperatures that cause fatal thermal shock, dust and its role in causing lung problems, workers fall from high distances, the occurrence of fires, sudden explosions, electrical accidents, and collapsing mines.

etc.