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the baseball metaphor
Perhaps schools must lower standards, raise expectations, and accept the fact that human children are not all the same.
Lower Our Standards. No, not something you hear often in education writings, but it is August when we can watch televised baseball (and softball) at every age level. It’s the month when the major leagues hold both their “Field of Dreams” Game in Dyersville, Iowa, and the Little League World Series Game in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. It’s when the baseball playoff races really take off.
Baseball is, yes, the ultimate American metaphor, even if it’s no longer “our national pastime.” But it’s important to think about things that make baseball remarkably unique. It isn’t just that it’s untimed or that — unlike other sports with origins in the United States — its rules have barely changed over the past 180 years. There are a few other key things.
Even more than soccer, there is no “baseball body.” Players can be pretty much any size. This matters. The hybrid of highly individualized and team sport, in which the most important skill is hand-eye coordination, offers opportunities for all kinds of players, including both males and females.
In school, everyone is expected to achieve based on the same standard, and that standard is based on doing very simplistic things, over and over and over.
Baseball is different. There are positions that require a player to be right-handed (whether catcher is one of these is a personal battle of mine), but left-handers are prized by teams. There are positions where speed is a huge asset, and positions where that doesn’t matter. Fielding ability is essential in some cases, hitting is essential in others. Teams seem to prefer big first-basemen, but shortstops and second-basemen are often pretty small. Teams need pitchers who can go 7–9 innings and pitchers who are built to just get 3 outs. Juan Soto, who is way below average in speed and as a defensive outfielder, just turned down a $440 million contract — his primary skill? Not swinging at pitches out of the strike zone. You don’t have to be built like an NFL lineman to do that. Baseball skills are complex, highly differentiated, and remarkably individualized.
