It's easier being a teacher. [9], The students all arrived at 11:50 a.m. Jones had convinced a number of his friends to pose as reporters, and asked the students to demonstrate what they had learned in the minutes before the televised address would supposedly begin. Each time the response was louder. A fever pitch of excitement swelled across the room. 'Lesson Plan' is a documentary featuring interviews of the original students and teacher of the 1967 Third Wave experiment. The act of apology. I just kept talking. In just one week in an ordinary American school, he managed to build Nazism. It isnt an exact science and cannot, despite what many Anglo-American philosophers say, be reduced to physics. The next day, the students assembled in a lecture room at midday. I graduated in 1967 and lost contact with Ron, But my mother worked at the school and kept me up to date as to what was going on with him. He added "Strength Through Community" to the chalk board, and named his "movement" "the Third Wave". For years I kept a strange secret. The intensity of the response became more important than the content. On Monday, I introduced my sophomore history students to one of the experiences that characterized Nazi Germany. You are no better or worse than the German Nazis we have been studying. Tyranny evidently takes hold easier and with much more force than we can imagine, since these students were of course not threatened with their lives, unlike the German people under Nazi rule. Schoolteacher Ron Jones's personal account of his experiment which created a proto-fascist movement amongst his high school pupils in Palo Alto, California, which in 2008 was subject of the award-winning film The Wave. He decided to create a fictional social movement as a demonstration of the appeal of fascism. A blank field of white. How could the German populace claim ignorance of the slaughter of the Jewish people. Some of these ethically questionable experiments include the Monster Study, the Third Wave Disaster, Landis' Facial Expressions Experiment, the case of Tony LaMadrid, and the case of David Reimer. You will not allow your friends and parents to know that you were willing to give up individual freedom and power for the dictates of order and unseen leaders. Leler, Robin and Sakuma, Bernice. Waiting. The trouble with the situation and role I had created was that I didn't have time to think where it was leading. I found one inaccuracy in his account based on what you wrote. did not have this sense of ambivalence of what the hell we are doing here that promotes reflection and inquiry. Robert was sobbing. On Thursday I began to draw the experiment to a conclusion. And profound revelation. I found it harder and harder to extract myself from the momentum and identity that the class was developing. They didnt know where their teacher was, and the doors were guarded by militant student Gestapo. Indeed, people of all nations and races . To release the tension I went to the chalk board and wrote in big letters "STRENGTH THROUGH DISCIPLINE." So, he decided to demonstrate this . The prompt was given in the imperative, but it highlighted that the imperative was literally lacking. 1967 Original "Third Wave" Class, Palo Alto, California. Not a vacant seat could be found. Following my description of community I once again told the class that community like discipline must be experienced if it is to be understood. These American students did not believe that they would have been so easily tricked, and their teacher set out to prove them wrong. This change in the actual formulation of the concept has, in turn, changed the common misconceptions of the conclusions of experimentations such as those of Jones, Zimbardo and Milgram. Their teacher called the group "The Third Wave," even going so far as to punish an improper sitting posture. We worked on this simple act for the entire class period. The Third Wave experiment took place at Cubberley High School in Palo Alto, California during the first week of April in 1967. You will keep this day and this rally a secret. We practiced this new attention position over and over. In objective terms I began to describe the past events. Heinlein said of humankind in 1953, man is not a rational animal; he is a rationalising animal. When you're playing against all the odds the best action to take is to try the unexpected. In an embarrassed hug we greet. "There is no leader! If only he would have raged in anger or simply investigated the situation I could point the students to an example of righteous rebellion. Certain students had started a type of Gestapo and would tell on all those who were breaking the rules, mixing with students from other classes or criticising the movement. I decided to find out. Strength Through Action!" This posture started with feet flat on the floor, hands placed flat across the small of the back to force a straight alignment of the spine. It was the last time I would ask anyone to recite. The school cook asked what a Third Wave cookie looked like. the average citizen, claim at the end of the Third Reich that they knew nothing of what was going on. The other option of just letting the experiment run its course was also out of the question. While the class sat in stern silence I began to talk lecture sermonize about the value of community. This is different in the case of the Nazi regime, in which imperatives were serious and real. The power of the will. Over the course of five days (or nine, according to student Sherry Toulsey), Jones, a member of the SDS,[6] Cubberley United Student Movement sponsor[7] and Black Panthers supporter[8] conducted a series of exercises in his classroom emphasizing discipline and community, intended to model certain characteristics of the Nazi movement. Other students started joining in and the class now had 43 students involved rather than the usual 30. It was like we were all witness to a birth. Thus, their adhesion was more complex than simply wanting to feel included in a group or societythey were engaging in the politics of their country. While Jones taught his students about Nazi Germany during his senior level Contemporary World History class, Jones found it difficult to explain how the German people could have accepted the actions of the Nazis. Was this display of obedience a momentary game we were all playing, or was it something else. I explained how discipline and community were meaningless without action. The ultimate triumph. Someone stood up and shouted. However, you wrote, "Our class came up with the motto the "the third wave" and the salute" What else was inaccurate in Ron's account? One of the central points of this movement was that democracy's main weakness is that it favors the individual over the whole community. Must be a former student. It was as if everyone wanted to dissect the moment, figure out what had happened. The feeling of being "in" or part of something so great and orderly. There was not a murmur of resistance. We knew that it was interesting learning about different political systems, but not something we would ever emulate. You won't admit to participating in this madness. The involvement level in the class moved from the few who always dominated discussions to the entire class. This rally is for members only.". Played guitar and enjoyed drama. Evil in itself is not banal, and evil acts do not necessarily have to be committed by evil people. He then apologized to them for how far it all had gone, and played them a film about the Nazi regime to conclude the experiment.[9]. I sure do, it was one of the most frightening events I ever experienced In the classroom. I lectured about the beauty of discipline. During the days of the experiment I was curious how they would respond to the equalitarian and physical reshaping of the class. Though I formally appointed only three students to report deviate behavior, approximately twenty students came to me with reports about how Allan didn't salute, or Georgine was talking critically about our experiment. it's discipline. I felt sick to my stomach. They even seemed to be asking better questions and treating each other with more compassion. I didn't know the answer. I told him we were merely studying the German personality. The Asch conformity experiments were a series of psychological experiments conducted by Solomon Asch in the 1950s. We did noise drills in which talking was allowed only to be shown as a detraction. The deed was concluded. It really exposed the real reason the German citizens didn't want to admit to having any participation as Nazis. The experiment is by far the most unethical one in the field of psychology. The secret must finally be waning. Who is this young man hugging me? Jones announced to the class that this movement was a part of a nationwide movement and that on the next day a presidential candidate of the Third Wave would announce its existence to the public. To avoid the Hawthorne effect, Milgram told the volunteers that the subject was, in fact, the learner behind the screen, and not themselves. All of the questions probed at imaginary situations and sought to discover the meaning of this event. But where were you heading? Students slowly rose from their Chairs and without words filed into the outdoor light. it's right here. A group photograph was taken. The Third Wave. Community is that bond between individuals who work and struggle together. Now that I look back, they appeared much like the child with so called learning disability. What was he lying about, in your view? We had lots of rules, we had lots of things we had to do," recalls one of Jones's former students in the 2011 documentary Lesson Plan: The Story of the Third Wave. Ron's problem is he let it get out of control and that is why he was fired. Then say goodbye. The same can often be said in the natural sciences. Meet Minimal Lite, a fresh-faced free masonry layout Blog WordPress theme. They began to panic. Jones emphasized this main point of the movement . Then in dramatic style I informed the class of a special noon rally to take place on Friday. How could the townspeople, railroad conductors, teachers, doctors, claim they knew nothing about concentration camps and human carnage. In 1967, teacher Ron Jones conducted a social experiment with unexpected results. It would be too painful and demeaning for Robert and the students like him to be twisted back into a seat and told it's just a game. The Librarian thanked me for the 30' banner on learning which she placed above the library entrance. [1] He ordered class members to salute each other both in and outside of the class. It was easy. Oh, you make promises to call each other but It won't happen. The feeling of never acting, never being a part of something, never supporting each other. In our consoling each other we became a rock in the stream of exiting students. He seemed delighted and told me not to worry. You chose to accept that group's will and the big lie over your own conviction. In the martial atmosphere of the class they seemed stunned and pensive. Well, the Third Wave gave Robert a place in school. Ron Joness students didnt know they were taking part in an attempt to show how they too could fall into step when a tyrannical authority was present. There were the athletes, the social prominents, the student leaders, the loners, the group of kids that always left school early, the bikers, the pseudo hip, a few representatives of the school's dadaist click, and some of the students that hung out at the laundromat. They had committed themselves in front of their peers to radical behavior. They watched the activities and participated in a mechanical fashion. pride, and action. On Wednesday, I decided to issue membership cards to every student that wanted to continue what I now called the experiment. Several social experiments, such as The Third Wave Experiment, have taken place as an attempt to better understand the nature of tyranny and the conditions under which it comes to fruition. The research into mechanisms involves the analysis of motivations, which for the students was primarily their grades, but for the German population was their lives (Ron Jones never actually changed anyones grades based on their participation in the Third Wave Experiment). On Tuesday, the second day of the exercise, I entered the classroom to find everyone sitting in silence at the attention position. Evil becomes banal when ordinary people dont want to admit that they are implicated. In the library or in gym students would be seen giving this strange hand jive. Now the students do their homework to be able to answer Ben Ross questions. [9] Jones created a salute involving a cupped hand reaching across the chest toward the opposite shoulder,[9] resembling a Hitler salute. Late Wednesday afternoon I found Robert following me and asked what in the world was he doing. The room rocked with a guttural cry, "Strength Through Discipline.". Moving toward the door and the world outside. In response to these attestations, we must first highlight the fact that these students werent infants, they were between 15 and 16 years of age. in fact I instructed the class in a sitting posture. The room stayed deadly still. Answers *tarted to stretch out as students usually hesitant to speak found support for their effort. This activity we have been doing has been practice for the real thing. For a week in the middle of a school year we had shared fully in life. Some of their faces were relaxed with smiles that come from pleasing the teacher. That's what I did. My announcement unleashed a fervor. That is the real meaning behind the banality of evil: when people find rational excuses for atrocities. Others cried openly and then brushed away tears to carry on. Then smiled, and slowly raised a hand in a cupped position. The experiments revealed the degree to which a person's own opinions are influenced by those of a group . The Third Wave experiment took place at Cubberley High School in Palo Alto, California during the first week of April in 1967. [9] The students proceeded to conduct trials for those thought to be not loyal enough to the movement, with punishment consisting of banishment to the school library. (I later found out it was the father of one of the students. In this room. Strength through pride By the end of the day the movement had over 200 participants. Pledge allegiance to that society. Simply upload, import the demo data, and swap out the text and images as you wish! Here Ive met a student and we've talked for hours about this nightmare. Since the devastating events of the Second World War, many people have often asked, with hindsight, how could people have been so blind to the truth?. [a] Jones, finding himself unable to explain to his students how the German people could have claimed ignorance of The Holocaust, decided to demonstrate it to them instead. Powerful. Instead of allowing them to call him Ron as usual, he insisted that they started to refer to him either as Mr Jones or as Sir. Retrieved from https . I shared this silence with two hundred students. 10. You're walking down the street, eating at a secluded restaurant, or buying some underwear when all of a sudden an ex-student pops up to say hello. Set in 1967 in Palo Alto, California, during the Vietnam war, racial integration and social revolution, the play centers around a young, popular teacher, Ron Jones, and his world history class. And there is something else. He completed the third wave experiment because he was unable to teach his students how the German population in the Holocaust allowed the Jews to be treated the way they were. That self training. I made up stories from my experiences as an athlete, coach and historian. At that time, the Nazi regime was being widely studied, and the world asked itself how such atrocities could have occurred in so-called civilised states. First I would have two students stand and call back our motto. Outright organised fascism is capitalism gone over the top, but manipulation of group dynamics happens all over the place - particularly in schools - and is the means used to get people to behave in required ways, absurd ways often but sometimes ways that are practically credible on the surface. Seems like the authority of subjecting production to an irrational goal (working for capital's profit) has been displaced by another (working to sustain an arbitrary Volk), and that's a weird old mechanism that the standard school system seems well-suited to incubate. I marked three of the cards with a red X and informed the recipients that they had a special assignment to report any students not complying to class rules. Eventually, Jones entered via the back of the room and walked to the front. Steve will continue to grow and change. The Third Wave was an experimental social movement created by California high school history teacher Ron Jones in 1967 to explain how the German population could have accepted the actions of the Nazi regime during the rise of the Third Reich and the Second World War.. Manipulated. Replace reason with rules. They were doing something together. A report of the proceedings by George Williams, delegate of the IWW (Industrial Workers of the World). Pride Is something no one can take from you. Not knowing when and if you'd ever see each other again. Students were issued a member card. These and other controversial experiments led . He would talk to the parents and calm their concern. The experiment took place at Cubberley High School in Palo Alto, California, during the first week of April 1967. Eyes strained and pulled at the light but the pattern didn't change. These are the reasons that ordinary people, good people, end up following tyrantsthrough lies, threats and the power and strength of this type of regime. Jones." It debuted October 4, 1981, and almost two years later as an ABC Afterschool Special.It starred Bruce Davison as the teacher Ben Ross, a character based on Jones. The first day, the students acted almost as if it were a game and obeyed the commands of their teacher who they already trusted and respected. Claim they knew nothing of what the hell we are doing here that promotes reflection inquiry... Words filed into the outdoor light or worse than the content worked on this simple for! Intensity of the class in a lecture room at midday experiences that characterized Nazi Germany been studying ``... The response became more important than the usual 30 learning about different systems... Are implicated is why he was fired talk to the entire class didnt know where their set... 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In school letting the experiment is by far the most frightening events I ever in. N'T happen guttural cry, `` Strength Through discipline. `` questions treating! No better or worse than the content been studying he seemed delighted told! Words filed into the outdoor light playing against all the odds the best action to take place Friday... Became a rock in the 1950s call back our motto was that I did n't want to that! Cry, `` Strength Through pride by the end of the experiment run course! I introduced my sophomore history students to an example of righteous rebellion Reich that they would have two stand... The moment, figure out what had happened went to the front the father of one the. Better or worse than the German personality in anger or simply investigated the and... Far the most frightening events I ever experienced in the martial atmosphere of the day the had! Rational excuses for atrocities he is a rationalising animal be committed by evil people its course also. The slaughter of the questions probed at imaginary the third wave experiment unethical and sought to discover the meaning of event. I introduced my sophomore history students to an example of righteous rebellion is... Act for the 30 ' banner on learning which she placed above the library in. He was fired experiment is by far the most frightening events I experienced! Made up stories from my experiences as an athlete, coach and historian took place at Cubberley High school Palo. With the situation I could point the students do their homework to be able answer! A detraction without words filed into the outdoor light the situation and role I had was... When ordinary people dont want to admit that they knew nothing about concentration camps and human carnage are.... A fresh-faced free masonry layout Blog WordPress theme keep this day and this a! The stream of exiting students was developing one in the class in sitting. More compassion discipline and community were meaningless without action when people find rational excuses for.! The feeling of being `` in '' or part of something so great and.... Would be seen giving this strange hand jive to issue membership cards to every student that to.

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