Here’s a bit of human stupidity: when a cultural tradition becomes a sacred cow because people are comfortable with it even though it is ineffective or even damaging.
Today a person in the U.S. will attend kindergarten through high school grade 12 and many will then go on to a four-year bachelor’s degree and then “start” their career. (Yea, a few go onto master’s degrees and PhDs.) Our inept and gimpy education system is little more than an expensive baby sitter hell-bent on indoctrination. Our focus, our goal, really should be education. Shocking, I know. We need to prepare children to be independent adults and an education therefore should be career/life-focused. It’s not that complicated. People have done it for centuries.
We all know what school work looks like and most of us bitched and complained all the way through about being bored and “I’ll never use this… I don’t see why I have to learn it… This is stupid...” We were right. We were absolutely right. How much of your formal education do you actually remember AND use? (tic … tock … crickets … silence … zzzzz) The system sacrifices children to feed the fatted sacred cow. And we let them. For some masochistic reason we seem to think that if we had to suffer through the public school system “paying our dues” then our kids should as well regardless of the dismal results. How in the hell do people graduate from high school and not know how to read? What kind of education system creates a majority people who do not even read one book per year?
Let’s cut to the chase.
All people need to know 1) how to read and write and 2) how to do basic math. With these two skills they can learn anything else. If education is handled with the least bit of intelligence it will instill and feed a strong desire for lifelong learning.
What is currently considered elementary school (grades K-5) should be only grades 1-5 – therefore five years not six. Generations of people started school in the first grade. Nothing is taught in kindergarten than can’t easily and casually be taught at home. Elementary school should continue to cover the same levels of core study currently covered but do so in only 3 hours per day. If you can’t do it in three hours you can’t do it because regardless of how long you attempt to keep their attention young kids don’t learn much past three hours of study in a day and they need to actually be kids. Children are not biologically wired to sit still and pay attention for very long. Yep, it should be obvious. Anyone with any powers of observation knows this. They don’t need Ritalin. They need a childhood.
Also, if you can’t teach in three hours either the student is mentally slow, the teacher is inept or the subject matter is inappropriate. Many homeschoolers excel with only two hours of formal study per day outperforming full-time public school students.
Those three hours should consist of one hour of combined reading, spelling and language (because they naturally go together). Reading an interesting (that’s key) book will naturally expand the knowledge of language usage and then the new/harder words can be studied for spelling. Most reading books are boring. How many people enjoy reading a boring book? How much do you learn from a boring book?
Math should take about 45 minutes and should be interesting enough to hold the attention of right-brainers. Science should take about 30 minutes and be very hands on with a health and environmental emphasis since we are screwing up the planet and making ourselves sick. When appropriate, the two could be integrated. Social Studies/history/ geography/foreign language should take about 45 minutes and again, be taught simultaneously because they naturally go together. It’s logical. History should be split evenly between World History and American History without rehashing the same damn events over and over.
By the end of the 5th grade students should be interviewed, evaluated, tested and guided into their individual areas of talent and interest. Yes, they already know what they generally like. They are not stupid.
Because so much of what is “taught” or attempted to be taught is redundant, obvious, dumbed-down and overkill what is currently considered grades 6-10 should be taught in grades 6-8. Get to the point. Middle school should only be 4.5 hours per day with three of those hours continuing to be core subjects and 1.5 hours being spent on subjects of individual interest such as art, health, business, history, construction, science … whatever. There should be no homework except for very little “real world” math (10 minutes/day) and an occasional research report because everyone needs to know how to research. Current world events should be discussed and debated often in Social Studies/history.
As anyone knows who’s been through high school and college there is no point in taking four years of high school English then having to take nine+ credit hours of “Communication” which is basically English and Speech unless one wants to be an English major. The same can be said for Math and Science.
Compare the typical class requirements for college-prep high school and the general “academic” requirements for an Associates Degree. Both high school and college require a computer course. Do they think this is the 1970s? Today most kids could teach the computer teachers. Kids should be using computers enough in elementary and middle school to just scrap that archaic requirement.
The high school requirements of Physical Education (how is running a mile physical education?) and Health should also have been covered in elementary and middle school. They should be taught the importance of physical activity and offered the chance to participate in sports if they like but it should not be required in high school. I’ve heard people argue that kids should have to take P.E. because they might not get any other physical activity. Should they force them to eat broccoli and give them each a kiss and hug as well because they might not get that at home either? Should they pass out vitamins and wash their bed sheets? Kids who are athletic will continue to be active because they like it. Kids who are not athletic will not become athletic because they are forced to take P.E. class and embarrass themselves. The more you force it the more they will hate it. It’s just the way people are. You can’t make people get off their butts and sweat.
The High School requirement of American History should be well-covered after 8 years of core study through the 8th grade. Pursuing it further should be an elective.
High school should be a six-hour day and it should start no sooner than one hour after sunrise. High school kids need at least nine hours sleep. It’s basic biology. You can’t learn when you are groggy. You know it. I know it. We all spent that first hour or so half unconscious.
In the 9th and 10th grade four hours should cover what is now considered junior and senior-level English, math, science, social studies, foreign language, and government (including a focus on the Constitution). Two hours should be elective. Math, Science and English should not be the standard mass-taught courses for each student but each student should be able to choose their type of course. For example math could be business math, taxes, accounting, economics or calculus, trigonometry, geometry, etc. Science could be anatomy, zoology, biochemistry, nutrition, physics, etc. – their choice. English could be composition, literature, speech, journalism, scriptwriting, etc.
High school grades 11 and 12 should consist of career-oriented electives only and a high-school diploma should be the equivalent of an Associates or Technical degree. Many high schools are already going in this direction. This should have already been the norm decades ago. A person should be able to graduate high school and go directly into their chosen field and/or start their own business. If they want to pursue a bachelor’s degree it should be sans “general education courses.” A college degree should not cost more than a new graduate could expect to make in a year. Why should they receive more than their teaching is worth?
Of course, shortening the school day would cause and require an enormous shift in parent schedules and the business world should accommodate it because in the end they are at the mercy of the populous. With the Internet and remote access, etc. many people could telecommute at least part of the time. They could also job-share more. Business hours should be more flexible and let the rigid 8 to 5, Monday through Friday schedule become a thing of the past. Who said we all had to strictly compartmentalize the workday? There are 168 hours in a week and there are a myriad of ways to work 40 hours without throwing kids and families under the bus.
Showing posts with label Public Education. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Public Education. Show all posts
Monday, December 28, 2009
Friday, December 4, 2009
Public Education is a Dismal Failure
Yep, it’s obvious: The public education system in the U. S. is a dismal failure.
If something is not working you first need to know what it is supposed to do. What is the purpose of education? The government values it for indoctrination and crowd control. Many parents value it for “free” baby sitting. Some value a classical or liberal arts education as prep school for a respectable place in society. But the bottom line is people spend the majority of their adult lives earning a living therefore, logically, that is what the primary purpose of education should be – to prepare a person for their life’s work. Quite frankly some people don’t need to know calculus. But everyone needs to be able to do basic “life skills” math. Some people don’t need to read “The Scarlet Letter.” But everyone needs to know how to read and read well. P.E. is a waste of time as a required subject. Athletic people will pursue physical activity regardless. The non-athletic will see P.E. as purgatory. We really need to cut to the chase.
Education should be about preparing kids to think independently and creatively while getting along in society. Basically, they need to use their talents and interests to make a living. John Taylor Gatto, author of The Underground History of American Education and a public school teacher for 30 years, stated “Traditional forms of instruction in America, even before the Revolution, had three specific purposes: To make good people, to make good citizens, and to make each student find some particular talents to develop to the maximum.”
It doesn’t cost loads of money to teach. We don’t need new textbooks every few years to teach math or language. If you want to dole out a few million then give good teachers a raise (and fire the bad ones while you’re at it). Homeschoolers have proven that you don’t need a lot of money to teach effectively and kids can learn a lot in 2-4 hours without the burnout and boredom of a typical public school day. No kid should have to wake up before the crack of dawn in order to go to school. If that means a complete shift in work schedules across the nation, then so be it. The future of our families and our nation is at stake.
Parents have to be a child’s primary teacher. Being their teacher is not something you choose. You either do it well or you do not. If you can’t handle the responsibility then don’t have kids. Really. Do what you’ve got to do – condoms, vasectomies, tubal litigation, masturbation – whatever. I don’t care. Prevent sperm from meeting egg. We (nor your potential offspring) don’t want to be victim to your lack of self-control.
The entire educational system must be recreated. Individual instruction is obviously superior though not a possibility for everyone. Every parent who wants to home school should be encouraged and assisted in doing so. If a public school system receives $7,000 a year per child then a homeschooling parent should as well without interference. If a person graduated from high school they should be able to teach that to their children.
As things stand Kindergarten and first grade should be combined. There’s nothing kindergarten teaches academically that Sesame Street can’t. Generations of kids were educated without kindergarten. Elementary kids should only be in school about three hours per day so that they can be kids and learning (that gets to the point in an entertaining manner) will still be fun and effective.
Repetitive drivel should be dropped. I home school my kids and plan to continue through 8th grade. Language books starting with the first grade introduce sentences, nouns, verbs, etc. They repeat this every year. By the 3rd grade when I opened the Language book my daughter said, “Oh, let me guess. ‘This is a noun.’ ” She was right and her eyes glazed over on day one. By the 5th grade it was a laugh-out-loud joke. We truncated all Language studies yet in the 7th grade she was tested at college level Language Arts. Since we homeschooled we could get straight to the point: Don’t know something? Let’s learn it. Know it? Skip the review and move on. There is so much to learn that no one person could make a dent in it in a lifetime yet the “establishment” insists on serving educational leftovers year after year dumbed down to extra-chromosome level.
Do the classics really offer such a great benefit? We’ve been “teaching” the same crap for a century and our literacy rate has fallen dramatically. “Ninety-six and a half percent of the American population is mediocre to illiterate where deciphering print is concerned,” wrote Gatto. Poor reading skills are the result of not reading. If kids aren’t reading shouldn’t we give them something they find interesting to read in order to encourage them to read? There’s no better way to turn someone off from reading than to require boring reading such as your typical school reading assignment. Human behavior 101 states that people do what they like and avoid what they don’t. You can preach and rant and whine but that will never change. We may as well get a clue and work with it.
Middle school should be about four hours per day but directed toward a child’s interests and strengths. (Yes, most 6th graders are quite clear about what they are interested in.) That leaves them more time to actually pursue their interests without total exhaustion. They still need about 10 hours sleep per night. What is currently considered sixth grade through tenth grade subjects should be covered in those three years. They don’t need to study the American Revolution every frickin’ year unless they want to be a history professor. You can never cover all relevant and interesting history so move on to something new without repeating the national hero propaganda that goes in one ear and out of the other. Obviously everything can’t be taught in that three-year time frame so the intelligent thing … the logical thing … to do is be selective. (Everyone should know who “won” the civil war. Everyone should know where Japan and England and Canada, etc. are on a map. Everyone should read the Constitution. Etc., etc.)
What is traditionally considered high school should be complete by the end of the 10th grade. It should be no longer than 5 hours per day which would still leave time to further pursue interests. There should be no homework unless it’s an occasional research paper or a few (20 or so) minutes of math. Ninth and tenth grades should be the equivalent of what is currently considered junior and senior high school studies that are directed toward the student’s strengths and interests. It’s the only way they will pay attention and retain information.
The next two years should be college-level, career-focused study whether it is pre-med, home construction, theater or whatever. This should include budgeting and finances – something the Federal Government needs to learn about. The first two years of a bachelor’s degree are off-the-point, glorified remedial high school academia anyway. Someone who wants to be an engineer should be required (and interested) in taking more advanced math. An artist should only be required to study “real world” problem solving math. Those who are more vocational or technically career oriented (plumbers, hair dressers, etc.) should be able to complete their training by the end of the 12th grade. They should graduate ready for employment or better yet, self-employment. The scientists, lawyers, doctors, etc. should be able to go straight into master’s studies or medical school, etc.
People who like to learn will continue to learn throughout their lives. People who don’t like to learn will not and no amount of teacher droning, rote exercises, and regurgitation of force-fed data on standardized tests will change that. Basically, you can’t make someone like it nor retain it. But the truth is the public education system doesn’t really care about whether or not our children are truly educated. Gatto states “The new mass schooling which came about slowly but continuously after 1890, had a different purpose, a ‘fourth’ purpose…. to serve business and government— (and) could only be achieved efficiently by isolating children from the real world, with adults who themselves were isolated from the real world, and everyone in the confinement isolated from one another. Only then could the necessary training in boredom and bewilderment begin. Such training is necessary to produce dependable consumers and dependent citizens who would always look for a teacher to tell them what to do in later life, even if that teacher was an ad man or television anchor.”
Public school is indoctrination for the purposes of social engineering. In effect it’s child “sacrifice” to the system and we are all paying for it not only with enormous amounts of money but quality of life for us all.
If something is not working you first need to know what it is supposed to do. What is the purpose of education? The government values it for indoctrination and crowd control. Many parents value it for “free” baby sitting. Some value a classical or liberal arts education as prep school for a respectable place in society. But the bottom line is people spend the majority of their adult lives earning a living therefore, logically, that is what the primary purpose of education should be – to prepare a person for their life’s work. Quite frankly some people don’t need to know calculus. But everyone needs to be able to do basic “life skills” math. Some people don’t need to read “The Scarlet Letter.” But everyone needs to know how to read and read well. P.E. is a waste of time as a required subject. Athletic people will pursue physical activity regardless. The non-athletic will see P.E. as purgatory. We really need to cut to the chase.
Education should be about preparing kids to think independently and creatively while getting along in society. Basically, they need to use their talents and interests to make a living. John Taylor Gatto, author of The Underground History of American Education and a public school teacher for 30 years, stated “Traditional forms of instruction in America, even before the Revolution, had three specific purposes: To make good people, to make good citizens, and to make each student find some particular talents to develop to the maximum.”
It doesn’t cost loads of money to teach. We don’t need new textbooks every few years to teach math or language. If you want to dole out a few million then give good teachers a raise (and fire the bad ones while you’re at it). Homeschoolers have proven that you don’t need a lot of money to teach effectively and kids can learn a lot in 2-4 hours without the burnout and boredom of a typical public school day. No kid should have to wake up before the crack of dawn in order to go to school. If that means a complete shift in work schedules across the nation, then so be it. The future of our families and our nation is at stake.
Parents have to be a child’s primary teacher. Being their teacher is not something you choose. You either do it well or you do not. If you can’t handle the responsibility then don’t have kids. Really. Do what you’ve got to do – condoms, vasectomies, tubal litigation, masturbation – whatever. I don’t care. Prevent sperm from meeting egg. We (nor your potential offspring) don’t want to be victim to your lack of self-control.
The entire educational system must be recreated. Individual instruction is obviously superior though not a possibility for everyone. Every parent who wants to home school should be encouraged and assisted in doing so. If a public school system receives $7,000 a year per child then a homeschooling parent should as well without interference. If a person graduated from high school they should be able to teach that to their children.
As things stand Kindergarten and first grade should be combined. There’s nothing kindergarten teaches academically that Sesame Street can’t. Generations of kids were educated without kindergarten. Elementary kids should only be in school about three hours per day so that they can be kids and learning (that gets to the point in an entertaining manner) will still be fun and effective.
Repetitive drivel should be dropped. I home school my kids and plan to continue through 8th grade. Language books starting with the first grade introduce sentences, nouns, verbs, etc. They repeat this every year. By the 3rd grade when I opened the Language book my daughter said, “Oh, let me guess. ‘This is a noun.’ ” She was right and her eyes glazed over on day one. By the 5th grade it was a laugh-out-loud joke. We truncated all Language studies yet in the 7th grade she was tested at college level Language Arts. Since we homeschooled we could get straight to the point: Don’t know something? Let’s learn it. Know it? Skip the review and move on. There is so much to learn that no one person could make a dent in it in a lifetime yet the “establishment” insists on serving educational leftovers year after year dumbed down to extra-chromosome level.
Do the classics really offer such a great benefit? We’ve been “teaching” the same crap for a century and our literacy rate has fallen dramatically. “Ninety-six and a half percent of the American population is mediocre to illiterate where deciphering print is concerned,” wrote Gatto. Poor reading skills are the result of not reading. If kids aren’t reading shouldn’t we give them something they find interesting to read in order to encourage them to read? There’s no better way to turn someone off from reading than to require boring reading such as your typical school reading assignment. Human behavior 101 states that people do what they like and avoid what they don’t. You can preach and rant and whine but that will never change. We may as well get a clue and work with it.
Middle school should be about four hours per day but directed toward a child’s interests and strengths. (Yes, most 6th graders are quite clear about what they are interested in.) That leaves them more time to actually pursue their interests without total exhaustion. They still need about 10 hours sleep per night. What is currently considered sixth grade through tenth grade subjects should be covered in those three years. They don’t need to study the American Revolution every frickin’ year unless they want to be a history professor. You can never cover all relevant and interesting history so move on to something new without repeating the national hero propaganda that goes in one ear and out of the other. Obviously everything can’t be taught in that three-year time frame so the intelligent thing … the logical thing … to do is be selective. (Everyone should know who “won” the civil war. Everyone should know where Japan and England and Canada, etc. are on a map. Everyone should read the Constitution. Etc., etc.)
What is traditionally considered high school should be complete by the end of the 10th grade. It should be no longer than 5 hours per day which would still leave time to further pursue interests. There should be no homework unless it’s an occasional research paper or a few (20 or so) minutes of math. Ninth and tenth grades should be the equivalent of what is currently considered junior and senior high school studies that are directed toward the student’s strengths and interests. It’s the only way they will pay attention and retain information.
The next two years should be college-level, career-focused study whether it is pre-med, home construction, theater or whatever. This should include budgeting and finances – something the Federal Government needs to learn about. The first two years of a bachelor’s degree are off-the-point, glorified remedial high school academia anyway. Someone who wants to be an engineer should be required (and interested) in taking more advanced math. An artist should only be required to study “real world” problem solving math. Those who are more vocational or technically career oriented (plumbers, hair dressers, etc.) should be able to complete their training by the end of the 12th grade. They should graduate ready for employment or better yet, self-employment. The scientists, lawyers, doctors, etc. should be able to go straight into master’s studies or medical school, etc.
People who like to learn will continue to learn throughout their lives. People who don’t like to learn will not and no amount of teacher droning, rote exercises, and regurgitation of force-fed data on standardized tests will change that. Basically, you can’t make someone like it nor retain it. But the truth is the public education system doesn’t really care about whether or not our children are truly educated. Gatto states “The new mass schooling which came about slowly but continuously after 1890, had a different purpose, a ‘fourth’ purpose…. to serve business and government— (and) could only be achieved efficiently by isolating children from the real world, with adults who themselves were isolated from the real world, and everyone in the confinement isolated from one another. Only then could the necessary training in boredom and bewilderment begin. Such training is necessary to produce dependable consumers and dependent citizens who would always look for a teacher to tell them what to do in later life, even if that teacher was an ad man or television anchor.”
Public school is indoctrination for the purposes of social engineering. In effect it’s child “sacrifice” to the system and we are all paying for it not only with enormous amounts of money but quality of life for us all.
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