It was a good way to start the education race back then and it worked. Most schools fail to teach basic disciplines today and most kids fail to achieve today. We used to start a foot race from the starting blocks upon specific signals; anyone deviating was eliminated. Liberal government schools run without traditional rules don’t run for crap and are extremely expensive financial and academic failures .
bigfoot
May 12, 2018 10:28 pm
I held records for absenteeism. I practiced writing like my mother and wrote my own excuses. I got kicked out of shop and study hall, flunked chemistry, and got D’s in the rest. I graduated high school with the exact number of credits necessary. I had no idea I was learning so much in high school.
Thunderbird
May 12, 2018 10:48 pm
“What does school really teach children.” The structure of the school teaches the basics in reading, writing, and arithmetic so that the student can function in our form of society.
But something else happens in the school environment that educates without the school teaching that form of education. This education is personal in that inter-action takes place between children in an atmosphere that allows natural reconciliations to occur.
No matter how bad the educational process seems to be children are still being exposed to social situations where they have to form their own strategies in dealing with their own demons.
School seems to be a good thing for children because otherwise they have nothing to do except play with games and watch fantasy movies. It seems today that children are eager to learn.
It seems today that the educational system is being ignored. Teachers complain about too low pay and not enough materials in the classroom. And rightfully so. So why is this happening?
Education should not be this expensive. But why is it so? Simple…Government administration. Don’t know what method can be implemented to rid the school system of all the incompetent extra personnel and the administrators who are alien to the parents and teachers because the administrators function is to carry out federal statues, rules and regulations.
But getting back to the point is that what schools really teach is social education. Reading, writing and arithmetic is secondary.
Inside of a classroom kids are not learning much “social education” as you put it. Kids do learn how slowly time goes by as they watch the clock on the wall rounding the hour until the ordeal is over. Then the next one begins after a couple minutes of jostling in the hallways. Some social education.
After school we used to gather in fields to play sports in a rough and tumble way that suited us. No adults in sight. That was social education. On weekends we’d sneak into the gym through heat tunnels and play basketball to our heart’s content. That was social education. We went fishing, hunting, and adventuring with our friends. We tooled around looking for girls that were tooling around looking to get picked up should they find us promising in some way. That was social education. We worked after school in grocery stores, gas stations, bakeries, hamburger stands, and movie theaters. That was social education. We didn’t need no school for social education. Furthermore, with a little bit of smarts you could learn math, algebra, geometry, chemistry, history, English, history, civics, and all the rest in less than half a day at most. It was painful to sit in classrooms hour after hour, day after day, while dullards taught what they had learned twenty years ago. Best to skip out.
Dr. Doom
May 12, 2018 10:55 pm
Here at Factory Pubic Children’s Prison, we have the taxpayer funded agenda of socializing your children to the delusions of people who don’t know what they’re doing, get them to obey petty tinpot tyrants and of course embrace everything that wise and caring parents do not want for their kids.
We are Marxist Apparatchniks. We have no future or souls. We crave power because the ugly and stupid cannot get people to pay attention unless they have a captive audience of young, gullible helpless victims.
Pubic Children’s Prison. Its like Adult Prison, but with worse food and without any of those pesky “rights” in your racist outdated US Constitution.
Thunderbird
May 12, 2018 11:45 pm
Sorry those are the schools you know bigfoot. Looking back I got a good basic education in school. I was taught enough in reading, writing and arithmetic to carry me to higher forms of education. And that is really what school is for.
You seem to be rambling on about the past. We are in the now so social education is different but it is still social education. There is a lot of good educating going on but through media we are always hearing about the bad and sad cases. Do you have young grand children? Do you talk to them about what they are learning; even in pre-school? Talk to them. You will be amazed at what is being taught.
And as California and New York go, eventually the rest of the other states go…this is why my teaching credential from California is accepted all 50 states
Thunderbird, you are as mad as a hatter. Your basic education allowed you to go get a higher education and that is what school is for? Bat-shit crazy. Only a university don would say that one should get an education so one can go on to get more education.
The purpose of education is the development of the potential of the individual. Ideally, anyway. Ever hear of educating yourself? Children are hard-wired to learn and love learning until they get to school and find their individuality sacrificed for the good of the school and its teachers and administrators. Resistance sets in, especially among those whose potentials are greatest.
My nephew’s son was going to school in Bellevue, WA. It’s an upscale place if you don’t know. The boy hated school at nine years of age. Hated his homework, hated going to school to point of crying over having to go. When his parents found out with time what the teachers were teaching, they took him out of that school and put him in private school at the tune of $8k per year. What happened then? The boy loves school, is excelling in school, does his homework, learns Russian, plays sports, and is happy as a clam.
I went to college out of high school, got a degree, went to another college and got a degree (MS in biology), and went to another college and was taking my last course for an MBA when I finally had enough and went into business for myself. I hated school. I’m an imbecile for going on and on like that. I did like playing basketball at noon and racquet ball every chance I could, though.
What a dreadful thing public schools are. And it ain’t getting any better soon because kids are eating junk, many are on prescription drugs, they don’t exercise, they are addicted to phones and games, their minds have turned to mush or hate, and the teachers are ones who got through school and thought, “Hey, this looks like a good place to park my ass until I retire.” Oh yes, there are the exceptions, why not tell me about them? BFD.
Iska Waran
May 13, 2018 12:33 am
What does school teach? That’s easy. Don’t fall asleep in class because the bell might ring and you’ll have to go to your next class with a huge fucking boner.
Platoplubius
May 13, 2018 12:48 am
@ Thunderbird
Can’t speak for all schools in every state but here in California the public schools are as Dr. Doom describe, not what you describe!
I’ve worked in them in varying capacities and levels for well over a decade and have been a vocal critic from within for years
Gayle
May 13, 2018 3:40 am
I can tell you some things children are learning in schools.
Technology is a tool for everything.
Learning is collaborative.
Authority is weak and truth is relative.
Memorization of facts is largely irrelevant.
Conformity now means the group must conform to the needs of the nonconformist.
Martin brundlefly
May 13, 2018 7:12 am
We spend almost 25 thousand dollars a year to educate kindergarteners. In a system of 617 kids we spend 1.5 million dollars in off sight administration costs. Kids learn all about waste in school. Waste of time. Waste of money. Wasted opportunities, and even how to get wasted.
Bubbah
May 13, 2018 7:15 am
The average school helps US students learn to read at a 7th grade reading level by the end of 12th grade. Some public schools still excel at teaching the basics, but far too many do a mediocre to lousy job. Although despite not being a fan of public schooling in the modern era, students and parents at the shit schools rarely show a bit of responsibility for learning. Schools are filled with kids that are raised in anti-intellectual environments and most just want to stare at tablets/phones/tvs/vid games all day and night. Typical schools still do social promotion so even if you kid can do math at a 4th grade level, if they are in 2nd grade, they still just practice adding. Kids that master a skill have to sit on ass all year long getting to feel “smart” rather than constantly be challenged to learn new material and struggle with new concepts. This inherently makes the mass public education system faulty. If a class if full of idiots there is peer pressure to pretend to be an idiot as well to fit in.
Many of the negatives regarding public school are built into the system, and the best of teachers can’t make much headway against subcultures and a rigid teach to the middle system. Getting rid of social promotion and teaching children based upon their skill level would help greatly. If a kid excels at math let them continue to test out of it and be taught based on the knowledge level, NOT the grade level. Technology can certainly help with this, since its easier to get instant feedback on the mastery level of individual students. BUT this isn’t happening in public schools, and social promotion continues. If kids needed to truly master the basics of each grade level before moving on, then half the students in the US wouldn’t graduate, they would merely get an attendance badge. So they just keep moving them along and blowing smoke up their asses, and then they tell them that they all need to go to college, despite not being able to read Harry Potter.
Great points.
You mention teaching to the middle…
For years I’ve called it “teaching to the lowest common denominator ”
I blame No Child Left Behind!!
It created the culture within school districts to behave like corporations where profit is primary motive and student success and proper human development is 2nd
Thunderbird
May 13, 2018 9:55 am
Reading, writing, arithmetic. Simple basics to learn. Why is it so hard to teach our children these concepts? Simple answer. Government interference in the process.
Get technology out of the process. It is not needed. Get the cell phones out of the schools.
Reading, writing and arithmetic are the core foundation needed for any pursuit of knowledge. But it takes a thirst for knowledge that has to be instilled in a child to get them to go along with the program.
The first thing needed to improve education in the public schools is to close the Federal Department of Education and fire all the Administrators.
The second thing needed is to stop testing in grades k to 8th grade and concentrate on teaching methods.
The third thing to do is make education mandatory up to the 8th grade only. High school for those only who demonstrate an aptitude for higher learning . Then those who qualify for higher learning can choose a vocational or college prep path.
People expect too much from the schools and nothing from their children. Many parents expect perfection in the teachers and nothing from themselves. How many homes have a library of good books and a thirst for continuing education? Almost none. So who are we kidding when we expect so much from the school system and nothing from ourselves? We are fooling ourselves. The schools are a reflection of ourselves.
So one may ask, “what does school really teach children?” It depends on who is asking the question. As a parent of a child going to school do you seek more knowledge on a daily basis? Do you have a thirst to learn more about your trade or work and the world around you? Your answer to these questions will answer why your child is learning in school or not.
It is easy to blame the schools for poor performance but not so easy to blame ourselves. But we the tax payers fund the schools. So where is the outrage in action rather than words? We talk a good game as is manifested in the comments but it is all hot air.
The american people have failed their children. We are more interested in material values than spiritual values. We are teaching our children to be material. The schools are only reflecting our own failed purpose in life.
There is a lot of good teaching going on in the public school system. Just like everything else in life the school system is not perfect. But it is sure better than nothing.
Right now the most powerful teachers in most students’ lives are on television and online. Only the most determined, attentive parents can put a dent in exposure to the voices teaching hostility to Western values while promoting selfishness, passivity, entertainment, sexual adventures, and groupthink. Kids are being primed to be locked in the matrix. I can assure you the average high school student spends half the time of a school day interacting with a smartphone. A teacher is boring by comparison. And so is reading a book.
Completely agree with you Gayle. The last average I saw for kids TV viewing was 36hrs per week. That’s for just TV! Nearly all the kids now adays spend lots of time with smart phones, even at a very young age. Then video games as well, especially boys. You can track education decline with TV viewing, it was noticeable even decades ago. Of course kids are the fattest and least healthy physically we have ever seen, and this effects cognition as well. Boys in particular have given up on reading the past couple decades as they became addicted to video games. This is likely a big reason that 60% of college graduates are female, girls still tend to read more, and thus can tackle most coursework that requires reading.
I don’t care for the public ed system much, but I don’t spend much time bitching about it b/c my sense is that even if teachers were all amazing, we would still be struggling b/c kids and parents are now entitled to easy grades. You see the Asians in America destroy everyone else b/c their families generally create a subculture of intellectualism, work over inherent ability, and hold them accountable.
It’s pretty sad that with the billions spent we are pumping out ignorant kids that couldn’t compete with 8th graders from the one room school house days.
Funny story, I pulled my kinder child out of the school he was in because his teacher sent home his chromebook first week of school before he could spell words with great penmanship yet
Thunderbird
May 13, 2018 9:58 am
@bubbah. I totally agree with you.
Bubbah
May 13, 2018 11:00 am
Common Core early Math is an utter joke. Has anyone had experience with this junk. Someone above mentioned how hard they try to have kids not memorize things, early common core math is a prime example. They attempt to show 4-5 “different” methods to subtract and add. Using number lines, blocks and all this other junk even into 3rd grade in the curriculum. These are at best conceptual tools, not methods in themselves. They didn’t even teach regrouping until 2nd grade, but rather tried an endless series of ludicrous ways to avoid having to memorize math facts. Attempt to turn every damn simple math problem into an algerbra equation is idiocy. The old methods damn well worked fine, we sent people into space with people that did math on slide rulers! Our culture changed, the effort level changed, entertainment became the GOD of this country and learning became one of its victims.
The states are constantly fucking with the curriculum, despite students doing better in the 80’s and earlier with basic curriculums. They recentered the SAT how many times now, 3? Because the average kept getting worse and worse. We have borderline 3rd world countries that have better students. The Education struggles won’t change until students are motivated again, parents are completely vested, and they schools quit worrying about everyone’s damn feelings and refocus on facts, memorization, and then moving onward to comprehension and mastery. The pendulum has moved so far from memorization, its turned into a bad word in education. YET its a damn requirement to be good at anything, you can’t have a mastery of any field of knowledge without a large spectrum of memorized knowledge in that field. Memorization is structure which allows for depth of knowledge and understanding, yet the modern Academic world has attempted to turn it into a bad word that should be avoided (because its boring they say). Well, people need to learn to tolerate boredom. That is a great skill as well, most people will do jobs that require them to do repetitive things that will bore them, or will eventually bore them. We have an overeducated population on paper, that are dumber then ever before–this problem has been getting worse for a long time. Great teachers aren’t going to fix it, and until schools start failing kids en masse I don’t see it getting any better. But retention and progression are stats that are extremely important for public schools and in higher Ed so there is too much vested interest to allow that to happen. SO instead we get a large group of poorly educated HS grads, that go to college and fail out eventually, but some scam the system and take easy as hell courses and find a way to graduate–just as ignorant as they were as they left HS. But they get a lousy work permit degree and a bunch of debt before the embark in an exciting hunt for part time jobs that likely will be destroyed within the next 10-15yrs anyway as the cost of machines gets cheaper.
Anonymous
May 13, 2018 11:35 am
Rule #1: Question authority. Rule #2: Do not question the teacher.
The irony is that in the little world of a student the teacher is the authority.
LGR
May 13, 2018 1:08 pm
What’s does school teach? Some unintended harsh lessons to life, but here’s one I remember.
The evil aspects of intimidation, and the various reactions to it.
{Encouragement being the positive polar opposite}
From authority, intimidation will emit either compliance due to fear, or some degree of rebellion.
From peers, it will produce fear and poor self esteem in the victims,
unless targeted victims reach their limit and stand up to the threat, whereby it stops,
or quietly plan revenge, and the cycle of evil increases and multiplies.
Best lessons come from a parent or older sibling who teach to respect authority without cowering to it. Or, at least the authorities who deserve to be respected.
And also how to fight back against intimidation, which should reinforce positive self worth.
Some receive that lesson, or just instinctively have it in them, while others are haunted from the wounds and scars of the past, when self determination and mental growth were weakened.
Sad, that those who find it easy typically have no compassion for those who struggle with it.
Thunderbird
May 13, 2018 1:23 pm
Illegals coming into this country from Mexico really appreciate our public schools system as they are putting their children into it. Interesting to compare the thoughts of those who come from less and those that take the school system for granted.
Rating the quality of the school system is really a matter of perspective. Want to know how educated a person is? Look at the books and reading material they have in their homes. Want to know the Quality of their education? Look at the types of books and reading material they have in their homes.
The primary purpose of public elementary school is to teach reading, writing and arithmetic. These skills are learned by rote and practice. These skills are not hard to learn. It just takes persistence and yes it can be boring to the student. If children can just learn these skills well then their road to higher education is secure.
One can lead a horse to water; it is said, but it cannot force the horse to drink the water. In the schools it is the same. But many want to drink of the water. So what to do with the disruptive ones? Isolate them into special classes that deal with their anomalies. That is what they did when I went to school.
Unfortunately our schools are now run by educated idiots supplied by the federal government. It seems that the government is saturated by educated idiots. What is an educated idiot? In my opinion it is one educated in a specialized field but has no social skills or common sense and seeks to impose their form of hubris on others.
But to others coming from less fortunate countries value our school systems. It is because they value any educational system that is better than where they are from. What they don’t know of course is that our educational system is material based at the higher levels like high school and college. Much of this material based monstrosity is useless material injected by government requirements and does not benefit the person at all.
Want to create a better educational system in this country? The simple solution is to start closing them down. Yes, let’s start shutting them down. Most of the colleges can be shut down along with many high schools and some elementary schools.
I’ll bet many of you cannot see the reasoning in this. Want to know why? It is because many of you do not know the difference in quantity and quality. By shutting down many schools our resources can be then used for quality education. Education is just like every other commodity in our world. There is only so much to go around.
Why are we trying to educate everyone up to high school and beyond? Is there something I don’t see in this absurd logic?
If we want to save the schools and make them better we better get our head on right. The bar is too high; not for quality, but for quantity. There is only so much education to go around. So let’s save it for those who have the ability and for those that don’t have the ability let them go into the world with what they can handle.
Forcing education on those that can’t or won’t handle it is a waste of resources. So why are we doing it?
I’ve said for years that many of the problems arise from the compulsory aspect of the schools and with NCLB providing funding based on student attendance the kids see it for what it is….
They give them Saturday schools for being tardy because the schools lose out on federal and state $ when students aren’t present! Has nothing to do with what the student is missing at school like is always said to the parents…
New markets and jobs, hours created with all this new disciplinary and attendance ed. Code.
School to prison pipeline
I’ve said for years we should get rid of NCLB and NO LONGER MAKE SCHOOL MANDATORY AND ENFORCED BY STATE,
GIVE THE PARENTS BACK TGEIR GOD GIVEN, NATURAL PARENTAL RIGHTS!
yea, there will always be bad parents, it isn’t the state’s duty to parent the parents, it should be left up to local communities to deal with individual cases on a case by case basis, not by case law
MarshRabbit
May 13, 2018 2:17 pm
Public school teachers have more on their hands than reading, writing, arithmetic. For example, mainstream kids with 504 Plans and IEP’S require a great deal of the teacher’s time. These kids have lists of special services tailored to their disability and/or special needs. The teacher must remember the list of services for each eligible kid in each class, and provide those services and be in addition keep accurate records of the services provided to presented at 504 & IEP meetings. The teacher must also teach the rest of the class too. https://www.understood.org/en/school-learning/special-services/504-plan/the-difference-between-ieps-and-504-plans
Soon every student will have a BSP behavior support plan or Individual education program…
The SPECIAL EDUMACATION of AMERICAN PUBLIC SCHOOLS, where profit trumps common sense…and politicians and school administrators hide behind the flag and the children’s, supposed, best interests to justify the conditions then blame the victims saying it is only the parents fault and not aspects of our society and their own hubris! Really, if looked act correctly, this is an example of the usurpation of U.N. Declaration of Rights and children’s rights enforced by the government and the expense of the parental, more natural, rights
A latent function of NCLB, is the cultivation of a caste system, similar to what India has…
It is working very well just like the “documentary” IDIOCRACY has foretold!!
These ed. Codes are what are being used to shape public perception into believing the State and schools have more authority to infringe upon certain NATURAL RIGHTS, outlined for the state’s sake in nour Constitution and not ours, that each individual is born with, regardless of credit score, bloodline, brown nosing, ass kissing or academic achievements!!
jamesthedeplorablewanderer
May 13, 2018 8:24 pm
My kids had those plans – most were worthless. ONE motivated, talented teacher who cares is worth more than all that paperwork bullshit, most of which is ignored by the classroom teacher – for the reason you mention! She has a whole room full of kids to teach, and cannot spare time / attention for one or two with “special needs”. We had ONE that did, who worked wonders with my kid, and when he graduated past her we started homeschooling him. We still had to pay property taxes to fund the schools he wasn’t in , but oh well. His sister was homeschooled from seventh grade (when little girls turn into vicous, snarling beasts) until she graduated from college; he should graduate this December. So what about socializing?
Same as the corporate world
Yeah, just memorise and don’t you dare think.
It teaches you that you should have homeschooled…
It was a good way to start the education race back then and it worked. Most schools fail to teach basic disciplines today and most kids fail to achieve today. We used to start a foot race from the starting blocks upon specific signals; anyone deviating was eliminated. Liberal government schools run without traditional rules don’t run for crap and are extremely expensive financial and academic failures .
I held records for absenteeism. I practiced writing like my mother and wrote my own excuses. I got kicked out of shop and study hall, flunked chemistry, and got D’s in the rest. I graduated high school with the exact number of credits necessary. I had no idea I was learning so much in high school.
“What does school really teach children.” The structure of the school teaches the basics in reading, writing, and arithmetic so that the student can function in our form of society.
But something else happens in the school environment that educates without the school teaching that form of education. This education is personal in that inter-action takes place between children in an atmosphere that allows natural reconciliations to occur.
No matter how bad the educational process seems to be children are still being exposed to social situations where they have to form their own strategies in dealing with their own demons.
School seems to be a good thing for children because otherwise they have nothing to do except play with games and watch fantasy movies. It seems today that children are eager to learn.
It seems today that the educational system is being ignored. Teachers complain about too low pay and not enough materials in the classroom. And rightfully so. So why is this happening?
Education should not be this expensive. But why is it so? Simple…Government administration. Don’t know what method can be implemented to rid the school system of all the incompetent extra personnel and the administrators who are alien to the parents and teachers because the administrators function is to carry out federal statues, rules and regulations.
But getting back to the point is that what schools really teach is social education. Reading, writing and arithmetic is secondary.
Inside of a classroom kids are not learning much “social education” as you put it. Kids do learn how slowly time goes by as they watch the clock on the wall rounding the hour until the ordeal is over. Then the next one begins after a couple minutes of jostling in the hallways. Some social education.
After school we used to gather in fields to play sports in a rough and tumble way that suited us. No adults in sight. That was social education. On weekends we’d sneak into the gym through heat tunnels and play basketball to our heart’s content. That was social education. We went fishing, hunting, and adventuring with our friends. We tooled around looking for girls that were tooling around looking to get picked up should they find us promising in some way. That was social education. We worked after school in grocery stores, gas stations, bakeries, hamburger stands, and movie theaters. That was social education. We didn’t need no school for social education. Furthermore, with a little bit of smarts you could learn math, algebra, geometry, chemistry, history, English, history, civics, and all the rest in less than half a day at most. It was painful to sit in classrooms hour after hour, day after day, while dullards taught what they had learned twenty years ago. Best to skip out.
Here at Factory Pubic Children’s Prison, we have the taxpayer funded agenda of socializing your children to the delusions of people who don’t know what they’re doing, get them to obey petty tinpot tyrants and of course embrace everything that wise and caring parents do not want for their kids.
We are Marxist Apparatchniks. We have no future or souls. We crave power because the ugly and stupid cannot get people to pay attention unless they have a captive audience of young, gullible helpless victims.
Pubic Children’s Prison. Its like Adult Prison, but with worse food and without any of those pesky “rights” in your racist outdated US Constitution.
Sorry those are the schools you know bigfoot. Looking back I got a good basic education in school. I was taught enough in reading, writing and arithmetic to carry me to higher forms of education. And that is really what school is for.
You seem to be rambling on about the past. We are in the now so social education is different but it is still social education. There is a lot of good educating going on but through media we are always hearing about the bad and sad cases. Do you have young grand children? Do you talk to them about what they are learning; even in pre-school? Talk to them. You will be amazed at what is being taught.
@ Thunderbird
Can’t speak for all schools in every state but here in California the public schools are as Dr. Doom describe, not what you describe!
I’ve worked in them in varying capacities and levels for well over a decade and have been a vocal critic from within for years
And as California and New York go, eventually the rest of the other states go…this is why my teaching credential from California is accepted all 50 states
Thunderbird, you are as mad as a hatter. Your basic education allowed you to go get a higher education and that is what school is for? Bat-shit crazy. Only a university don would say that one should get an education so one can go on to get more education.
The purpose of education is the development of the potential of the individual. Ideally, anyway. Ever hear of educating yourself? Children are hard-wired to learn and love learning until they get to school and find their individuality sacrificed for the good of the school and its teachers and administrators. Resistance sets in, especially among those whose potentials are greatest.
My nephew’s son was going to school in Bellevue, WA. It’s an upscale place if you don’t know. The boy hated school at nine years of age. Hated his homework, hated going to school to point of crying over having to go. When his parents found out with time what the teachers were teaching, they took him out of that school and put him in private school at the tune of $8k per year. What happened then? The boy loves school, is excelling in school, does his homework, learns Russian, plays sports, and is happy as a clam.
I went to college out of high school, got a degree, went to another college and got a degree (MS in biology), and went to another college and was taking my last course for an MBA when I finally had enough and went into business for myself. I hated school. I’m an imbecile for going on and on like that. I did like playing basketball at noon and racquet ball every chance I could, though.
What a dreadful thing public schools are. And it ain’t getting any better soon because kids are eating junk, many are on prescription drugs, they don’t exercise, they are addicted to phones and games, their minds have turned to mush or hate, and the teachers are ones who got through school and thought, “Hey, this looks like a good place to park my ass until I retire.” Oh yes, there are the exceptions, why not tell me about them? BFD.
What does school teach? That’s easy. Don’t fall asleep in class because the bell might ring and you’ll have to go to your next class with a huge fucking boner.
@ Thunderbird
Can’t speak for all schools in every state but here in California the public schools are as Dr. Doom describe, not what you describe!
I’ve worked in them in varying capacities and levels for well over a decade and have been a vocal critic from within for years
I can tell you some things children are learning in schools.
Technology is a tool for everything.
Learning is collaborative.
Authority is weak and truth is relative.
Memorization of facts is largely irrelevant.
Conformity now means the group must conform to the needs of the nonconformist.
We spend almost 25 thousand dollars a year to educate kindergarteners. In a system of 617 kids we spend 1.5 million dollars in off sight administration costs. Kids learn all about waste in school. Waste of time. Waste of money. Wasted opportunities, and even how to get wasted.
The average school helps US students learn to read at a 7th grade reading level by the end of 12th grade. Some public schools still excel at teaching the basics, but far too many do a mediocre to lousy job. Although despite not being a fan of public schooling in the modern era, students and parents at the shit schools rarely show a bit of responsibility for learning. Schools are filled with kids that are raised in anti-intellectual environments and most just want to stare at tablets/phones/tvs/vid games all day and night. Typical schools still do social promotion so even if you kid can do math at a 4th grade level, if they are in 2nd grade, they still just practice adding. Kids that master a skill have to sit on ass all year long getting to feel “smart” rather than constantly be challenged to learn new material and struggle with new concepts. This inherently makes the mass public education system faulty. If a class if full of idiots there is peer pressure to pretend to be an idiot as well to fit in.
Many of the negatives regarding public school are built into the system, and the best of teachers can’t make much headway against subcultures and a rigid teach to the middle system. Getting rid of social promotion and teaching children based upon their skill level would help greatly. If a kid excels at math let them continue to test out of it and be taught based on the knowledge level, NOT the grade level. Technology can certainly help with this, since its easier to get instant feedback on the mastery level of individual students. BUT this isn’t happening in public schools, and social promotion continues. If kids needed to truly master the basics of each grade level before moving on, then half the students in the US wouldn’t graduate, they would merely get an attendance badge. So they just keep moving them along and blowing smoke up their asses, and then they tell them that they all need to go to college, despite not being able to read Harry Potter.
Great points.
You mention teaching to the middle…
For years I’ve called it “teaching to the lowest common denominator ”
I blame No Child Left Behind!!
It created the culture within school districts to behave like corporations where profit is primary motive and student success and proper human development is 2nd
Reading, writing, arithmetic. Simple basics to learn. Why is it so hard to teach our children these concepts? Simple answer. Government interference in the process.
Get technology out of the process. It is not needed. Get the cell phones out of the schools.
Reading, writing and arithmetic are the core foundation needed for any pursuit of knowledge. But it takes a thirst for knowledge that has to be instilled in a child to get them to go along with the program.
The first thing needed to improve education in the public schools is to close the Federal Department of Education and fire all the Administrators.
The second thing needed is to stop testing in grades k to 8th grade and concentrate on teaching methods.
The third thing to do is make education mandatory up to the 8th grade only. High school for those only who demonstrate an aptitude for higher learning . Then those who qualify for higher learning can choose a vocational or college prep path.
People expect too much from the schools and nothing from their children. Many parents expect perfection in the teachers and nothing from themselves. How many homes have a library of good books and a thirst for continuing education? Almost none. So who are we kidding when we expect so much from the school system and nothing from ourselves? We are fooling ourselves. The schools are a reflection of ourselves.
So one may ask, “what does school really teach children?” It depends on who is asking the question. As a parent of a child going to school do you seek more knowledge on a daily basis? Do you have a thirst to learn more about your trade or work and the world around you? Your answer to these questions will answer why your child is learning in school or not.
It is easy to blame the schools for poor performance but not so easy to blame ourselves. But we the tax payers fund the schools. So where is the outrage in action rather than words? We talk a good game as is manifested in the comments but it is all hot air.
The american people have failed their children. We are more interested in material values than spiritual values. We are teaching our children to be material. The schools are only reflecting our own failed purpose in life.
There is a lot of good teaching going on in the public school system. Just like everything else in life the school system is not perfect. But it is sure better than nothing.
Right now the most powerful teachers in most students’ lives are on television and online. Only the most determined, attentive parents can put a dent in exposure to the voices teaching hostility to Western values while promoting selfishness, passivity, entertainment, sexual adventures, and groupthink. Kids are being primed to be locked in the matrix. I can assure you the average high school student spends half the time of a school day interacting with a smartphone. A teacher is boring by comparison. And so is reading a book.
Completely agree with you Gayle. The last average I saw for kids TV viewing was 36hrs per week. That’s for just TV! Nearly all the kids now adays spend lots of time with smart phones, even at a very young age. Then video games as well, especially boys. You can track education decline with TV viewing, it was noticeable even decades ago. Of course kids are the fattest and least healthy physically we have ever seen, and this effects cognition as well. Boys in particular have given up on reading the past couple decades as they became addicted to video games. This is likely a big reason that 60% of college graduates are female, girls still tend to read more, and thus can tackle most coursework that requires reading.
I don’t care for the public ed system much, but I don’t spend much time bitching about it b/c my sense is that even if teachers were all amazing, we would still be struggling b/c kids and parents are now entitled to easy grades. You see the Asians in America destroy everyone else b/c their families generally create a subculture of intellectualism, work over inherent ability, and hold them accountable.
It’s pretty sad that with the billions spent we are pumping out ignorant kids that couldn’t compete with 8th graders from the one room school house days.
Funny story, I pulled my kinder child out of the school he was in because his teacher sent home his chromebook first week of school before he could spell words with great penmanship yet
@bubbah. I totally agree with you.
Common Core early Math is an utter joke. Has anyone had experience with this junk. Someone above mentioned how hard they try to have kids not memorize things, early common core math is a prime example. They attempt to show 4-5 “different” methods to subtract and add. Using number lines, blocks and all this other junk even into 3rd grade in the curriculum. These are at best conceptual tools, not methods in themselves. They didn’t even teach regrouping until 2nd grade, but rather tried an endless series of ludicrous ways to avoid having to memorize math facts. Attempt to turn every damn simple math problem into an algerbra equation is idiocy. The old methods damn well worked fine, we sent people into space with people that did math on slide rulers! Our culture changed, the effort level changed, entertainment became the GOD of this country and learning became one of its victims.
The states are constantly fucking with the curriculum, despite students doing better in the 80’s and earlier with basic curriculums. They recentered the SAT how many times now, 3? Because the average kept getting worse and worse. We have borderline 3rd world countries that have better students. The Education struggles won’t change until students are motivated again, parents are completely vested, and they schools quit worrying about everyone’s damn feelings and refocus on facts, memorization, and then moving onward to comprehension and mastery. The pendulum has moved so far from memorization, its turned into a bad word in education. YET its a damn requirement to be good at anything, you can’t have a mastery of any field of knowledge without a large spectrum of memorized knowledge in that field. Memorization is structure which allows for depth of knowledge and understanding, yet the modern Academic world has attempted to turn it into a bad word that should be avoided (because its boring they say). Well, people need to learn to tolerate boredom. That is a great skill as well, most people will do jobs that require them to do repetitive things that will bore them, or will eventually bore them. We have an overeducated population on paper, that are dumber then ever before–this problem has been getting worse for a long time. Great teachers aren’t going to fix it, and until schools start failing kids en masse I don’t see it getting any better. But retention and progression are stats that are extremely important for public schools and in higher Ed so there is too much vested interest to allow that to happen. SO instead we get a large group of poorly educated HS grads, that go to college and fail out eventually, but some scam the system and take easy as hell courses and find a way to graduate–just as ignorant as they were as they left HS. But they get a lousy work permit degree and a bunch of debt before the embark in an exciting hunt for part time jobs that likely will be destroyed within the next 10-15yrs anyway as the cost of machines gets cheaper.
Rule #1: Question authority. Rule #2: Do not question the teacher.
The irony is that in the little world of a student the teacher is the authority.
What’s does school teach? Some unintended harsh lessons to life, but here’s one I remember.
The evil aspects of intimidation, and the various reactions to it.
{Encouragement being the positive polar opposite}
From authority, intimidation will emit either compliance due to fear, or some degree of rebellion.
From peers, it will produce fear and poor self esteem in the victims,
unless targeted victims reach their limit and stand up to the threat, whereby it stops,
or quietly plan revenge, and the cycle of evil increases and multiplies.
Best lessons come from a parent or older sibling who teach to respect authority without cowering to it. Or, at least the authorities who deserve to be respected.
And also how to fight back against intimidation, which should reinforce positive self worth.
Some receive that lesson, or just instinctively have it in them, while others are haunted from the wounds and scars of the past, when self determination and mental growth were weakened.
Sad, that those who find it easy typically have no compassion for those who struggle with it.
Illegals coming into this country from Mexico really appreciate our public schools system as they are putting their children into it. Interesting to compare the thoughts of those who come from less and those that take the school system for granted.
Rating the quality of the school system is really a matter of perspective. Want to know how educated a person is? Look at the books and reading material they have in their homes. Want to know the Quality of their education? Look at the types of books and reading material they have in their homes.
The primary purpose of public elementary school is to teach reading, writing and arithmetic. These skills are learned by rote and practice. These skills are not hard to learn. It just takes persistence and yes it can be boring to the student. If children can just learn these skills well then their road to higher education is secure.
One can lead a horse to water; it is said, but it cannot force the horse to drink the water. In the schools it is the same. But many want to drink of the water. So what to do with the disruptive ones? Isolate them into special classes that deal with their anomalies. That is what they did when I went to school.
Unfortunately our schools are now run by educated idiots supplied by the federal government. It seems that the government is saturated by educated idiots. What is an educated idiot? In my opinion it is one educated in a specialized field but has no social skills or common sense and seeks to impose their form of hubris on others.
But to others coming from less fortunate countries value our school systems. It is because they value any educational system that is better than where they are from. What they don’t know of course is that our educational system is material based at the higher levels like high school and college. Much of this material based monstrosity is useless material injected by government requirements and does not benefit the person at all.
Want to create a better educational system in this country? The simple solution is to start closing them down. Yes, let’s start shutting them down. Most of the colleges can be shut down along with many high schools and some elementary schools.
I’ll bet many of you cannot see the reasoning in this. Want to know why? It is because many of you do not know the difference in quantity and quality. By shutting down many schools our resources can be then used for quality education. Education is just like every other commodity in our world. There is only so much to go around.
Why are we trying to educate everyone up to high school and beyond? Is there something I don’t see in this absurd logic?
If we want to save the schools and make them better we better get our head on right. The bar is too high; not for quality, but for quantity. There is only so much education to go around. So let’s save it for those who have the ability and for those that don’t have the ability let them go into the world with what they can handle.
Forcing education on those that can’t or won’t handle it is a waste of resources. So why are we doing it?
I’ve said for years that many of the problems arise from the compulsory aspect of the schools and with NCLB providing funding based on student attendance the kids see it for what it is….
They give them Saturday schools for being tardy because the schools lose out on federal and state $ when students aren’t present! Has nothing to do with what the student is missing at school like is always said to the parents…
New markets and jobs, hours created with all this new disciplinary and attendance ed. Code.
School to prison pipeline
I’ve said for years we should get rid of NCLB and NO LONGER MAKE SCHOOL MANDATORY AND ENFORCED BY STATE,
GIVE THE PARENTS BACK TGEIR GOD GIVEN, NATURAL PARENTAL RIGHTS!
yea, there will always be bad parents, it isn’t the state’s duty to parent the parents, it should be left up to local communities to deal with individual cases on a case by case basis, not by case law
Public school teachers have more on their hands than reading, writing, arithmetic. For example, mainstream kids with 504 Plans and IEP’S require a great deal of the teacher’s time. These kids have lists of special services tailored to their disability and/or special needs. The teacher must remember the list of services for each eligible kid in each class, and provide those services and be in addition keep accurate records of the services provided to presented at 504 & IEP meetings. The teacher must also teach the rest of the class too. https://www.understood.org/en/school-learning/special-services/504-plan/the-difference-between-ieps-and-504-plans
Soon every student will have a BSP behavior support plan or Individual education program…
The SPECIAL EDUMACATION of AMERICAN PUBLIC SCHOOLS, where profit trumps common sense…and politicians and school administrators hide behind the flag and the children’s, supposed, best interests to justify the conditions then blame the victims saying it is only the parents fault and not aspects of our society and their own hubris! Really, if looked act correctly, this is an example of the usurpation of U.N. Declaration of Rights and children’s rights enforced by the government and the expense of the parental, more natural, rights
A latent function of NCLB, is the cultivation of a caste system, similar to what India has…
It is working very well just like the “documentary” IDIOCRACY has foretold!!
These ed. Codes are what are being used to shape public perception into believing the State and schools have more authority to infringe upon certain NATURAL RIGHTS, outlined for the state’s sake in nour Constitution and not ours, that each individual is born with, regardless of credit score, bloodline, brown nosing, ass kissing or academic achievements!!
My kids had those plans – most were worthless. ONE motivated, talented teacher who cares is worth more than all that paperwork bullshit, most of which is ignored by the classroom teacher – for the reason you mention! She has a whole room full of kids to teach, and cannot spare time / attention for one or two with “special needs”. We had ONE that did, who worked wonders with my kid, and when he graduated past her we started homeschooling him. We still had to pay property taxes to fund the schools he wasn’t in , but oh well. His sister was homeschooled from seventh grade (when little girls turn into vicous, snarling beasts) until she graduated from college; he should graduate this December. So what about socializing?