# We don't need no education....



## Steve (Jun 20, 2013)

In another thread, the subject of education was brought up.  What do you think primary education is for?  What's the purpose?  And, if applicable, what do you think the purpose SHOULD be?  

I tend to think that primary education really is about training young people and giving them the skills they will need in order to be well adjusted and successful contributors to society.  Is that brainwashing?  Well...  I guess you could say that it is, in a way.  In a perfect situation, the educators and the parents partner with each other to mold young people over time until they are ready to leave the nest.

I think schools should teach students about civics, and think it's perfectly appropriate to instill some sense of civic pride in the kids.  

While I think that it's important to teach kids to think critically and to challenge the status quo, this is, in my opinion, NOT the primary goal of a primary education.  

What do you think?


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## oaktree (Jun 20, 2013)

Mark twain said " I never let my schooling interfere with
 My education. "
A famous comedian once said about the pink Floyd song
" we don't need no education uh ya you do if you had an education you would know
That is a double negative. "


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## Makalakumu (Jun 20, 2013)

The fundamental question, IMO, is who controls the child's mind.  If society controls the child's mind, they can instill whatever they see fit and call it education.  If parents control the child's mind, they can instill whatever they see fit and call it education.  If the child controls it's own mind, the child can actually *be *educated.  In another thread I wrote that the root of the word education means "to draw out".  Therefore, the intent of education is to draw out the child's talents and interests and help them grow.  

I also wrote that "schooling" was the opposite of this because schooling seeks to put in information for the benefit of others.  This was called "brainwashing" by some, but I called it training.  

Trained children are not educated, IMO, if the training is forced.  Forced training is training only.


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## Tgace (Jun 20, 2013)

IMO...the big 3. Reading, Writing and Arithmetic should be the core. 

Primary schools are spending too much time on "Social Studies"...it's not even called "History" because even troglodyte Conservatives like me can see that Social Studies is not History or Civics. 

I'm starting to loose count of how many kids I see being passed through 12 years of the system who can't write an acceptable paragraph, name the branches of their own Government or hell...tell you who fought in the Civil War.... but they know that Columbus was a European invader and how to use birth control.


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## Makalakumu (Jun 20, 2013)

Tgace said:


> IMO...the big 3. Reading, Writing and Arithmetic should be the core.
> 
> Primary schools are spending too much time on "Social Studies"...it's not even called "History" because even troglodyte Conservatives like me can see that Social Studies is not History or Civics.
> 
> I'm starting to loose count of how many kids I see being passed through 12 years of the system who can't write an acceptable paragraph, name the branches of their own Government or hell...tell you who fought in the Civil War.... but they know that Columbus was a European invader and how to use birth control.



The agendas are crowding out the effectiveness of the learning.


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## arnisador (Jun 20, 2013)

Teach them the basics--fundamental skills. When they get to college, I'll teach them to think. They aren't ready until they have enough facts. "Philosophy is the study of its own history." You need to know some stuff first.

*The Faulty Logic of the Math Wars*



> At stake in the math wars is the value of a reform strategy for  teaching math that, over the past 25 years, has taken American schools  by storm. Today the emphasis of most math instruction is on  to use the  new lingo  numerical reasoning. This is in contrast with a more  traditional focus on understanding and mastery of the most efficient  mathematical algorithms.
> 
> A  mathematical algorithm is a procedure for performing a computation. At  the heart of the discipline of mathematics is a set of the most  efficient  and most elegant and powerful  algorithms for specific  operations. The most efficient algorithm for addition, for instance,  involves stacking numbers to be added with their place values aligned,  successively adding single digits beginning with the ones place column,  and carrying any extra place values leftward.
> 
> What is striking  about reform math is that the standard algorithms are either  de-emphasized to students or withheld from them entirely. In one widely  used and very representative math program  TERC Investigations  second  grade students are repeatedly given specific addition problems and  asked to explore a variety of procedures for arriving at a solution. The  standard algorithm is absent from the procedures they are offered.  Students in this program dont encounter the standard algorithm until  fourth grade, and even then they are not asked to regard it as a  privileged method.


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## Makalakumu (Jun 20, 2013)

arnisador said:


> Teach them the basics--fundamental skills. When they get to college, I'll teach them to think. They aren't ready until they have enough facts. "Philosophy is the study of its own history." You need to know some stuff first.
> 
> *The Faulty Logic of the Math Wars*



The problem with this approach is that the fundamental skills drive kids away from math. It's drill and kill boring most of the time in most places. The traditional way math is taught is not popular or paticularly effective.


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## Bob Hubbard (Jun 20, 2013)

When you have schools turning out students by the thousands who are incapable of reading, writing, or balancing a check book, you've failed as educators.

The purpose of todays schools is to prepare students for the next grade. Little more. 

Our teachers regularly dip into their own pockets to get supplies for their students. Meanwhile, the football team has new gear, new uniforms and even a tour bus. Something's wrong with that picture.

You can not teach the future while living in the past. A class equipped with bear skins and flint knives is not going to build a radio. 

You don't teach communications when rule 1 is no talking.

Arni said "When they get to college, I'll teach them to think."  That's too late for half of them. As to the other half, will you teach them to think, or to echo your positions? You become like that which you surround yourself. If a student comes to you, and other teachers, and all of you teachers hold some things to be true, it is highly likely that your student will come to echo you. If you have succeeded in your intent to teach them to think, they will understand why they hold those views, beyond "well my professor said".  (Side note: The Hills company teaches most of the veterinary training in the US. Guess who's food is most recommended by vets?) 

Teach them readin, writin and rithmatic when they are youngest. Teach them to take care of them selves when they are older.  How to cook, how to clean, how to sew, how to hammer a nail and cut a plank. Teach them how to balance a check book, prepare a budget and the value of being responsible. Teach them history, and open the road for them to the future.


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## Takai (Jun 20, 2013)

Tgace said:


> .... but they know that Columbus was a European invader and how to use birth control.



Yeah, they learned that watching cable.

[h=1]&#8220;A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly.&#8221; - Robert Heinlein[/h]


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## Tgace (Jun 20, 2013)

I would not pass HS today with the new math requirements ...was never good at it and was never taught to be competent with it. I remember having difficulty with my multiplication tables in 4th grade and it just continued from there.

IMO much of my problem was that it was never explained to me in a manner by which I could grasp the "point". It may as well have been metaphysics...

Even to this day I don't know how the graphs (sine, cosine, tangent) I was taught in HS are applied in what...engineering? Electronics? Communication? What are their practical uses?

If some teacher could have taken me to a gun range and explained ballistics as math class Id probably be a math teacher today. 

Sent from my Kindle Fire using Tapatalk 2


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## Tgace (Jun 20, 2013)

Takai said:


> Yeah, they learned that watching cable.
> 
> [h=1]A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. - Robert Heinlein[/h]



And many similar skills I possess were not learned in school...my father taught me how to repair a car...my uncle taught me how to kill and gut a deer...the Army taught me how to give and take orders..

Schooling is important but "education" is not restricted to the classroom......

Sent from my Kindle Fire using Tapatalk 2


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## aedrasteia (Jun 21, 2013)

Noting that contributors to this thread, including OP, comment as though 'primary' education
occurs in a school.  A revealing position.

By the time an official school enters the picture, a child has had 4-6 years of 24 hour education.
babies and small children are sponges - *all they do every day is learn - every second of every day*.
Their brains are developing and they can take in massive amounts of information through
every sensory mode. They are acutely immitative, with short but massively intense spans of
attention, alert to 'novelty' and difference in all sensory experiences.

Me? I had a 5-6 year old who would help me prep for catering lunches - and he was standing on a chair, safely
poaching vegetables over pots of boiling water, using a knife (age/size appropriate) etc.  He learned to be safe
as I brought him thru skill levels, calculated to be at his competency level or just slightly over it, but with a *big* 
safety factor built in. Yeah, he had a knife (very small w/no point and not sharp). The learning included just enough 
discomfort (a drop of hot water, a small 'ouchie') to reinforce my words with sensory experience.  Later his first real
job was in a restaurant where he was fast, sharp and accurate with the big knives.

Adults greatest weakness/mistake  lies in either *under estimating or grossly over-estimating *what small children can manage physically/emotionally/psychologically.   

Adult bias pushes people to NOT see what is actually in front of them. 

I've had many a parent tell me that their 
child is NOT affected by whatever home or media diet the kid is exposed to (movie, video, tv, even audio and books)
when the kid is obviously overwhelmed by noise, visual chaos, violence, aggression and hostility, cruelty, fear. 
 But that's inconvenient for the adults.

Those can come from what is actually happening in the kid's home, family, neighborhood or what comes in through the Big Media pipe.  And it affects the child. Guaranteed 100%. 

I know because we carried the responsibility to take in a family child from a chaotic, unstable, frightening 
environment and see what would work. And then help the other children in our family also faced
with chaos, instability, fear. We made lots of dumb mistakes but most of those were small change.

what i learned was unsettling.   Most adults (yep, guys) over-estimate kids emotional capacity and seriously 
under-estimate the emotional/psychological effects on kids of exposure to anger, violence, uncertainty, instability
noise, chaos, especially in media, but also in their immediate environment.  

Watching and helping a frightened and also resilient 6 year old cope with a desertion by one parent 
and separation (thru prison) by the other parent made me intensly observent and focused. No predetermined
assumptions. No telling him/them that their emotions were unacceptable or frightening to us adults. 
Behavior and emotions are not the same. 

Anger/hurt/terror/guilt/lonliness because Mom is in jail and no word from Daddy since you were 3 are absolutely
accepted and understood. OK ways to express those emotions are available and we will find the ones that
work for you and don't do more harm.  Comfort thru words, hugs, special time, kisses, play comes with no limits - 24/7.  And we are not going away - you will not be abandoned.  You are safe. 
We will tell you that in words but you can believe it because thats how we behave.

Based on previousl posts, there are  huge biases here @ MT.    Can you see them?

I'd rather know what actually works, based on your own demonstrated experience: real life little kids,
your own or ones you have consistently connected with.  

Less abstraction, less pontificating, please
thanks,


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## arnisador (Jun 21, 2013)

Tgace said:


> If some teacher could have taken me to a gun range and explained ballistics as math class Id probably be a math teacher today.



Freshman physics and sophomore math. covers this--quadratic trajectories when air resistance is neglected (freshman), a more complicated scenario when air resistance and/or the curvature of the earth is included (sophomore). Napoleon funded a lot of research like this for his artillery--he was a great friend of mathematical physics.


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## arnisador (Jun 21, 2013)

Tgace said:


> Schooling is important but "education" is not restricted to the classroom......



Even in college, I learned more in the dorms--maturity, social skills, etc.--that was of real use in my day to day life, including at work, than I did in the classrooms.


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## granfire (Jun 21, 2013)

> The purpose of todays schools is to prepare students for the next grade. Little more.



:lfao:

No, to pass a standardized test.


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## Steve (Jun 21, 2013)

aedrasteia said:


> Noting that contributors to this thread, including OP, comment as though 'primary' education
> occurs in a school.  A revealing position.
> 
> By the time an official school enters the picture, a child has had 4-6 years of 24 hour education.
> ...


Okay.  As the person who wrote the OP, I can tell you that this wasn't intended to be a discussion about how to be a good parent or early childhood development.  I don't mind thread drift, but since I wrote the OP, I can tell you with 100% confidence that this WAS intended to be a discussion about what people think kids should learn in school and what purpose schools serve in society.  So, while I appreciate a good discussion about specific parenting skills and strategies for positive, early childhood education, I think you've completely missed the boat here.   Getting all judgy about people having a high level discussion about the purpose of schools is inappropriate in a thread about what kids learn and SHOULD learn in school.

You are obviously a passionate advocate for kids, and that's great.  I'd love to hear more from you about what you believe "actually works, based on your own demonstrated experience: real life little kids, your own or ones you have consistently connected with."  You can even do it in this thread, as far as I'm concerned.  But the attitude is unwelcome, at least by me.  We're talking about apples, and you're judging us because we're not talking about oranges.  I don't see why we can't talk about both.

Lest there be any confusion, I used the term "primary education" several times in the OP.  I was referring specifically to Primary Education as elementary/middle school in America.  Secondary Education refers commonly to High School in America.  I used the term Primary Education because we have people from other countries.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primary_education


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## pgsmith (Jun 21, 2013)

Steve said:


> In another thread, the subject of education was brought up. What do you think primary education is for? What's the purpose? And, if applicable, what do you think the purpose SHOULD be?
> 
> I tend to think that primary education really is about training young people and giving them the skills they will need in order to be well adjusted and successful contributors to society. Is that brainwashing? Well... I guess you could say that it is, in a way. In a perfect situation, the educators and the parents partner with each other to mold young people over time until they are ready to leave the nest.
> 
> ...



  Saw this post this morning, and have had that song running through my head all day! Thanks for that.

  I disagree with you Steve in that I think primary school education should be more about teaching facts, how to use and apply logic, and the scientific method rather than trying to impart life skills. The skills to deal with their lives and society should be delivered in secondary school, once the child is old enough to have been exposed to society somewhat. It is my belief that if you can teach a child _how_ to learn, they'll embrace and enjoy learning their entire lives. It seems to me that lately, at least from what exposure I've had to kids and schools, they are no longer being taught how to learn. They are simply taught to regurgitate what they are given in order to pass tests. That's not learning in my book, that's reciting. Come to think of it, that's what most political extremists tend to do also. Maybe that's what our politicians are pushing for in order to have a more malleable society. Maybe I just tend to overthink these things. 

  Just my opinions though, others may vary.


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## Makalakumu (Jun 23, 2013)

Here are some thoughts I wrote down a few years ago as I began to formulate my ideas on this matter.



> *No Room Schoolhouse*
> 
> _The past is not past.  The dead are not dead_
> 
> ...


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## K-man (Jun 23, 2013)

Makalakumu said:


> Here are some thoughts I wrote down a few years ago as I began to formulate my ideas on this matter.
> 
> _&#8220;Literacy rates were as high or higher than they are today. A study conducted in 1800 by DuPont de Nemours revealed that only four in a thousand Americans were unable to read and write legibly. Various accounts from colonial America support these statistics._





> *Illiteracy*
> Illiteracy statistics give an important indication of the education level of the adult population. Today, illiteracy is a different issue than in earlier years. The more recent focus on illiteracy has centered on functional literacy, which addresses the issue of whether a person's educational level is sufficient to function in a modern society. The earlier surveys of illiteracy examined a very fundamental level of reading and writing. The percent of illiteracy, according to earlier measurement methods, was less than 1 percent of persons 14 years old and over in 1979.
> http://nces.ed.gov/naal/lit_history.asp



I don't know where you get your figures from but there seems to be a huge discrepancy. Maybe the definition of literacy has changed but I find it hard to believe that functional literacy was the same in 1800 as it is today, yet in between it dropped to 80% in 1870. 



> For the later part of this century the illiteracy rates have been relatively low, registering only about 4 percent as early as 1930. However, in the late 19th century and early 20th century, illiteracy was very common. In 1870, 20 percent of the entire adult population was illiterate, and 80 percent of the black population was illiterate. By 1900 the situation had improved somewhat, but still 44 percent of blacks remained illiterate. The statistical data show significant improvements for black and other races in the early portion of the 20th century as the former slaves who had no educational opportunities in their youth were replaced by younger individuals who grew up in the post Civil War period and often had some chance to obtain a basic education. The gap in illiteracy between white and black adults continued to narrow through the 20th century, and in 1979 the rates were about the same.
> http://nces.ed.gov/naal/lit_history.asp


Perhaps things aren't as bad as you seem to think.


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## Makalakumu (Jun 23, 2013)

K-man said:


> I don't know where you get your figures from but there seems to be a huge discrepancy. Maybe the definition of literacy has changed but I find it hard to believe that functional literacy was the same in 1800 as it is today, yet in between it dropped to 80% in 1870.



The Civil War destroyed families and communities for generations after it ended.  It also freed an entire population of people who had no access to the tools or the culture of literacy.  At the same time, America was wiping out and integrating it's indigenous populations.  The US would wipe out tribes, force the remnants onto reservations, and take the children and put them into boarding schools.  When you couple this with the influx of immigrants who were learning English for the first time and trying to teach themselves how to read, it's remarkable that the rate only dropped that far.  

Here is an interesting summation of a recent study on literacy rates.

http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/education/2009-01-08-adult-literacy_N.htm



> A long-awaited federal study finds that an estimated 32 million adults in the USA &#8212; about one in seven &#8212; are saddled with such low literacy skills that it would be tough for them to read anything more challenging than a children's picture book or to understand a medication's side effects listed on a pill bottle.



The study itself is linked and gives a state by state breakdown.

http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/education/2009-01-08-adult-literacy_N.htm


LocationFIPS code[SUP]0[/SUP]Population size[SUP]1[/SUP]Percent lacking _basic_
prose literacy skills[SUP]2[/SUP]95% credible interval[SUP]3[/SUP]Lower boundUpper boundHawaii15000944,4721611.522.2Hawaii County15001118,659136.122.0Honolulu County15003675,3561711.725.0Kalawao County15005127209.436.0Kauai County1500746,358126.021.6Maui County15009103,972146.824.1

This is the breakdown for my state.  Hawaii public schools are exceptionally poor at delivering services.  25% of the population either uses private schools or charter schools in the islands.  This has created an interesting market in education that doesn't exist anywhere else.  We actually have schools that tailor their methods to specific populations of students and these are very successful.  For example, there are several private schools that specifically target learning disabled populations and with a combination of assistive technology, alternative reading strategies, and smaller class sizes, they are able to teach every child functional literacy skills.


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## Makalakumu (Jun 23, 2013)

Here is one of the worst examples in the United States.

http://theweek.com/article/index/215055/detroits-shocking-47-percent-illiteracy-rate


> *M*
> ore than 200,000 Detroit residents &#8212; 47 percent of Motor City adults &#8212; are "functionally illiterate," according to a new report released by the Detroit Regional Workforce Fund. That means they can't fill out basic forms, read a prescription, or handle other tasks most Americans take for granted, according to the fund's director, Karen Tyler-Ruiz, as quoted by _CBS Detroit_. Her organization's study also found that the education and training aimed at overcoming these problems "is inadequate at best," says Jackie Headapohl at _Michigan Live_. So what's to blame?
> 
> *Our education system is broken:* This study "shows the staggering degree to which public education has failed in one of the most economically depressed cities in the United States," says Doug Mataconis at _Outside the Beltway_. And it's "even more shocking" that half of the illiterate population "somehow made it through public school." Clearly, "taxpayers aren't getting their money's worth." It's too bad that half of them "aren't able to read the report to figure that out."


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## K-man (Jun 23, 2013)

Makalakumu said:


> Here is one of the worst examples in the United States.
> 
> http://theweek.com/article/index/215055/detroits-shocking-47-percent-illiteracy-rate


*Maka*, it's a pity you don't research before posting figures that support your arguement but just seem too good to be true. Whenever I see claims that fly in the face of common sense I check a little deeper. 

The author of your quoted article wrote this the following day.



> _Well, unless someone has better information, the 47% illiteracy rates out of Detroit I wrote about yesterday may not be exactly reliable:
> _http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/05/06/detroit-literacy-numbers-questionable/



He concludes by saying:



> There you have it: not new research, but a 1993 computerized extrapolation of information collected two decades ago. It&#8217;s not even on point, since the low literacy rates among adults in US urban areas have at least as much to do with recent immigration as with failing schools.
> 
> 
> To be sure, the statistic is not exactly encouraging, but it&#8217;s far from an urgent mandate for doubling down on testing and other corporate reforms. Too bad Yglesias, Kristof, and their unthinking followers couldn&#8217;t be bothered to do some elementary research before granting new life to an ancient and misleading factoid.


As I have previously said, Just because something is written does not make it a fact.   :asian:


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## Makalakumu (Jun 23, 2013)

Teachers in Detroit public schools have confirmed this. At a national conference I attended last summer. 47% is correct.


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## K-man (Jun 23, 2013)

Makalakumu said:


> Teachers in Detroit public schools have confirmed this. At a national conference I attended last summer. 47% is correct.


Crap. The data is totally flawed.

http://detroit.jalopnik.com/national-pundit-parachutes-into-detroit-to-regurgitate-453855983
:asian:


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## Makalakumu (Jun 23, 2013)

K-man said:


> Crap.



The only crap here is the political mess you accidentally stepped in. Detroit is a black eye for America. The city is an economic apocalypse with murder and crime rates higher than third world countries. Entire neighborhoods are being bulldozed. There are what I can only call refugees fleeing from the city. I've had some of them as students, the poor children.  This stat is an estimate, but it is also  correct. Even if the estimate is high, as critics suggest, it's not off by much.

Still, i think the main thesis doesn't depend on this. I've suggested that we need a new way of schooling children, one that keeps up with modern conditions and is more successful than the one we have now. When the nationwide stat is 1 out of 7, that's really bad. Think about the economic potential that is lost here.


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## Carol (Jun 23, 2013)

Do you think we need a new way of schooling?   Or more acceptance for diverse ways of schooling?

I had the good fortune to meet Kelly Haldorson and her family last week, complete with their Unschool Bus.  I think Unschooling is working well for their family.  I'm not sure if it would work well for every family....and not sure if has to.  Granted, I have some personal bias here.  In my own family I have 2 young relatives who were home schooled through grade 8.

I'd be concerned that a new way of schooling in and of itself would be a new way of cutting a one-size-fits-all garment and expecting it to fit -- but I suspect your ideas are deeper and more complex than that.  :asian:


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## arnisador (Jun 24, 2013)

Carol said:


> Unschooling



Fascinating idea but my fear has always been you'll never get someone with standard H.S. level competence in math. and science out of this system. Are there unschooling "graduates" who are now physicians?


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## Tgace (Jun 24, 2013)

arnisador said:


> Fascinating idea but my fear has always been you'll never get someone with standard H.S. level competence in math. and science out of this system. Are there unschooling "graduates" who are now physicians?



I think that there is a problem with the mentality that being a doctor or an engineer is the ultimate end goal....this goes hand in hand with the trend towards "needing" a college degree to get almost any entry level job these days. I have a Masters and I cannot think of a single job I started out in that really required it beyond a check box on some personnel form.


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## Makalakumu (Jun 24, 2013)

arnisador said:


> Fascinating idea but my fear has always been you'll never get someone with standard H.S. level competence in math. and science out of this system. Are there unschooling "graduates" who are now physicians?



There are. And there also ways that a student can learn higher levels of math quicker than regular education teaches them. I don't neccesarily think it's due to a revolution in pedegogy though. More likely it's due to the fact that one can pursue an interest and not be held back by the rest of the class.


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## pgsmith (Jun 24, 2013)

Everyone talks about improving the education system, but that's not what's broken in my opinion. What's broken are the parents. Nobody teaches how to properly raise and motivate children. Schools are not supposed to be solely, or even primarily in my opinion, responsible for a child's education. This is the responsibilty of the child's parents. They are the ones that are supposed to be working with and educating their children. Fobbing that responsibility off on a bunch of strangers, and then getting upset when it doesn't work so well, is just wrong. 

I've known many parents who just want to be their children's friend, and make their little lives happy. I've known many other parents that are busy with their own lives and just don't want their kids to bother them. I've also known many parents that were intimately involved in their kid's education, working with their children and their children's school and teachers to insure that their kids are actually learning everything they need to. The difference in how the children grew up to handle life is nothing short of amazing. This is something that's simple to research and read about. However, the people that are doing this research into how to properly raise their kids are definitely in the minority, and it is becoming more so all the time. People need to learn how to raise children _before_ they have them, or no amount of educational reform is going to do more than the most superficial amount of good.

  Sorry about the soap box. I'll get down now ...


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## Makalakumu (Jun 24, 2013)

pgsmith said:


> Everyone talks about improving the education system, but that's not what's broken in my opinion. What's broken are the parents. Nobody teaches how to properly raise and motivate children. Schools are not supposed to be solely, or even primarily in my opinion, responsible for a child's education. This is the responsibilty of the child's parents. They are the ones that are supposed to be working with and educating their children. Fobbing that responsibility off on a bunch of strangers, and then getting upset when it doesn't work so well, is just wrong.
> 
> I've known many parents who just want to be their children's friend, and make their little lives happy. I've known many other parents that are busy with their own lives and just don't want their kids to bother them. I've also known many parents that were intimately involved in their kid's education, working with their children and their children's school and teachers to insure that their kids are actually learning everything they need to. The difference in how the children grew up to handle life is nothing short of amazing. This is something that's simple to research and read about. However, the people that are doing this research into how to properly raise their kids are definitely in the minority, and it is becoming more so all the time. People need to learn how to raise children _before_ they have them, or no amount of educational reform is going to do more than the most superficial amount of good.
> 
> Sorry about the soap box. I'll get down now ...



This is the elephant in the room, IMO.  It's so easy to have children, but raising them is another matter entirely.  My wife and I actually took some parenting classes when we had our first child.  This helped us immensely.  Imagine if raising children and managing a family was something that we could elevate to the level of learning math and science.  I think it could be argued that it is more important than both.


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## arnisador (Jun 24, 2013)

Tgace said:


> I think that there is a problem with the mentality that being a doctor or an engineer is the ultimate end goal....



That's not what I think. I think that what I have seen here of unschooling and homeschooling while we homeschooled our kids for 10 years all too often has parents stopping after elementary-level material because the rest is beyond their knowledge, and the kids don't like it and complain. I think it's unfair to the kids to effectively deny them the possibility of becoming a physician/scientist/engineer/etc. because of this.



> I have a Masters and I cannot think of a single job I started out in  that really required it beyond a check box on some personnel form.



Getting a M.S. is usually a large pay boost--it is better bang-for-the-buck than a Ph.D. Surely you'd grant that there are jobs where the extra knowledge is truly useful? I've taught M.S.-level engineering students in Silicon Valley and M.S.-level engineering students in very specialized curricula (e.g., weapons systems engineering) for the Navy. They appreciated and used that material. I don't doubt that the difference between a B.A. and M.A. in English (say) is not as appreciated. Try getting an M.P.H. and see if people want that.


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## arnisador (Jun 24, 2013)

pgsmith said:


> Everyone talks about improving the education system, but that's not what's broken in my opinion. What's broken are the parents.



There's a lot of truth here but from a public policy point-of-view that's a lot harder to address, sadly. Poverty is the enemy.


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## pgsmith (Jun 24, 2013)

arnisador said:


> Poverty is the enemy.



  I'm sorry, but poverty is an excuse, plain and simple. It makes a lot of things harder, it's true. However, it also makes some things easier. My experience (from growing up in poverty) is that most of the poor, not all but most, have never been taught either how to learn, nor how to properly raise children. Those two factors perpetuate the cycle of poverty, and make for an almost impossible task teaching the poor.


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## arnisador (Jun 24, 2013)

Any  one person can rise above any given problem, but poverty explains much of what we're seeing here.


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## Tgace (Jun 24, 2013)

And whats the solution to poverty? Just give them money?

Education will open opportunities to employment so it's sort of a snake eating it's tail problem.


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## Makalakumu (Jun 24, 2013)

arnisador said:


> Any  one person can rise above any given problem, but poverty explains much of what we're seeing here.



This is a bit simplistic. Might I suggest that schools in impoverished neighborhoods focus on different goals and values? Perhaps this would help poor families learn the skills they need to get out of poverty.

This is the problem with one size fits all standards, btw. Because of them, the schools cannot tailor their teaching to the communities needs.


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## Steve (Jun 24, 2013)

pgsmith said:


> I'm sorry, but poverty is an excuse, plain and simple. It makes a lot of things harder, it's true. However, it also makes some things easier. My experience (from growing up in poverty) is that most of the poor, not all but most, have never been taught either how to learn, nor how to properly raise children. Those two factors perpetuate the cycle of poverty, and make for an almost impossible task teaching the poor.



You say that poverty is an excuse, but the rest of your post is literally explaining how poverty is self perpetuating.

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD


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## arnisador (Jun 24, 2013)

Tgace said:


> And whats the solution to poverty?



As I said--we talk so much about schools because the root causes are very hard to address.



> Education will open opportunities to employment so it's sort of a snake eating it's tail problem.



Not exactly. People in poor communities who almost never interact with degreed professionals outside their run-down schools may not internalize the "stay in school" message if it doesn't seem borne out by their day to day lives.


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## Makalakumu (Jun 24, 2013)

arnisador said:


> As I said--we talk so much about schools because the root causes are very hard to address.



I agree, the root causes are hard to address, especially from thousands of miles away.  The notion of centrally planning an education system in a country as large and diverse as the United States is what makes this so difficult.  Education professionals, if left to tailor their teaching to the communities needs...aka their customers, could begin to craft solutions to gnarly social problems.


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## Bob Hubbard (Jun 25, 2013)

If you want to fix poverty, stop supporting the idea that government is responsible to care for you, and push personal responsibility and achievement as American ideas again. It's no wonder that as our "safety net" has grown, so too have the numbers of those using it.  Part of that has to come from the schools.  In the 12 years I was in public school not once was I offered courses that pushed entrepreneurship. Not once. More time was spent in assemblies to watch the "drill team" do some bastardized clog tap dance.  Economics was more theory than practical...not once was 'balancing a check book' touched on, or budgeting, or credit.  You want to reduce poverty, instill solid work ethics in our kids.  I run into too many people, too many of them under 18, who are used to the idea if they wait long enough someone else will be along to do it for them. Stop lowering the standards. 45 shouldn't be a passing grade! 

Bah.


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## Steve (Jun 25, 2013)

Bob Hubbard said:


> If you want to fix poverty, stop supporting the idea that government is responsible to care for you, and push personal responsibility and achievement as American ideas again. It's no wonder that as our "safety net" has grown, so too have the numbers of those using it.  Part of that has to come from the schools.  In the 12 years I was in public school not once was I offered courses that pushed entrepreneurship. Not once. More time was spent in assemblies to watch the "drill team" do some bastardized clog tap dance.  Economics was more theory than practical...not once was 'balancing a check book' touched on, or budgeting, or credit.  You want to reduce poverty, instill solid work ethics in our kids.  I run into too many people, too many of them under 18, who are used to the idea if they wait long enough someone else will be along to do it for them. Stop lowering the standards. 45 shouldn't be a passing grade!
> 
> Bah.



Statistically, one in four people receives some kind of monthly payment from social security, whether disability, retirement, survivors or auxiliary payments.  That suggests that if this forum is typical of the general population, a quarter of the posters here have an immediate stake in it.  

I've posted the historical figures before, but there is no way anyone can argue that it is overwhelmingly successful at keeping seniors and disabled workers from living below poverty.


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## Sukerkin (Jun 25, 2013)

I agree with both #34 and #35 above.  I am one of those who hauled myself away from my working class poor roots by dint of being blessed with more than average mental horsepower and a drive not to be living hand-to-mouth.  But I couldn't have done it, I don't think, without the public funding of education we had over here in England at the time.  No university fees and a small grant to live off whilst studying made everything that lead me to where I now am possible.

I also managed to be one of the very few non-wealthy students to have a car of my own by the end of my first year as I channeled my grant into stock for a mail order business I ran whilst studying.  I left uni with more money than I started with, unlike the ones today who leave with £30k debts.


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## Sukerkin (Jun 25, 2013)

arnisador said:


> Not exactly. People in poor communities who almost never interact with degreed professionals outside their run-down schools may not internalize the "stay in school" message if it doesn't seem borne out by their day to day lives.



By coincidence, I read an article on the BBC about poverty in the Welsh valleys that made almost exactly that point - in an entire town no-one had gone to university in living memory.

For background, here is the article:  http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23028078


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## pgsmith (Jun 25, 2013)

Steve said:
			
		

> You say that poverty is an excuse, but the rest of your post is literally explaining how poverty is self perpetuating.


Bingo! 
In our present society, the cycle of poverty is extremely difficult to break. I was lucky in that my mother, being British, was extremely independent minded. She worked hard to instill a love of learning in both myself and my brother. Unfortunately, my brother went down the drug path and is, as far as I know, being supported today by the government. 

All of my friends when I was growing up thought I was odd for wanting to read books and engage the teachers at school. Their parents never taught them how to learn, and so learning was quite difficult for them. Until we devise some way of teaching _parents_ how to better raise their children, we can't hope to break the ever increasing cycle of poverty that mires our government's social welfare programs.


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## granfire (Jun 25, 2013)

pgsmith said:


> Bingo!
> In our present society, the cycle of poverty is extremely difficult to break. I was lucky in that my mother, being British, was extremely independent minded. She worked hard to instill a love of learning in both myself and my brother. Unfortunately, my brother went down the drug path and is, as far as I know, being supported today by the government.
> 
> All of my friends when I was growing up thought I was odd for wanting to read books and engage the teachers at school. Their parents never taught them how to learn, and so learning was quite difficult for them. Until we devise some way of teaching _parents_ how to better raise their children, we can't hope to break the ever increasing cycle of poverty that mires our government's social welfare programs.



well, part of the vicious cycle we are in. 
Parents do not grow up in an air tight environment. The went to school and were taught to hate it.
Now the parents (and other so called adults) spread the myth that a god child has to dislike school and live for recess (which, BTW, does no longer exist) 

Then the kids are taught that school sucks and the teachers stink, and TV keeps portraing school like a place where you go to to socialize and torment adults with no repercussion. 

There are a lot of things that I liek about the current system, but more that I find stink.

Coed through middle school is detrimental to the student, studies have proven this a long time ago, Uniforms are actually beneficial, but for the life of me, I do not understand why kids throughout middle school ahve to have their individual schedule...but then again, I was raised in a system that did not lump all kids in one school, so you did not have to make accomodations for the bright kids and the brighter ones (since we all know, no snowflake is ever really dumb...)

And kids hate it because, well, it's not coherent, so they go out into th world, telling their kids that school stinks and teachers suck....


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## DennisBreene (Jun 25, 2013)

While there are many good points being made from all fronts in this discussion; I'm less convinced that schools, teachers, and top down state programs are a panacea. With our autistic son, we found that the entrenched views of many educators was actually very destructive. It required placing him in a private school with a demonstrated track record of success and a very specialized curriculum and staff to counter the problems exacerbated by public school. There are any number of kids who, for whatever reason, do not function well in the classic classroom. A system that allowed for more versatility and creative teaching could potentially benefit many more of these kids.


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## Steve (Jun 25, 2013)

Agreed, Dennis.  More customized, individualized attention is great.  But that costs money.   No easy answer.

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## Tgace (Jun 25, 2013)

Steve said:


> Agreed, Dennis.  More customized, individualized attention is great.  But that costs money.   No easy answer.
> 
> Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk 2



Yep...it's especially costly when you still have to pay School Taxes on top of having to pay tuition.


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## granfire (Jun 25, 2013)

Steve said:


> Agreed, Dennis.  More customized, individualized attention is great.  But that costs money.   No easy answer.
> 
> Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk 2



I don't think it does cost so much more, but you have to change the system.

And change a few things around.
Like, seriously, school here starts at 7 AM....That is cruel and unusual punishment!
And I am talking about me here, not the kid. And that is on top of studies that have shown that tens are wired differently and their biological clocks don't work like adults. 
Meaning they are not lazy for sleeping in in the morning and staying up late, but rather that the schedule is skewed. I think in Finland they have taken such things into consideration and made school start later.

I mean, my school started at 8AM, was done most days by 1PM...and yet I had language, foreign language (two from grade7, actually) math, social studies, history, two sciences and PE....and recess.
The kid is in school longer and gets less done! (I forgot music and art...) One of the tings that should not be possible!


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## DennisBreene (Jun 25, 2013)

Steve, 
You won't get any argument from me on that issue. However, I was fortunate enough to be able to pay private tuition. Most of the students at the school were sent by their respective school districts because they could not offer the services locally. Often the school districts were under some sort of administrative or legal mandate to send the child and it came out of their budget. So the question is; would it be more cost effective in the long run to create such schools (ie. create versatile educational opportunities) than to spend large sums of money in beaurocratic wrangling and still ultimately pay for private placement.


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## granfire (Jun 25, 2013)

well, indeed.

this way it's syphoning the money from the pot, making bad schools worse.


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