8 ms·

Instead of reinventing the school, I think we need to be thinking outside the school. The institution of school comes with a whole host of problems that are jus

by codva 13y ago

Instead of reinventing the school, I think we need to be thinking outside the school. The institution of school comes with a whole host of problems that are just systemic to the idea of everybody reporting to a central location and being primarily segregated by age. Not that you can't get a decent education in school, because many of us did. We don't need the best and brightest teachers. We need the most passionate and dedicated teachers. Passion trumps intelligence for teachers just about every time. The best teachers don't teach so much as they light the fire in a kid to learn. It's a subtle but important difference. If I were designing better schools I'd stick with the basic group format up through about 8th grade, then go to a community college type model where every kid could branch off to follow their interests. The universe of stuff that everybody needs to know is much smaller than most people presume. Everybody needs to write well, read well, and handle math up through about Algebra I. After that, it is all electives. So after about 8th grade, when the 3 Rs should be solid in most kids, let them do what they want. That is how we handled our kids educations (we homeschooled) and it worked out very well. HSing is not an option for most, but the "system" can learn a lot from what works for homeschoolers.

arethuza 13y ago
A quick question - when you say "where every kid could branch off to follow their interests" does this imply that kids in the US education system don't choose a set of subjects to focus on at about 14?
- SirSkidmore 13y ago
  Completely true, if not implied. I just graduated from secondary school in the US. I want to be a programmer, but I never once took a programming class; my school didn't offer them. Most of my peers still have NO idea what they would like to study, even though some of them are paying $10,000-$20,000 to go to college. At least at my school (a small rural secondary school), there just weren't enough classes to to "specialize" or focus on any one particular field. You just took the core classes every year: a science (sometimes), a math, an English.
  - dragonwriter 13y ago
    > I just graduated from primary school in the US. I want to be a programmer, but I never once took a programming class. Normally I would say "that's okay, you've got plenty of time to do that in secondary school (middle/high school)". But then you go on to say this: > Most of my peers still have NO idea what they would like to study, even though some of them are paying $10,000-$20,000 to go to college. If you just graduated from primary school, why are your peers going to college? That's quite odd. I suspect, in declining order of likelihood, that either "primary school", or "college", or "peers" is an error...
    - zanny 13y ago
      US doesn't see middle / high as "secondary" school. Secondary school is college. Primary school is just the K-12 process because it is continuous with no breaks in between, besides maybe the divide between one year being led around hallways by a teacher and next going room to room on your own.
      - dragonwriter 13y ago
        > US doesn't see middle / high as "secondary" school. Yes, it does. [1] > Secondary school is college. No, secondary school is either equivalent to "high school" or equivalent to "middle and high school". [2] College is "post-secondary school". [3] [1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primary_school#United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primary_school#United_States [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secondary_school#United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secondary_school#United_States [3] e.g., http://www.cpec.ca.gov/SecondPages/CommissionHistory.asp http://www.cpec.ca.gov/SecondPages/CommissionHistory.asp
    - SirSkidmore 13y ago
      yeah, sorry, fixed. It's a Monday, can you tell?
- zanny 13y ago
  No, they don't. K-12 is strictly adherence to state standards education with very little room for "optional" coursework, and even where they is the option, the staggering monotony and disdain a student would have for the primary subjects they spend 80% of their time in they will have no energy or effort left to be truly passionate about a choice subject (usually). IE, my 8-12th grades had strict guidelines : must finish algebra, must have a course in each of the 4 primary sciences, must have world and us history and government, must have literature classes covering 4 time blocks from early writing -> Renaissance writing -> new world writing -> modern writing. Must have gym, must have a foreign language (after 6 years of Spanish, and 2 years out of college, I can't remember a word of it since I never used it). I think I got one class per year I could "pick", and the closest to software / IT was web design which was just how to make a wordpress site, and never touched html / css / js.
- Kuiper 13y ago
  I attended a California high school in the 00's and most of the courses I took were prescribed; each year we got to take one "elective" course. Some students use these elective courses to take additional levels of courses that they are required. (For example, students are required to take one year of chemistry; some students such as myself opted to take a second year of chemistry. However, these students were a very small minority; I believe that only around 20 students of a graduating class of 1000 students opted to take more than one year of chemistry in high school. There were also only two tiers of each science course, meaning that you couldn't take a third year of a given science.) I lived in a county with a large Hispanic population (whites were a minority), so Spanish classes were offered and were a popular option for an elective course, with many students opting to spend multiple years in Spanish classes. Some of the elective courses were tied to non-athletic extra-curriculars, like band, orchestra, choir, and the speech & debate team. Other electives included various visual arts, creative writing, "agriculture" (learn how to maintain a garden, "computer skills" (learn how to use Word and Excel), welding, drafting, and cooking, as well as the yearbook committee.
  - arethuza 13y ago
    Interesting, here in Scotland at year 3 of Secondary School (~14 years old) you choose 8 subjects from about ~40 available (this varies on the school). You have to take English, Maths a Science and a Social Science - but you have a reasonably choice. These are examined at age 15 in "Standard Grades". In 5th year (~16 years old) you usually do 5 subjects - not sure if any of these are compulsory (English used to be, but I don't think it is now) - these are examined in your "Highers" (Higher Grades). I did Maths, Chemistry, Physics, English and Engineering Drawing (this was before CS was available, it is now). Highers are used for University entrance and, in Scotland, depending on your birthday you can get your Highers and be off to University when you are 17. Sixth year at secondary school in Scotland is either used top up your exams if you didn't get enough to do the course you want, doing more advanced courses and/or going to parties... The downside of this approach is that you specialise very early - basically you choose at 14. Which is great if you know what you want to do and not so good if you don't. This is aggravated by UK Universities traditionally having very focused courses e.g. I did a CS course and all we had was 4 years of Computer Science and Maths classes with some Statistics for light relief. Again this is great if you pick the right course and dreadful if you make a mistake. [NB I have a 14 year old son and we've just been through the trauma of picking Standard Grade courses] FYI Here is a exam paper for an Advanced Higher in Computing, which I think is pretty good: http://www.sqa.org.uk/pastpapers/papers/papers/2012/AH_Computing_All_2012.pdf http://www.sqa.org.uk/pastpapers/papers/papers/2012/AH_Compu...
Inception 13y ago
I agree with you about allowing people to follow their interests. The curriculum that schools follow turns people off to learning in my opinion. We as a society have become so set on fulfilling educational requirements that it takes the fun out of learning. I have a piece of paper worth over $100,000 that symbolizes my ability to memorize, regurgitate and forget information that my college decided would make me a contributing member of society. Don't get me wrong, I did take courses that I was interested in and I still use to this day, but I would bet that I can't tell you one thing that I learned from the majority of the required courses that I took because I was not interested in them. Now that my curriculum days are done I've rediscovered the fun in learning. I would attribute that to my interest in the areas that I am exploring. What I find for myself, and this may be true for others as well, is that if I am truly interested in an area that I am learning about I can remember and actually use the information. Teach children the basics and then the rest of their education should be interest based.
kazagistar 13y ago
> We don't need the best and brightest teachers. We need the most passionate and dedicated teachers. Agreed. It is reasonable that people who did poorly academically will be the ones who have the best insight on how to improve academic performance, and the teachers who struggled to understand a subject area will have the best insight on how to make the subject easier to learn.
- arkades 13y ago
  According to a study done on GPAs of SUNY graduates (State University of New York; several state-funded universities), teachers already have the lowest GPAs and SATs of all graduates.* A cynic might suggest this has less to do with offering insight into a flawed system and more to do with providing the lazy/dumb with a pathetically easy degree. *This trend did vary by demographics. Asian teachers had lower-than-average-for-a-teacher SAT's; African Americans had higher.

by codva 13y ago

arethuza 13y ago

A quick question - when you say "where every kid could branch off to follow their interests" does this imply that kids in the US education system don't choose a set of subjects to focus on at about 14?

SirSkidmore 13y ago
Completely true, if not implied. I just graduated from secondary school in the US. I want to be a programmer, but I never once took a programming class; my school didn't offer them. Most of my peers still have NO idea what they would like to study, even though some of them are paying $10,000-$20,000 to go to college. At least at my school (a small rural secondary school), there just weren't enough classes to to "specialize" or focus on any one particular field. You just took the core classes every year: a science (sometimes), a math, an English.
- dragonwriter 13y ago
  > I just graduated from primary school in the US. I want to be a programmer, but I never once took a programming class. Normally I would say "that's okay, you've got plenty of time to do that in secondary school (middle/high school)". But then you go on to say this: > Most of my peers still have NO idea what they would like to study, even though some of them are paying $10,000-$20,000 to go to college. If you just graduated from primary school, why are your peers going to college? That's quite odd. I suspect, in declining order of likelihood, that either "primary school", or "college", or "peers" is an error...
  - zanny 13y ago
    US doesn't see middle / high as "secondary" school. Secondary school is college. Primary school is just the K-12 process because it is continuous with no breaks in between, besides maybe the divide between one year being led around hallways by a teacher and next going room to room on your own.
    - dragonwriter 13y ago
      > US doesn't see middle / high as "secondary" school. Yes, it does. [1] > Secondary school is college. No, secondary school is either equivalent to "high school" or equivalent to "middle and high school". [2] College is "post-secondary school". [3] [1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primary_school#United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primary_school#United_States [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secondary_school#United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secondary_school#United_States [3] e.g., http://www.cpec.ca.gov/SecondPages/CommissionHistory.asp http://www.cpec.ca.gov/SecondPages/CommissionHistory.asp
  - SirSkidmore 13y ago
    yeah, sorry, fixed. It's a Monday, can you tell?
zanny 13y ago
No, they don't. K-12 is strictly adherence to state standards education with very little room for "optional" coursework, and even where they is the option, the staggering monotony and disdain a student would have for the primary subjects they spend 80% of their time in they will have no energy or effort left to be truly passionate about a choice subject (usually). IE, my 8-12th grades had strict guidelines : must finish algebra, must have a course in each of the 4 primary sciences, must have world and us history and government, must have literature classes covering 4 time blocks from early writing -> Renaissance writing -> new world writing -> modern writing. Must have gym, must have a foreign language (after 6 years of Spanish, and 2 years out of college, I can't remember a word of it since I never used it). I think I got one class per year I could "pick", and the closest to software / IT was web design which was just how to make a wordpress site, and never touched html / css / js.
Kuiper 13y ago
I attended a California high school in the 00's and most of the courses I took were prescribed; each year we got to take one "elective" course. Some students use these elective courses to take additional levels of courses that they are required. (For example, students are required to take one year of chemistry; some students such as myself opted to take a second year of chemistry. However, these students were a very small minority; I believe that only around 20 students of a graduating class of 1000 students opted to take more than one year of chemistry in high school. There were also only two tiers of each science course, meaning that you couldn't take a third year of a given science.) I lived in a county with a large Hispanic population (whites were a minority), so Spanish classes were offered and were a popular option for an elective course, with many students opting to spend multiple years in Spanish classes. Some of the elective courses were tied to non-athletic extra-curriculars, like band, orchestra, choir, and the speech & debate team. Other electives included various visual arts, creative writing, "agriculture" (learn how to maintain a garden, "computer skills" (learn how to use Word and Excel), welding, drafting, and cooking, as well as the yearbook committee.
- arethuza 13y ago
  Interesting, here in Scotland at year 3 of Secondary School (~14 years old) you choose 8 subjects from about ~40 available (this varies on the school). You have to take English, Maths a Science and a Social Science - but you have a reasonably choice. These are examined at age 15 in "Standard Grades". In 5th year (~16 years old) you usually do 5 subjects - not sure if any of these are compulsory (English used to be, but I don't think it is now) - these are examined in your "Highers" (Higher Grades). I did Maths, Chemistry, Physics, English and Engineering Drawing (this was before CS was available, it is now). Highers are used for University entrance and, in Scotland, depending on your birthday you can get your Highers and be off to University when you are 17. Sixth year at secondary school in Scotland is either used top up your exams if you didn't get enough to do the course you want, doing more advanced courses and/or going to parties... The downside of this approach is that you specialise very early - basically you choose at 14. Which is great if you know what you want to do and not so good if you don't. This is aggravated by UK Universities traditionally having very focused courses e.g. I did a CS course and all we had was 4 years of Computer Science and Maths classes with some Statistics for light relief. Again this is great if you pick the right course and dreadful if you make a mistake. [NB I have a 14 year old son and we've just been through the trauma of picking Standard Grade courses] FYI Here is a exam paper for an Advanced Higher in Computing, which I think is pretty good: http://www.sqa.org.uk/pastpapers/papers/papers/2012/AH_Computing_All_2012.pdf http://www.sqa.org.uk/pastpapers/papers/papers/2012/AH_Compu...

Inception 13y ago

I agree with you about allowing people to follow their interests. The curriculum that schools follow turns people off to learning in my opinion. We as a society have become so set on fulfilling educational requirements that it takes the fun out of learning. I have a piece of paper worth over $100,000 that symbolizes my ability to memorize, regurgitate and forget information that my college decided would make me a contributing member of society. Don't get me wrong, I did take courses that I was interested in and I still use to this day, but I would bet that I can't tell you one thing that I learned from the majority of the required courses that I took because I was not interested in them. Now that my curriculum days are done I've rediscovered the fun in learning. I would attribute that to my interest in the areas that I am exploring. What I find for myself, and this may be true for others as well, is that if I am truly interested in an area that I am learning about I can remember and actually use the information. Teach children the basics and then the rest of their education should be interest based.

kazagistar 13y ago

> We don't need the best and brightest teachers. We need the most passionate and dedicated teachers. Agreed. It is reasonable that people who did poorly academically will be the ones who have the best insight on how to improve academic performance, and the teachers who struggled to understand a subject area will have the best insight on how to make the subject easier to learn.

arkades 13y ago
According to a study done on GPAs of SUNY graduates (State University of New York; several state-funded universities), teachers already have the lowest GPAs and SATs of all graduates.* A cynic might suggest this has less to do with offering insight into a flawed system and more to do with providing the lazy/dumb with a pathetically easy degree. *This trend did vary by demographics. Asian teachers had lower-than-average-for-a-teacher SAT's; African Americans had higher.