How Do You Define Morality?

[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by piercehawkeye45

Its brainwashing. I don't want to be to be taught word for word what to think, I would rather be taught how to think and figure it out by myself. You can't test how well you can think on standardized tests. There are times when you have to have subjects force fed to you, but a lot of times you don't and it ruins the whole point of getting an education.

That's crap. Basic arithmetic should be "word for word what to think." There is no deep analytical skill involved in the base levels of these tests.

The answer you're actually looking for is: the problem with teaching to the test is that every student who isn't a complete moron is bored out of their minds. Which just means there should be more honors/regular/remedial separation at younger ages, and more willingness to make kids repeat grades early on. Poor test scores reflect very little on a teacher's skill and very much on the general performance of the students in the area.

[piercehawkeye45]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

That's crap. Basic arithmetic should be "word for word what to think." There is no deep analytical skill involved in the base levels of these tests.

Thats why I said some subjects need to be force fed to you.

The answer you're actually looking for is: the problem with teaching to the test is that every student who isn't a complete moron is bored out of their minds. Which just means there should be more honors/regular/remedial separation at younger ages, and more willingness to make kids repeat grades early on. Poor test scores reflect very little on a teacher's skill and very much on the general performance of the students in the area.

That would help but it still doesn't allow a child develop basic problem solving skills for situations they've never been in before. All it does is give them more information they can forget in three months.

There should be two different types of classes, one be the type we have right now where it is an A-F scale and more or less standardized and then there should be another group that would be pass/fail that isn't based off a curriculum but can help the students with life skills and basic understanding of the world. Those classes would be mostly electives and be classes like Phy Ed, Sociology, Psychology, Child Development, Political Science, Debate, Personal Finance, etc.

[monster]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

That's crap. Basic arithmetic should be "word for word what to think."

oh no. Basic arithmetic is about understanding numbers. About understanding how they relate to real life concepts. Learning sums and procedures by rote fucks kids up. really. I spent this morning teaching subtraction to 5th graders. Yes, subtraction. yes 5th graders. 10-year-olds. Are they stupid ? No. Has "the system" let them down? yes.

Ours is and "alternative" (public) school. We concentrate on teaching the kids how to learn. How to work out stuff for themselves. We often end up being the last resort for kids who are floundering in "the system" for no discernable, diagnosable reason. These kids had (mostly) transferred to us this year from other public schools in the district.

It turned out the problem went back as far as addition. They knew about carrying the 1 when adding 23 and 48 together. But they had no idea why they were doing it, and so couldn't extrapolate to larger numbers or to sums with more than two numbers. And had even less idea what it represented in the real world when they did it in reverse for subtraction. But they gotmany of the answers right on paper, although they couldn't explain why they did what they did, and couldn't find their own mistakes in the ones they got wrong.

We got out the unit and 10 and 100 blocks and had them physically add numbers together and "trade up" 10 smaller ones for a bigger unit. Then we worked it in reverse. We could see the lightbulbs going on as they gradually got it. it was a great teaching experience, but frightening that these kids would have gone on to get OK test scores without getting a good grip on what they are actually supposed to be learning.

Oh, and the school disctict they are in is supposed to be a very good one. It's desirability triples house prices compared to neighboring cities. And it's test scores are awesome. but I'm telling you, those kids knew bugger all about basic arithmetic.