Fixing Education

[AndyZ]

I want this thread to be about policy, not politics.  Most of these threads rapidly fill up with ad hominem arguments, talking about political parties rather than actually discussing the issues in question.  I ask people not to do that this time.

Example:

Talking about No Child Left Behind is fine.  Pointing out that Bush started it isn't strictly forbidden, but becomes a distraction.  Adding that Bush is an idiot isn't really necessary.  Saying that all Republicans hate education doesn't solve anything.  Adding that nothing will ever be fixed is likewise pointless; let's talk about how we'd fix things if we could.  Following a realistic budget would be ideal, but if no realistic budget can solve the problem, explain why.

If you have nothing constructive to post, please don't post at all.




We know the American education system is broken.  How do we fix it?

[RubySlippers]

No problem. I would keep fixing it simple go back to what worked in the earlier times updated for today. In short track students since not all students are the same their education plans need to fit better. So here is what I would consider:

K-8th Grade should be for general education the breadth of core knowledge and no testing done save for identifying the childs abilities in language and mathematics, teach one added language and test in that but these will not lead to retention just determine where needs are. Students doing well and more likely to be college bound will get added options the rest would get career exploration focused activities. They should leave with the goal of being well rounded citizens with essential core knowledge.

High school would be then this two years of general education with some non-commited electives and further testing for a final determination before 11th grade, then track into pre-college or career preparation (options for community college/trade school transition or directly into working.

Those in pre-college education would get a focus on that, simple.

Those ,most likely the majority say 70%, could choose from many options focused on on a core area business/retail, technical trades, health care, child care, creative arts or transitional (joint programs to track these students into a two year college program in a career area or a trade school or apprenticeships with unions or professionals). Those students would then get applied language and mathematics, general area skills and training one on area of work. An example might be a young woman wanting to go into the business/retail they would get general classes and might take a focus in retail sales so might have four semesters of required classes and practical experience at job sites in that. When done she would get a diploma and a certification in retail sales, with references and general skills suited to work in that area. A transition option would add some options but lead into an associated degree in perhaps retail management with a semester or two taken off.

I think this would be both far more practical, allow low income students to get into the workforce with no debts and if they have the aptitudes would not exclude them from college.

[Darius]

I have a number of friends who are teachers and every last one of them says the same thing. "If you want to improve education, get the kids off TV and get the parents involved."

In my state and city they just announced that they're laying off almost a thousand teachers after this year ends. Class sizes will increase immensely next year.

Today after my workout at the gym I sat in the jacuzzi for a bit listening to some people complain about the high wages that teachers are getting and I kept wondering, just how much is enough to be paying for one of the people who may well spend more time with your child than you do? And, who has such a huge impact on their development? I had to ask them what they did for a living, they were valets. Which means in this city they probably make more than double what the average teacher makes in a year.

[Callie Del Noire]

First off. Stop laying off teachers. Class rooms have gone from 20 kids when I was in first grade to something like 40 or so where I went to high school. Do proper budgeting rather than this crap with 'vouchers'. Revamp the core curriculum to focus on skills like math, reading, grammar, basic logic and use that as a basic to build on.

Things like civics, history, and languages can be added to it (6th to 8th grade) and then build an idea of the students aptitude. Not everyone is going to college but you can prepare them for jobs better than flipping burgers. Technical skills are just as helpful as a degree. you can train the next generation of workers, be it the excutives, teachers, pipe fitters or a/c repairmen.

And we need to break the 'those who can't, teach' bullshit. Teachers do a LOT of work, and have to have a unique skillset that has to be cultivated and grown. 

[Exelion]

Two core things that NEED to be done before thinking about curriculum, or testing methods, or whatever.

1) Increase our education budget. I think we can stave a billion or two off our immense defense budget for that.

2) Get parents off their asses and involved in their children's education. Too many parents view school as a form of day care- toss the kid in, they're out of my hair until supper. It needs to change.

[itsbeenfun2000]

I have been teaching for 29 years. It is one of the few professions that the people doing the work are not asked how to improve the system. You would never have people outside the medical field dictate how a doctor would improve the health of his or her patients.

A few things can be done that have already been said. Get the parents involved. Most students reflect the attitude of their parents when they come into a class. Make sure the elementary levels have good teachers and not people that just couldn't get a degree in something else. That would mean raising the pay of the teachers to recruit the best. How important is this? Some research shows if a student has two years with a bad math teacher their math skills will not recover.

Let the educators make decisions for what is best with the school systems. School systems where you have buy in from all stake holders, parents, teachers, community, and administration work better. Make schools, especially high schools smaller, schools with a population between 600-900 show the most increase in student achievement.

That is just a start. Someone else's turn.

[AndyZ]

A lot to think about here, and thanks everyone for their thoughts and notes.

One thing that puzzles me a little bit, though:

1) Increase our education budget. I think we can stave a billion or two off our immense defense budget for that.

When it started out in 1980, the Education budget was $14,011,052.  Running this into http://inflationdata.com/inflation/inflation_calculators/inflation_rate_calculator.asp it came out as $39,122,970.  Now, we have over 70 billion (billion, even though it started at million) being spent for the Department of Education, and students seem to be getting worse, not better.

I would absolutely love for someone to explain that to me.  Even taking inflation into account, you're approaching a 2,000 times magnification.  It's easy to say to just throw more money at it, but that really doesn't seem to work.



I would also adore knowing any recommendations on methods for getting the parents more involved.  It may not be possible, but hey, it's more fun to try to come up with ways, right?

[Callie Del Noire]

A lot to think about here, and thanks everyone for their thoughts and notes.

One thing that puzzles me a little bit, though:

When it started out in 1980, the Education budget was $14,011,052.  Running this into http://inflationdata.com/inflation/inflation_calculators/inflation_rate_calculator.asp it came out as $39,122,970.  Now, we have over 70 billion (billion, even though it started at million) being spent for the Department of Education, and students seem to be getting worse, not better.

I would absolutely love for someone to explain that to me.  Even taking inflation into account, you're approaching a 2,000 times magnification.  It's easy to say to just throw more money at it, but that really doesn't seem to work.



I would also adore knowing any recommendations on methods for getting the parents more involved.  It may not be possible, but hey, it's more fun to try to come up with ways, right?

You can thank 'No Child Left Behind' and things like school voucher programs for part of that decay in performance. And aside from pulling funding the Department of Education has little they can Directly do to effect a school system. Ditto with the DoD funds, I know at least on school system out in California tried to keep their DoD funds after kicking recruiters off campus.

[AndyZ]

So what exactly is wrong with them?  Should we just do away with them entirely?

[Exelion]

A lot to think about here, and thanks everyone for their thoughts and notes.

One thing that puzzles me a little bit, though:

When it started out in 1980, the Education budget was $14,011,052.  Running this into http://inflationdata.com/inflation/inflation_calculators/inflation_rate_calculator.asp it came out as $39,122,970.  Now, we have over 70 billion (billion, even though it started at million) being spent for the Department of Education, and students seem to be getting worse, not better.

I would absolutely love for someone to explain that to me.  Even taking inflation into account, you're approaching a 2,000 times magnification.  It's easy to say to just throw more money at it, but that really doesn't seem to work.



I would also adore knowing any recommendations on methods for getting the parents more involved.  It may not be possible, but hey, it's more fun to try to come up with ways, right?

Teacher salaries are among the worst in the nation for the education level required. Benefits are also generally poor. It's not uncommon for schools to lack the funding to get the materials they need.

While you are right, and our edu budget has gone WAY up, the cost of everything else has too.

[Lilias]

The education budget, like that for any other industry, should be directed more towards maintaining staff than equipment. State of the art gadgets without people to use them are just props gathering dust.

It seems that the more indispensable a profession is, the nearest to a calling, if you will, the less respect, moral and financial, it commands. Teachers of all levels, like most healthcare workers (nurses, midwives, health visitors) towards the bottom of the payscale. Riddle me this. ::)

Curriculum-wise, we need a return to the humanities as the base. People can no longer afford to be just functionally literate, nor to ignore the rest of the world. Allowing one's horizons to shrink to what they can see around them and what they can remember happening is effectively returning them to the Dark Ages.

Above all, kids need to be reintroduced to the F-word: failure. There must be some minimal standard, if we don't want the adult world flooded with more generations of self-entitled twerps.

[AndyZ]

Teacher salaries are among the worst in the nation for the education level required. Benefits are also generally poor. It's not uncommon for schools to lack the funding to get the materials they need.

While you are right, and our edu budget has gone WAY up, the cost of everything else has too.

Yes, that's how inflation works.  If it started at 14 million and jumped up to 39 million over 30 years, that'd be perfectly normal.  It's instead jumped to over 70 billion.  If this phenomenal amount of money doesn't even begin to put a dent in the problem, then perhaps it cannot be solved simply by throwing money at it.

Now, Callie's said that the Department of Education has little that they can actually do to aid schools.  If this is the case, perhaps we should scrap the program altogether, and let that money flow directly into the school systems.



As a note, just because I don't comment on something doesn't mean that I didn't read it.  Often I don't know what to say, and sometimes I don't want to derail the conversation in methods which would inevitably happen if I made certain comments.

[Chris Brady]

A lot to think about here, and thanks everyone for their thoughts and notes.

One thing that puzzles me a little bit, though:

When it started out in 1980, the Education budget was $14,011,052.  Running this into http://inflationdata.com/inflation/inflation_calculators/inflation_rate_calculator.asp it came out as $39,122,970.  Now, we have over 70 billion (billion, even though it started at million) being spent for the Department of Education, and students seem to be getting worse, not better.

I would absolutely love for someone to explain that to me.  Even taking inflation into account, you're approaching a 2,000 times magnification.  It's easy to say to just throw more money at it, but that really doesn't seem to work.



I would also adore knowing any recommendations on methods for getting the parents more involved.  It may not be possible, but hey, it's more fun to try to come up with ways, right?

Two major points.  First is that the level of respect that kids have to adults is nearly non-existent.  Because punishing kids is now equated with abuse.  Maybe not legally, but it's there, so kids don't respect their teachers and even their own parents (Not all kids, but a significant majority.)

Secondly, and I've said this before, is that the school system is still the one that we've been using since the 19th century.  Yes, there's more options now, but the basic structure, the basic setup, is still the one designed for pumping out good little factory workers.  And our society and business models have changed.  We have jobs now that require more free thought and imagination, and frankly, most of schooling today is still designed to kill creativity.

The school system needs to be rebuilt from the ground up, and kids need to be reined in.  Will they?  Not likely, we'll just keep throwing money at it, rather than what needs to be done.

[AndyZ]

Two major points.  First is that the level of respect that kids have to adults is nearly non-existent.  Because punishing kids is now equated with abuse.  Maybe not legally, but it's there, so kids don't respect their teachers and even their own parents (Not all kids, but a significant majority.)

Secondly, and I've said this before, is that the school system is still the one that we've been using since the 19th century.  Yes, there's more options now, but the basic structure, the basic setup, is still the one designed for pumping out good little factory workers.  And our society and business models have changed.  We have jobs now that require more free thought and imagination, and frankly, most of schooling today is still designed to kill creativity.

The school system needs to be rebuilt from the ground up, and kids need to be reined in.  Will they?  Not likely, we'll just keep throwing money at it, rather than what needs to be done.

While I don't disagree, I would love to know how to fix these problems.  The first is more of a societal issue and I'm not sure can be convinced by the government (though feel free to prove me wrong ^_^) but what kinds of changes should be made to the school?

I've been planning a futuristic novel where children can be one on one tutored by an artificial intelligence (which seems an ideal method to me, but obviously isn't practical by modern-day standards) but I'd love to see examples of things which can be done.

The only way I can think of would be to segregate by intelligence across topics.  Kids which are smarter in math should be taught in different classes than kids who are slower and have a harder time with it.  Would this work?  What other techniques would work?

[Lilias]

The only way I can think of would be to segregate by intelligence across topics.  Kids which are smarter in math should be taught in different classes than kids who are slower and have a harder time with it.  Would this work?  What other techniques would work?

That is the system in the UK, with at least three sets (as those ability classes are called) for each main subject. I'm sure it has its disadvantages, and I'll poke our resident British educator to weigh in, but I for one would have preferred that to the mixed-ability classes we had in Greece. It was out of necessity, no doubt (in my time, school still operated in morning and afternoon shifts because there were not enough buildings), but it was still doing an awful disservice to the smart kids, who were held back and bored silly.

[itsbeenfun2000]

[/quote]
The only way I can think of would be to segregate by intelligence across topics.  Kids which are smarter in math should be taught in different classes than kids who are slower and have a harder time with it.  Would this work?  What other techniques would work?
[/quote]

We have this system already at the high school. It is called honors/regular/essentials.It does work to an extent as long as the students can move from one to another and be at different levels by subject. For example someone that is in honors math may not be honors in English. Our department requires a B in the previous honors class to stay in the honors system. Students can move up from the regular track with an A in the class and teacher recommendation.

Has anyone considered the system may not be broken and never has been? In 1920 20% of the students graduated in high school. in the 50's it was around 50%. Today a typical non urban high school graduates more then 90% of its students.

Respect has to be worked on in the school. It needs to be demanded from the students. Too often newer teachers want to be friends first and the authority figure second. Part of this is training but from my experience most students respect a teacher when asked of it.

[Exelion]

Has anyone considered the system may not be broken and never has been? In 1920 20% of the students graduated in high school. in the 50's it was around 50%. Today a typical non urban high school graduates more then 90% of its students.

Respect has to be worked on in the school. It needs to be demanded from the students. Too often newer teachers want to be friends first and the authority figure second. Part of this is training but from my experience most students respect a teacher when asked of it.

To the first point..graduation is not an indication of a successful education. It means you met whatever standards were given. And we've constantly lowered our standards in an effort to make sure kids pass no matter what. Just because more kids graduate doesn't mean we have more, better educated kids than 50 years ago.

I will agree with respect. Even in my day (you know you're old when you use that phrase), I couldn't believe things that were said/done to teachers by their students. And I;ve seen far worse examples as time has gone by.

All the same, respect for parents by their children (oh gods I AM old) is a problem too.

[RubySlippers]

In the 1920's even into the 50's High School was generally not vital to complete you could earlier complete grade school and go into a skilled trade or work in a factory, even in the 1950's you could complete some High School and it was not crippling. High School was a big deal in the early 20th century you earned a diploma it was the way in to skilled work, management paths and college and specialty business colleges. An example in the 1950's my grandfather graduated High School and walked into a machinists job as a helper, but it paid twice the coal mining work did and when he rose up the ranks made a big income far over his relatives. He learned this trade in High School with related classes.

Now High School is not enough and I wonder why? It seems all college prep and nothing is available to do other things a Plan B for those not doing well in these classes focused on college.

I agree parental involvement is a must, more money would be good and based on performance and bad teachers need to be able to be removed and teachers need with administrators to have more control to advance students not commit a test as the main means, but day to day interaction. But in the end if a student is not college material or likely to do well in high skill work (making solar panels and such) then need other options in High School where the career education is practically free.

[Exelion]

In the 1920's even into the 50's High School was generally not vital to complete you could earlier complete grade school and go into a skilled trade or work in a factory, even in the 1950's you could complete some High School and it was not crippling. High School was a big deal in the early 20th century you earned a diploma it was the way in to skilled work, management paths and college and specialty business colleges. An example in the 1950's my grandfather graduated High School and walked into a machinists job as a helper, but it paid twice the coal mining work did and when he rose up the ranks made a big income far over his relatives. He learned this trade in High School with related classes.

Now High School is not enough and I wonder why? It seems all college prep and nothing is available to do other things a Plan B for those not doing well in these classes focused on college.

I agree parental involvement is a must, more money would be good and based on performance and bad teachers need to be able to be removed and teachers need with administrators to have more control to advance students not commit a test as the main means, but day to day interaction. But in the end if a student is not college material or likely to do well in high skill work (making solar panels and such) then need other options in High School where the career education is practically free.

One thing I will agree with is the shift in how we view post-secondary education and trades. And I blame the economy, as well as to an extent popular belief.

Popular belief states that "trade" jobs like factory worker, carpenter, auto mechanic, what have you pay poorly and can become phased out fast. But, thanks to how we're all led to believe, a college education promises us fantastic high paying jobs with just a few years of effort and a little debt! What's not to love?

Sadly both things are complete falsehoods; I know a guy with 30k still in debt, in his thirties, with a degree, and works at the same place I do for the same pay (I have some college education, but no degree). I know an auto mechanic that makes twice what I do.

High school nowadays seems half college prep, half "You can't manage a job at Mcdonald's without a diploma, so let's find ways to give them diplomas". Very little prep for the real world, very little help in determining what you want to do or your life plan. So you get tons of HS graduates, dropped into college, and no clue what they're doing.

I'll agree more options need to be presented to our students, especially trades- hence why I think we need a better budget. that, and to pay teachers more so that it's an attractive job. I know people that want to teach and could do well at it, but couldn't pay the bills if they did.

[BCdan]

I think the problems are really fundamental. 

• The government tends to bring fourth a one size fits all education system.  Historically it has had a very hard time with trying to tailor education to the student.  I think that this is inevitable when you have a large bureaucratic organisation directing education.
• Funding for education as increased greatly over time, last I heard it has more than doubled sin the 70's and yet we get worse results.  I think incentives need to be fixed and that throwing money at the problem makes it worse.   
• We need to stop treating teachers as infallible educators who are doing it all for the kids and making incredible sacrifices. I have had great teachers, there are great teachers, but there are also crappy teachers who drag down the average.  I have had some truly great teachers in school, but I have also had some total tyrants who really hurt me as a person. Something needs to be done about this.
• The National Education system needs to be abolished and replaced with state level education system, or better yet a local level education system. 
• Schools need to change.  I learned more from Khan academy in 6 months than I learned in all of high school.  I also learned a lot from Kumon, a private after-school program that teaches math.  Because they treated me as a valued customer, I received the politest treatment ever from an education system.
• Vouchers have worked well in inner city areas where the economics allow for choice in schools.  Washington DC had its voucher system recently stripped of funding, even though they were doing statistically better than the rest of the education system.

[Oniya]

And we need to break the 'those who can't, teach' bullshit. Teachers do a LOT of work, and have to have a unique skillset that has to be cultivated and grown.

Everyone who spouts off with 'those who can't, teach' should be strapped to a chair and forced to listen to Taylor Mali's 'What Teachers Make'.  That said, I think that some systems really are broken.  The little Oni's math class had just about every student working on different objectives at any given time.  They had a goal of so-many by the end of so-much-time, but how do you teach a class when you are essentially running a glorified study hall?  There were apparently very few days that he actually went to the whiteboard to demonstrate a concept.  Most of the time, he sat behind his desk and waited for students to come to him when they had trouble.

[ExisD]

I think the biggest things that need to change for our education system are letting students have more creative input in their classes and using more positive reinforcement in the class room. The most effective teachers that I had in regards to me learning things, in high school I know they were also the ones with the highest performing students on standardized tests, made sure to reward good behavior and gave the students some level of input into the classes.

The biggest personal examples of these ideas that I can think of are  my 4th grade teacher, my 6th grade teacher, high school physics/chemistry teacher, and my law teacher(also in high school). As a note my school was average to slightly below average across the board for my state, which was New York.

My 4th grade teacher taught all of his classes at the rate his students were learning, this very quickly out paced the standard syllabus for even the kids that were bad at math and science, and for those who performed well offered benefits. These benefits were mostly being allowed to come into the class room and play videogames for recess and lunch periods. Th games were something he incorporated into regular classes too, but everyone wanted to beat them and never had the time to in normal class so eventually we had the whole class in there playing these games. All of the videogames were educational games:Math Blaster, Reading Blaster, and the Logical Journey of the Zombeinies.

• 
  For his science classes he taught a bit of theory and then had us perform an experiment and show why the theory was correct. For math he went straight into algebra, making us use a variable instead of the blank box that other classes used. So we had 2*x=7 rather than 2*[ ] = 7. This may not sound like a huge deal, but when algebra came up my classmates from that class found it much easier to understand than many from other classes where other teachers had to explain it by saying replace the blank that was used before with x and it took many people time to wrap their minds around it.
  For english we read books that were suggested by our classmates if he approved of them. This mostly resulted in things like Captain Underpants at first, but we also went into the Chronicles of Narnia, books 1 and 2, and Harry Potter as time progressed. We read them as a group in class alternating who was reading by passing the book around the room, with our teacher getting only the first paragraph, and by halfway through year many were reading more outside of class so one of their book might be picked next.
  I think that this man did more for my developing a love of learning than any other teacher I've had and I'm very thankful to him for that.
  


• Continuing my 6th grade teacher had a very interesting policy about what lessons she would teach. Before each chapter of the text book, no matter what the subject was, she would give a short test. Anyone who got above a 90, this is prior to having actually been taught the material, was allowed to instead go into a section of the classroom with beanbag chairs and do whatever they wanted so long as it didn't disrupt the class. We still needed to do the homework and take the actual test. If everyone got all of the questions from one part correct, this only happened for basic math(ASMD) and fractions(but not fraction multiplication and division), then she would give a single short lesson as a refresher and we would move on to the next topic quickly, even skipping all of the homework for the part everyone did well on. We were fairly far ahead of the other classes because of this and got to look at more advanced material, 7th grade, at the end of the year as a result.
  Incidentally, she did something similar for book report assignments. You had to submit a short report about why you think a particular book was a good choice and automatically got a 100 for the entire length of the reading->book report process if your recommendation got chosen.
  
• For my physics, chemistry, and ap physics teacher the rewards were a fair bit lower, but he also had a much more standardized curriculum that he needed to teach. If you got a 95% or better on a test you were exempt from the review period, which was all of the next class, and he would give you a pass to anywhere in the school that you wanted to go. No one ever abused this so I have no idea what he would do if someone did. Also, if the entire class got a 90% or better then the next class block, we had 1.5 hour classes for high school, would be watching a non-R-rated movie that the class after a small review period where he would only go over questions posed to him and questions a significant number of people got wrong. The movie watching only happened once, but four other students and I were typically going to the library or gym every review session.
  The bigger thing he did though was in ap physics. Rather than assigning labs, we had a lab every other week, we had to give him a lab proposal and if it wasn't good enough he would use one of the standard, boring, labs instead. Because of this policy we got used to making interesting lab ideas, in many cases that were harder than the actual one such as the time we tried to find the acceleration of a ball thrown by a catapult we built based on how far it flew. There were also no right answers because we didn't know exactly what would happen; this aspect of the lab helped me a great deal in college when similar things happened all of the time.
  
• Lastly there was my law teacher, his class focused on the aspects of law that mattered to the average person like what your rights are and how to represent yourself in court. The big thing he did was very simple. At the beginning of each class we would have a discussion about a recent court case or bill. He would call on people randomly to give their case. If it met his criteria, which was mostly something that could be either debated or analyzed, then that person would get 2 extra points on the next exam and anyone who participated in the discussion got 1 point. This got more of us paying attention to the news and at some points our entire lesson was a debate; either planned like abortion and capital punishment, or spur of the moment like gun rights, which became a three way debate quickly, and divorce law.
  

In each of these teacher's classes I found myself much more involved as did many of my friends. Their records also showed the results of their techniques. As an example half of my ap physics c;ass got a 5 on the exam and no one got a 1 or a 2. The next year's class, taught by a different teacher had a single 5 with twice as many students. This alone isn't enough evidence for his abilities, but his classes also scored higher on the regents exams than the other science teachers every year for the 4 years before my class and for mine as well.

Reinforcement has also been proven to be the most reliable method or changing behavior in humans, which I think is something that is commonly taught to teachers now. Given what my friends who are studying teaching say anyway.

[Oniya]

Oh man, don't get me started on book reports!  The little Oni has never written a book report, despite having (and passing!) a reading requirement.  Instead, there's this list of specific books, and they have a point value.  When the student finishes a book, they take a test on it, and I'm 98% sure that it's a multiple guess choice test (just like her math homework/tests are).  If the book isn't on The List, then it doesn't matter - they can't get credit for it.  We lucked out on the Percy Jackson books, but things like the little physics book we read together, or the book on black holes weren't given any weight on her reading grade.

[ExisD]

Oh man, don't get me started on book reports!  The little Oni has never written a book report, despite having (and passing!) a reading requirement.  Instead, there's this list of specific books, and they have a point value.  When the student finishes a book, they take a test on it, and I'm 98% sure that it's a multiple guess choice test (just like her math homework/tests are).  If the book isn't on The List, then it doesn't matter - they can't get credit for it.  We lucked out on the Percy Jackson books, but things like the little physics book we read together, or the book on black holes weren't given any weight on her reading grade.

That's... what, why would someone even put a policy like that in place? I can't think of any use for that besides restricting what children are reading, which isn't a comforting thought at all.

I know that three years after me my sister went through elementary school and all of her math was pushed back a year(multiplication was 4th grade rather than 3rd), but they've hit reading and writing too? Maybe my teachers were able to get away with everything they did because they were all tenured, but I can't see any of the good ones willingly doing something like that.

Suddenly my idea about homeschooling any children I might have until middle school or high school is sounding like a better and better option.

[Oniya]

Well, we read together as a routine (my parents stopped reading to me when they figured out I could do it myself), so we've read a lot of things not on The List.  Our technique is to pick a 'big point' book from The List that we like, read it, and then fill the rest of the quarter with other books.  My guess is that it's faster to computer-score a standardized test than read and mark an essay-style paper.  It doesn't mean I have to like it.

As far as math is concerned, I've picked up a copy of Barron's E-Z Math to work our way through over the summer.  The tests are scanalicious, but the exercises are 'show your work'.

[AndyZ]

Oniya, as a parent (though other viewpoints on this are welcome), I'd love your perspective: are there lots of things which can be picked up like videos and computer programs and all which help teach this stuff?

I realize that getting kids to actually use the stuff is another matter entirely (my ADD-riddled self was always so seriously drained after 8 hours of school that I'd never have used them) but do they even exist in any seriously helpful and useful form?  Or is it all just textbooks and elementary-school videos?

[Oniya]

There are computer programs out there, educational sites (like coolmath.com) - it takes some looking to find them, and of course, I've been primarily looking for elementary to middle-school stuff.  Schoolhouse Rock was instrumental in teaching the little Oni multiplication and grammar, and a little bit of history as well.  You can find most of those on YouTube.

[RubySlippers]

I'm going to take another view of this and the point I want to make is: does Education need to be fixed?

I was looking over our state FCAT scores for reading, writing and mathematics and a typical students needs a 3 on a 1 to 5 scale in these or a average score to pass with the number at grade level and for mathematics a 50. If under that at a 2 you can still pass but need help and a 1 is a failure. Similar requirements are for mathematics on that scale.

In High School the new requirements are higher a bit for obligated classes but that is another matter to me I'll look at just what my point is going to be. How many citizens by the time they reach eighteen are fully illiterate or unable to function in society they have a poor grasp of daily mathematics or cannot understand civics enough to vote which from my experience is pretty low.

And I will note international test scores place us at the mid-range of peer nations that is the top 50 nations we have average performing students this is not the same as being unable in these in fact in one we are over some EU nations and performing well over many other nations.

So what is there to fix our youth in the majority I would say nine out of ten are able to read and write English well enough, can do mathematics well enough, understand civics and other things well enough or knows how to look information up to get along well enough. So isn't the real issue employers demanding a diploma when it may not be necessary, lack of low skilled jobs that pay well enough (classic factory work) and a lack of options to work to get skills (I think the minimum wage is oddly hurting the poor and hard to employ in this case) none of which are related to education proper?

Education can matter if we assume this percent of students are at risk ,say 20%, we can assume they won't graduate so have something else for them like vocational skills training so they have something going for them but that would be secondary to the major issues to me. But I would say this is a matter of going to the persons level and where they are in order to see to their education needs.

[Oniya]

Ruby, you've made it patently obvious that you don't care about anything higher than basic education.  Those of us who do are trying to come up with constructive input here.

As for this bit here:

And I will note international test scores place us at the mid-range of peer nations that is the top 50 nations we have average performing students this is not the same as being unable in these in fact in one we are over some EU nations and performing well over many other nations.

How do you explain the fact that:

U.S. students rank 32nd in mathematics and 17th in reading. (More behind the link on how the researchers did this.)

[Maiz]

To help fix education I would change tenure so that the bad teachers (who don't teach, who are abusive to students, etc) are easily booted, and good teachers have incentive to stay. I would change the curriculum to include nation wide standards, including comprehensive sex ed, and an have a rewrite of the canon that students are exposed to in literature. I would also make sure that history is isn't simply told from the point of view of white men.

I would also change the reaction to students misbehaving a la:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-jascz/empathy-and-understanding_b_1498041.html
which would keep students from dropping out, hopefully, and help their mental/emotional health at the same time.

[Oniya]

I would also make sure that history is isn't simply told from the point of view of white men.

History got much more interesting when I made the jump from 'colonial-centric' (Nothing existed before 1492!) even just to Western-centric (countries existing for thousands of years!).  I can only imagine what a leap to global-centric (is that an oxymoron?) could do.

[Maiz]

History got much more interesting when I made the jump from 'colonial-centric' (Nothing existed before 1492!) even just to Western-centric (countries existing for thousands of years!).  I can only imagine what a leap to global-centric (is that an oxymoron?) could do.

Yes! Also, I think it's good for students of color, and white students as well, to learn history where they aren't being colonized. It's empowering.

[Callie Del Noire]

I'll answer that RubySlippers..

Yes, it needs fixing. When I was in school in the US (prior to my living in the Republic of Ireland) I was written off as 'stupid' by a few teachers. Turns out I had a minor dyslexia problem that impeded my ability to read and work though things. As a result I got bored in class when i'd make mistakes. Add in two classmates who were excellent 'stealth bullies' and I spent most of the 5th grade in a walled off corner by myself because the teacher didn't want me distract. I could see the board but not her talking, and the filling cabinets.. that was it. As a result, needless to say, my 3rd grade experience was less than sterling and I wound up repeating it.

The next year I got tapped for one of the first reading assistance programs the school system started.  I went from having problems with some words.. (I, for example, saw words like 'any' as 'ant' and so forth) to reading on an 7th to 8th grade level very quickly once I was able to find what I was doing wrong. The teacher after school was helpful, listened and told me how to work through my problems.

Importantly I wasn't isolated anymore.  I wasn't punished because of what others did to me. I learned that I wasn't stupid. I learned reading was fun. Within 2 years I was reading Tolkien and Heinlein and history books.  High school and intro college books my folks had for their own interests.

Then I went to Ireland. I was blown away about how LITTLE I had been taught about math in American schools. I spent 2 1/2 years feeling like an idiot. By the time I got back I was able to hold my own but knew that I was behind the curve compared to the peers I had just left.

Of course by the time I got back to the states I was reading on a college level and clocking at about 90%+ retention with something like 800 words a minute.

Let me sum it up like this. In Ireland.. my teacher was a respected member of the community and accorded respect. Granted in the small village of Newtownforbes he taught 3 grade levels (there were maybe 25 of us) but I learned to think for myself and he didn't shirk on putting down trouble makers.

In the US ..I returned to classes that were already topping over 40 people. I watched three excellent teachers implode my first year from budget cuts and burnout. By the time I left my hometown in NC, there were a few classes that had to be held in the auditorium because they didn't have enough qualified teachers in math and civics. They had gotten too 'qualified' and the school couldn't afford anyone over a masters degree. Yet the teachers were REQUIRED to continue educating themselves. This happened again in SC where I went to highschool where the local music teacher/band director had to work music classes for SIX GRADE levels to keep his job because he got a doctorate in music. The school board couldn't afford him for JUST highschool.. he had to teach jr. high and highschool.

We put so little into the system. Bush II inflicted the onus of 'No child left behind' which inflicted standardized testing on us as the SOLE critera for success in some districts. You live and die by your ratings. Kids were getting transferred and kicked out because they brought the standard test scores down.

That isn't what we should be teaching. We should be teaching core skills in math, reading, as well as showing the basics of civics, history and critical thinking. building a base to work from. Technical schools are sneered at by so many now but they teach vital skills and abilities.

[ExisD]

The issue with tenure is that you can't make it easier to kick out the bad teachers without also making it easier for someone to also kick out the good ones. People can't empathize with everyone and enough are vindictive enough that they would try to ruin someone's career just for disagreeing with them or punishing their child that tenure is a very important thing that my friends who are going into teaching wish they had as a protection already. There was an article on ccn about bad parents driving teacher to quit or be fired recently.

I also honestly think we focus on ancient history in general too much and should put much more into current affairs/recent history. Don't eliminate the study of the past completely, but I think we really should focus on teaching children how to be aware of the world they live in. How to find out about what's happening, how to critique your sources, and how to actually get involved in what's happening. I was startled by the number of my peers in college who'd never voted and didn't know how to register to vote.

I also think economics, ethics, and basic law should be required classes for everyone in middle and high school. Being able to manage your money and understand what your government is actually saying are vital skills today. As for why ethics, having different ethical and moral systems explained to people and making them try and think in those systems makes them more able to accept different opinions on issues without reflexive fear and hatred. Though I'll admit my own bias of not believing that many parents are capable of teaching their own child to behave ethically. Even if they could you should have the ability to make your own decisions about what system to follow and deserve to be exposed to as many as possible because of this.

[RubySlippers]

I'll answer that RubySlippers..

Yes, it needs fixing. When I was in school in the US (prior to my living in the Republic of Ireland) I was written off as 'stupid' by a few teachers. Turns out I had a minor dyslexia problem that impeded my ability to read and work though things. As a result I got bored in class when i'd make mistakes. Add in two classmates who were excellent 'stealth bullies' and I spent most of the 5th grade in a walled off corner by myself because the teacher didn't want me distract. I could see the board but not her talking, and the filling cabinets.. that was it. As a result, needless to say, my 3rd grade experience was less than sterling and I wound up repeating it.

The next year I got tapped for one of the first reading assistance programs the school system started.  I went from having problems with some words.. (I, for example, saw words like 'any' as 'ant' and so forth) to reading on an 7th to 8th grade level very quickly once I was able to find what I was doing wrong. The teacher after school was helpful, listened and told me how to work through my problems.

Importantly I wasn't isolated anymore.  I wasn't punished because of what others did to me. I learned that I wasn't stupid. I learned reading was fun. Within 2 years I was reading Tolkien and Heinlein and history books.  High school and intro college books my folks had for their own interests.

Then I went to Ireland. I was blown away about how LITTLE I had been taught about math in American schools. I spent 2 1/2 years feeling like an idiot. By the time I got back I was able to hold my own but knew that I was behind the curve compared to the peers I had just left.

Of course by the time I got back to the states I was reading on a college level and clocking at about 90%+ retention with something like 800 words a minute.

Let me sum it up like this. In Ireland.. my teacher was a respected member of the community and accorded respect. Granted in the small village of Newtownforbes he taught 3 grade levels (there were maybe 25 of us) but I learned to think for myself and he didn't shirk on putting down trouble makers.

In the US ..I returned to classes that were already topping over 40 people. I watched three excellent teachers implode my first year from budget cuts and burnout. By the time I left my hometown in NC, there were a few classes that had to be held in the auditorium because they didn't have enough qualified teachers in math and civics. They had gotten too 'qualified' and the school couldn't afford anyone over a masters degree. Yet the teachers were REQUIRED to continue educating themselves. This happened again in SC where I went to highschool where the local music teacher/band director had to work music classes for SIX GRADE levels to keep his job because he got a doctorate in music. The school board couldn't afford him for JUST highschool.. he had to teach jr. high and highschool.

We put so little into the system. Bush II inflicted the onus of 'No child left behind' which inflicted standardized testing on us as the SOLE critera for success in some districts. You live and die by your ratings. Kids were getting transferred and kicked out because they brought the standard test scores down.

That isn't what we should be teaching. We should be teaching core skills in math, reading, as well as showing the basics of civics, history and critical thinking. building a base to work from. Technical schools are sneered at by so many now but they teach vital skills and abilities.

Actually you proved my point you eventually got the help you needed and I would be wondering where your parent or parents were in the early issues. Plus under NCLB you would have been tested at 3rd grade in your state and then they would have likely looked at what was the issues that is were many Florida students get help with reading disabilities. When I was at an Army run school they tested at 3rd grade, they found out I read and wrote poorly and then found out why and corrected matters so I improved. So I would say overall our system is decent with room for improvement but our society has enough people proficient in core skills to get along on most jobs.

If there are areas needing efforts its in skills education for those not cut out for college and an acceptance a minority number of students will not complete High School normally so they need other options.

I will use the report cited okay in that one we place still among the top 50 nations out of 190 nations, and among those not at the bottom in fact in literacy we are above the average and mathematics below the average but still in the top 50! Many nations are not that successful. I checked our literacy rate in the US is over 97%.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:WorldMapLiteracy2011.png] [url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:WorldMapLiteracy2011.png [/url]

The main issue is can we have workers compete with other nations and that is more than education this is corporate policy, government regulations, things such as the minimum wage and other factors even labor protection laws based on gender or race can hurt employment options. There is no assurance if we trained 1 million people to do high tech manufacturing work that they would have a job and you all know that.

I think education modestly should prepare each person to be as productive an adult as they can, to understand American society and to provide the blocks to the ability of the person to build them up to be productive. That seems to me all we can do. But this means that some will fall through the system no system can be 100% idea as the poster I'm replying to points out by an example.

[Oniya]

I'm just going to let the distribution of the data on that map speak for itself.

[Callie Del Noire]

Actually you proved my point you eventually got the help you needed and I would be wondering where your parent or parents were in the early issues. Plus under NCLB you would have been tested at 3rd grade in your state and then they would have likely looked at what was the issues that is were many Florida students get help with reading disabilities. When I was at an Army run school they tested at 3rd grade, they found out I read and wrote poorly and then found out why and corrected matters so I improved. So I would say overall our system is decent with room for improvement but our society has enough people proficient in core skills to get along on most jobs.

Oh.. I forgot to mention that the program was killed the next year. There were twelve of us in the school who benefited that year.. and when I got back my mom ran into the counselor that ran the program to thank her. We found out that the program was terminated as 'irrelevant'. Last year my mom ran into her again when she went by my home town and mentioned me again. The next program of that like didn't show up till the late Clinton administration. Twenty years later.

As for NCLB, I don't think it is a 'success'. I see too many cases of 'teaching the test' and every program that ISN'T part of the accountability regs has been reduced, parred down, or removed. Art, Music and Language programs have been cut back by 71% of the school systems to put in more time in English, Math and other NCLB 'skills'. 

We're 'teaching the test' not 'training the future'. There is a difference. There is very little local/state level flexibilty to allow for cultural bias on the tests also.

[itsbeenfun2000]

Oh.. I forgot to mention that the program was killed the next year. There were twelve of us in the school who benefited that year.. and when I got back my mom ran into the counselor that ran the program to thank her. We found out that the program was terminated as 'irrelevant'. Last year my mom ran into her again when she went by my home town and mentioned me again. The next program of that like didn't show up till the late Clinton administration. Twenty years later.

As for NCLB, I don't think it is a 'success'. I see too many cases of 'teaching the test' and every program that ISN'T part of the accountability regs has been reduced, parred down, or removed. Art, Music and Language programs have been cut back by 71% of the school systems to put in more time in English, Math and other NCLB 'skills'. 

We're 'teaching the test' not 'training the future'. There is a difference. There is very little local/state level flexibilty to allow for cultural bias on the tests also.

As far as the tests are concerned you are absolutely right we do teach to the test. In Illinois the test is the ACT test the first day. The test was never intended to be a general test it is a college placement exam. The second day is something called Work keys which puts out questions related to the trades in all subjects tested. I would prefer to see different tests in the high school based on what the students goals have been for their future. College, trade school, military.

[RubySlippers]

I never liked high pressure testing in a private school and most are decent ones you have classes and naturally mid-term and then final exams each semester usually in upper level classes term papers or some sort of project. That seems to be enough then the faculty, administrators and parents decide things such as classes and goals based on knowing the student.

I don't see if you have highly trained professionals that is not enough and to trust them to pass students that seems to be what would be the best option.

We did voluntarily take part in the state tests one year because the state asked private schools to do so I know we outdid the public schools, I didn't do that well in mathematics and writing (was two grade levels lower in mathematics and in writing) but in reading I topped off the test at college level (I read a great deal on many topics for years). In history and science I did well but that was from having interests in both. I would say my self-education helped me alot more in fact than school in this area of testing.

They never ask us to test after that I think we shocked the education establishment that we did a better job our school would have ranked in the top 20% of schools if a public school. And we had disabled and learning needs students and they also beat the public schools also.

And before you get ideas it was small class sized many of my classes had 25 students or more, the only ones that didn't was accounting 1 & 2, consumer mathematics and employment skills 1 & 2 (cashiering, office skills in general, use of a computer for work, handling money and the like).

I just think it was better teachers could teach and backed by parents who paid for the education was a built in oversight I as a student was pushed to use this opportunity and they made sure teachers knew they expected us to be taught.

[Trieste]

Having handled class sizes anywhere from about 8 students to over 40 students, I do have to say that class size is not the highest determinant for student learning. Granted, my classes didn't exactly come with tests (other than the tests I gave myself, to see what they had retained from the last class) but the main difficulty I ran into was parental support. I've never had parents try to undermine what I was teaching, but what I did experience was amazement. Parents were amazed that their kids could learn about acid/base reactions and electron movements. It seems like the parents of some of my students just assumed their kids weren't old enough or smart enough. So I think part of it is a misconception that complicated things can't be broken down into grade school sized chunks.

In fact, I think probably my third graders grasped the concept of electrostatics better than some of my college classmates. They had no problem imagining that their hair was made up of tiny particles that rubbed off on a balloon. One of my students told me, "It's like germs, but cooler", which made me think she had the concept well enough for the moment. :)

I cannot count how many times, though, that I had to tell a 'slow' student, "You're not dumb, you just have stuff to learn".

[RubySlippers]

What gets me the most is children have all the power here if they had enough say we are not going to comply, we will come to school and do what we want not causing problems maybe go the library or play baseball or draw or practice an instrument or something else we will do those things. But only attend classes we like. What would the system and parents do you can't force them with violence, you can't lock them into a room or pretty much use any other threat if theydon't care. A teacher lays a hand on a child who is peacefullly resisting its assault. Parents have marginally more options but even there if you ground the child and they decide to leave you can't do much locking them in a room is abusive in most cases criminally so.

If they ever opt to "opt out" of the "game" the education system is going to be in serious trouble.

[AndyZ]

Trieste, I definitely like the idea of teaching things outside the usual speed and would be interested to hear more about your successes there.

Ruby, I'd love to live in your world where a teacher would actually be fired or prosecuted for hurting students.  I've been physically hurt by teachers and it doesn't happen.  Look into unions and tenure and how impossible it is to fire a teacher.

http://www.laweekly.com/2010-02-11/news/lausd-s-dance-of-the-lemons/

http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/02/21/10465939-where-do-problem-teachers-go-las-rubber-room?lite

[Callie Del Noire]

Trieste, I definitely like the idea of teaching things outside the usual speed and would be interested to hear more about your successes there.

Ruby, I'd love to live in your world where a teacher would actually be fired or prosecuted for hurting students.  I've been physically hurt by teachers and it doesn't happen.  Look into unions and tenure and how impossible it is to fire a teacher.

http://www.laweekly.com/2010-02-11/news/lausd-s-dance-of-the-lemons/

http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/02/21/10465939-where-do-problem-teachers-go-las-rubber-room?lite

I agree that there are some serious problems dealing with tenure but it cuts both ways.

I never got a fair shake in one year of school thanks to a teacher who didn't bother to believe me over two students with a history of trouble making at our prior school (I actually lived across the street from the principal of the school and got my mom to get her to give the school a call). As far as I'm concerned the school year of 1978 was a total waste and had it not been for the pilot program into reading and the year of being restricted to my room for 'failing' that grade working on my math skills I'd have never caught up. As it was I had a few 'bumps' in the road later on.. being taught to spell words in the 'English' way rather than the 'American' way got me a few bugs but the math work I spent a year writing out as 'punishment' did more to teach me the multiplication and division tables up to 20 than that bitch who stuck me in the corner rather than moving me out from between two tag team troublemakers. (In a 1 year period.. I filled about a dozen or so multiple subject notebooks.. with multiplication tables. Years later, apparently she tried to do something similar to another student.. one whose father was a lawyer with ties to the board of education and city council. She didn't get away with it with that kid. I wonder how many kids she did it to before someone with a voice that couldn't be ignored)

Tenure and teacher protection are a delicate balance. On one hand you've got teachers like the lovely domineering/lying bitch that destroyed a year (or two) of my life, putting kids in peril or destroying their will to learn, or the seventy plus math substitute who liked putting up notes in one hand and erasing with the other. (Years later I encountered a college professor who did the same.

On the other hand, you got teachers who don't bow to the hide bound puritanical idiots who go after a woman because she's a Jew, teaches drama and civics. (That was in high school, and thanks to their OTHER efforts, we had NO drama classes in school for two decades but I had an excellent civics teacher because the school board refused to fire her. They had to literally run a referendum to kill the drama program.)

[AndyZ]

Wasn't actually going to dwell on the issue of tenure, but okay.

In my experience, whenever we find ourselves in an issue of black and white, the true answer tends to be some form of gray which nobody thought of yet.

We end up with the question of having teachers be fired like in any other business, or having it like now where sexual predators are paid not to work, obvious extremes and significantly distant from each other.

Perhaps someone can offer a sort of compromise or better method of dealing with this situation than has been currently considered?

[Callie Del Noire]

Wasn't actually going to dwell on the issue of tenure, but okay.

In my experience, whenever we find ourselves in an issue of black and white, the true answer tends to be some form of gray which nobody thought of yet.

We end up with the question of having teachers be fired like in any other business, or having it like now where sexual predators are paid not to work, obvious extremes and significantly distant from each other.

Perhaps someone can offer a sort of compromise or better method of dealing with this situation than has been currently considered?

Well the assessment board in your cited articles SEEMS like a better move than tenure, but given the strict partisan attacks on school systems throughout the country I will admit I don't have an idea how to institute a fair and balanced rule set for them. You got folks from both sides demanding teachers and school administrator heads.

I mean you got the religious right demanding on thing while equally radical liberal elements demanding the opposite, I don't see a way to protect students and teachers coming out of things the way they are. 

It would take a wiser man than me when we can't even get folks to agree that we need to return to teaching our children.

[AndyZ]

Okay, I've been putting some thought into this.  We're always going to have people who are more left or more right than others on various issues.  If we leave it up to an assessment board, then it's going to be biased.  As far as I can gather, perhaps the best way is to leave it up to parents, with a caveat: if a large majority of parents want a teacher gone which the assessment board doesn't want gone, we should look into a way to transfer the teacher to another school, and try to make sure that the transfer is accepted before letting go of the teacher.

This means that if the teacher is too far left for a far right community, the school board, Department of Education and all such can look into sending the teacher somewhere which is far left.  It's not a perfect solution, but I think it would be equitable if the teacher was compensated for the move.  Certainly it would be preferable to keeping the teacher somewhere where s/he isn't wanted.

I would prefer a solution where theories are kept as theories, but I don't expect us to reach that point so quickly.  I was often left baffled in my History classes when I'd change semesters and suddenly every President I thought was good was evil and every President I'd been taught was evil was actually great.

Now, if it's not possible to swap the teacher, that's something else entirely.  If nobody wants the teacher because he's been accused of molesting children, that's another issue entirely.  However, letting the teacher go seems preferable to holding him on in a rubber room.  Rubber rooms are just idiotic in my opinion.

[Oniya]

Over the summer, I've been working with the little Oni on her math skills.  Her teacher 'taught to the test', and those tests (as I said earlier) were 'multiple guess'.  It's really struck Mr. Oniya and myself how much of a disservice that was to her, when we see her getting frustrated because the idea of working the problem to the very end hasn't occurred to her.  Example:  Given a set of ten numbers, determine which are prime, and which aren't.  For the composite numbers, write down the prime factorization.

She encounters '49'.  The text has given handy divisibility tests for 2, 3, and 5.  She knows her times tables up to the 12s.  She still only bothered to check 2, 3, and 5, and wrote down that 49 was 'prime'.  Later on, there was another 'divide by 7' number, that she also marked incorrectly as prime.  I fully admit that the final number, 289, was a challenge, but by that point, she should have grasped the idea of trying and discarding numbers.

[AndyZ]

Michelle Apperson, recently awarded the title of "Teacher of the Year" for the Sacramento City Unified School District, has lost her job.

Apperson is one of nearly 400 Sacramento City Unified teachers who received lay-off notices last month due to budget cuts. Neither her nine years at Sutterville Elementary School nor her best-teacher honor could shield her from state law, which carries a "last in, first out" policy, requiring that teachers be laid off by seniority -- starting with the most recently hired.

What the crap is this?  Why would you set up a "last in, first out" policy for cuts?  Is this what tenure has reduced us to?

[OldSchoolGamer]

Our whole educational paradigm needs to be tossed out.  It's a relic of the assembly line Industrial Age.  We now live in the Information Age, with Khan Academy and Wikipedia and Wolfram-Alpha.  We need a new pedagogical model that takes advantage of these resources.  The "everyone sit in nice neat rows and turn to Page 58" is 20th century.

And parents definitely need to get off their asses and get involved in their child's education.  Something as simple as walking your young child home from school and turning the world around them into a learning experience.  There's no substitute for that.  You can't buy it.  You can't legislate it.  All government can do is get in the way of it.

[AndyZ]

No argument with the second paragraph, but I need some clarification on the first.  We certainly need to replace it; what do we replace it with?  What does the 21st century model look like?

[Starlequin]

I don't usually post in threads like this, because I often find I lack sufficient experience to discuss matters on this board with the sort of depth and precision they deserve. But its late, and I'm hyper. So this is what you get.

I would say that a new model would look maybe something like communal homeschooling (and if thats not already a thing somewhere, its cuz I'm making this up as i go, so there). Instead of dragging kids out of bed at ungodly hours and shipping them to what's basically kiddie prison, they get a few more hours sleep and go to school on their time (within reason and consideration for their parental units' schedules, of course). I've read/heard that it takes somewhere around 50-100 hours of tutoring and practice to impart the basics of Readin', 'Ritin' and 'Rithmetic to children (not sure how accurate that is or if age is a factor, but it doesn't sound implausible to me), so it seems to me that the rest of the time students spend in school is wasted on boring curricula and testing materials. Instead, why not open classtimes up to more self-study opportunities and allow students to pursue the topics that really interest them? It could be loosely guided, of course, to ensure at least basic well-rounding; a few required hours in history, sciences and maths, literature, et cetera, (like college credits) but for the most part children could guide their own education. A big plus from this would be kids getting to nurture their interests and natural talents, and instilling a deeper appreciation for the actual learning process. Students with less interest in academia could be placed in part-time job shadowing or apprenticeship type programs. And with such student-guided learning would probably come an increased need for more personalized attention, which would open the door to hiring more new teachers.

[Oniya]

Khan Academy is an online class resource - I remember seeing Trieste mention it, and keep meaning to go back there myself.  Wolfram-Alpha is another educational resource - I remember them from their focus on math (I once browsed their site so heavily, they thought I was a 'bot), but they might offer other courses. 

I think there needs to be a certain amount of 'push', rather than leaving it strictly 'student-driven'.  I'm a little biased, due to the little Oni's decision to try to 'coast' through 5th grade, but parental insistence (and assistance) on getting X amount of learning in can be crucial to getting the 'learning bug' going.  We started out giving the little Oni a written note with what exercises she had to do before getting on the computer for about a week - complete with password-locking the computer.  Yesterday, I had forgotten to leave the note out, and despite having figured out the password, she still got the book, did the next set of exercises, asked me for help, did the work, and then actively listened to my explanation of why two of the problems really couldn't be answered as 'True' or 'False'.

I can envision Internet 'conference classes' set up for some subjects:  Teacher in a central location, kids at home computers, libraries, whatever.  The 'blackboard' would be replaced with a tablet that outputs to a separate frame on the page - no more 'I can't see the booooard!' - while the teacher explains the lesson over Skype.  Questions could be asked over headsets, entered on a form or typed into chat room-style setups.  'Going to the board' could be done with keyboard, mouse, or other input.  Important:  Teachers would still be needed!  I'm not good with the idea of one teacher handling an undefined number of students - I worked tech support in a chatroom with 19 users at a time, and that was hard enough, thank you.  Classroom sizes should be limited to something less than that.  Added benefit:  Lessons could be recorded for review (I'd incorporate something so that the recorded lessons were tied to a given student ID for better teacher compensation - or tie something to the amount of times the recorded lesson was downloaded.)  Oh, and if they'd had things like this in my Biology class, instead of making us suffer from formaldehyde fumes, I'd have been a whole lot more interested and less nauseated.  (Found that site through the little Oni.)

[Trieste]

I think that the 21st century model looks a lot like what intelligent, creative teachers have been doing with their classes. Taking them outside, making things visual and alive instead of just stuff in a book. I was re-watching the television series The Dead Zone recently and was struck by a scene from the first episode. The main character, who was a teacher originally, had his class up in a tree. He was talking about how "from below, it looks like a jumble of leaves, but from up here you can see that every branch and every leaf is exactly where it needs to be, perfectly positioned to catch the sun". (I may have gotten the quote wrong but the gist is there.) He commented later, "They'll never look at a tree the same". That philosophy of teaching - changing your perspective so that you understand the world around you better and you just won't look at something the same again - is the 21st century model of teaching, I feel.

We have the technology to make, essentially, a living classroom. I would love to see that; I would love to see kids' desks turned into virtual dissection tables, for instance. They can do it for med schools, to get around the shortage of cadavers. How neat would it be if you could use a stylus to zoom in on an animation of a frog, learn about its breathing and how it blinks, then zoom in further past the skin so that you could see how the heart works and how the organ systems work. Then when you're done, you zoom out of the animation and the virtual frog hops away unharmed. It would take some of the trauma out of biology, it would remove the need to acquire fresh frogs for every biology class (plus instruments and waste disposal) and you could use the same virtual desktop to learn about economics, geography, history, and so on.

I personally would prefer to see our tax dollars go toward that than drone attacks on a country on the other side of the globe.

[Oniya]

We have the technology to make, essentially, a living classroom. I would love to see that; I would love to see kids' desks turned into virtual dissection tables, for instance. They can do it for med schools, to get around the shortage of cadavers. How neat would it be if you could use a stylus to zoom in on an animation of a frog, learn about its breathing and how it blinks, then zoom in further past the skin so that you could see how the heart works and how the organ systems work. Then when you're done, you zoom out of the animation and the virtual frog hops away unharmed. It would take some of the trauma out of biology, it would remove the need to acquire fresh frogs for every biology class (plus instruments and waste disposal) and you could use the same virtual desktop to learn about economics, geography, history, and so on.

The link I provided goes to a virtual knee surgery.  The site also has brain and heart surgery.  Funny as all get-out when I first saw her clicking around on it.

[AndyZ]

Resurrecting an old thread due to new information.

Apparently there's a school out there actually going for this 21st century method, called Carpe Diem over in Yuma, Arizona.  They use computers in order to repeat and regurgitate lesson plans which can be sped up or slowed down to work at the speed of the student.

I have no idea how accurate this actually is (I don't even live in Arizona) but I'd love some info from parents and the like if anyone knows anything.

[Oniya]

My one question about this would be if there was a system in place to catch 'coasters' and nudge them to the next stage - like, after getting 100% on a given exercise so many times, that particular one is locked out.  I'm still slightly kicking myself for not noticing what the little Oni was pulling last year.  Over the summer, I've gotten her up to introductory algebra with little more than a 'do one page a day' mindset.  And that's including the vacations where her aunts and grandparents let her coast a bit.

[AndyZ]

I don't honestly know.  Here's the link to the site if you want to look into it:  http://www.carpediemschools.com/

If you can let me know the good and the bad from a parent's perspective and if things actually work, I'd love to be informed.

Here's a page I found with various reviews on the place: http://www.greatschools.org/arizona/yuma/2966-Carpe-Diem-E-Learning/

Most of the reviews are great, but from the one star rating from the former student, it seems like they still have a few things to patch up.  Uniforms aren't necessary, and you should definitely make sure that your teachers are trained in the respective subjects, even if you only have one teacher per subject who's fully understanding of the fields.

Please be advised that I don't know any of this stuff firsthand and it may well be wrong.  I'm not trying to mislead people, I'm just going with the information that I have available.

[Oniya]

If it's all done over the Internet, uniforms definitely aren't necessary.  I can understand uniforms in a public/private school, where you want to minimize visual differences in social standing, but even if you assume that everyone is on webcam and can see each other, you're going to see those differences in the backgrounds.  'Nothing in camera range can be disruptive' would be as far as I'd go (no shirts with sayings or pictures, no hats, no rap-star-sized 'bling')  Beyond that, you can conduct/participate in an Internet class in your fuzzy slippers for all I care.

[AndyZ]

On the thing I saw, it was an actual classroom where they had hundreds of computers set up in a cubicle style, and teachers would wander around like managers to check on the students.

The uniform issue would be an entirely separate debate.  I remember a kid from middle school who would show up in a Marlboro shirt all the time and the teachers would make him turn it inside out.  I also get not allowing gang colors.  I'd have gone nuts if I was forced to wear a uniform, though, and I don't want my future kids subjected to it.

[Oniya]

We've got an ultra-strict dress code this year.  I'm not overly thrilled, since it's white, light-blue, and navy - all collared shirts - and the little Oni's wardrobe to this point has been pinks, oranges, etc. with barely a blue in the bunch.

[AndyZ]

Collared shirts are not comfortable.  I only really speak for myself, but if I'm not comfortable, it makes it more difficult for me to pay attention, which means I'm not learning as much as I could be.  I doubt I'm alone on that.

[Lilias]

Uniforms are great for forcing uniformity (duh!). No rich kids showing off their designer wear and poor kids being mocked for having only one or two outfits for school. No headaches for the teachers about what is appropriate school wear and what is not. Just kids focusing on what they do, not what it will do to their clothes.

[Oniya]

*nods*  I get that.  Making the uniforms more comfortable would be a good step, though, as AndyZ says.  If it had been a home-based, computerized, teleconference-type system, however, evidence of different socioeconomic status would be visible through more than just clothes - 'Look, Marty has a big-screen TV in the room behind him' or 'Charlotte's living in a trailer.'

I'm not sure I like the idea of 'teachers as proctors', the way it was described.  I'd like to see similarly-able students grouped together for verbal instruction before being turned loose into their little machine-worlds.

[Trieste]

Uniforms are great for forcing uniformity (duh!). No rich kids showing off their designer wear and poor kids being mocked for having only one or two outfits for school. No headaches for the teachers about what is appropriate school wear and what is not. Just kids focusing on what they do, not what it will do to their clothes.

Nooo, uniforms are great for simplicity of what to wear to school. Even if you are wearing a uniform, you can tell who got their uniform at the nice uniform shop in town and who got theirs at the discount uniform shop in town because the fabric and the dyes are different. The discount kilt doesn't pleat as cleanly. Not to mention that you can tell who has the money to get their uniforms professionally cleaned and who has to wash them at home and then iron the pleats back in.

And even if you have one place giving out the uniforms, there is still a divide. My grandmother went to a school where every single girl was provided, by the school, with their uniforms: blouses, jumpers, skirts. The only thing the girls bought were stockings and shoes. The wealthier girls (this was an all-girls parochial school so I don't know what guys would have done) turned around and had their uniforms tailored.

Don't get me wrong, uniforms provide a lot of benefits. I actually really miss going to a school that had a uniform requirement because it honestly made things so much simpler in the mornings. Get out of bed, open closet, yank something out of the side of the closet where uniform shirts hang... find kilt that I threw to the side after school the day before (eh, I was a teenager), pull 'em both on and go to find my backpack. Boom... done. But it would be nice to see uniforms praised for the benefits they actually confer, rather than some imagined income equality... thing. You can still tell who has money and who doesn't, especially if you're the kind of person that cares about that.

[Lilias]

Maybe over there that's the case. :-) Here, the logo'ed items are identical for all, and the generics are dirt cheap, wherever you buy them. The button-downs are non-iron. The polo shirts are stain-resistant. The trousers and skirts are teflon-treated, for both stain resistance and durability. Perhaps kids that go to prep schools with 300 years of history and fees in the five digits per term are directed to exclusive tailors. Around town, what determines where you buy school clothes is your local supermarket - Sainsbury's, Tesco or Asda.

Uniforms have grown much more comfortable, with a shift away from blazers and ties towards the shirt-jumper combo. I don't think expecting kids to learn to do up buttons and tie shoelaces is too much. I went to school during a time of transition from uniform to non-uniform, and I wouldn't wish the mess that caused to anyone.

[Trieste]

The point being that it doesn't work that way all the time, for everyone, and it's silly to imply that it does. :P

[Lilias]

Nothing ever does, so I'll settle for 'most of the time for most people'. :P

[Oreo]

Speaking of the uniforms, I never had to deal with them. However, I would like to know if they still stereotype the girls with a skirt as the only option? Are they allowed to choose a pants uniform?

[Trieste]

In all of the schools I've attended, there has been an option to wear nice pants. One school only allowed khakis, another school allowed us to wear any kind of non-jeans (within reason, I mean, they couldn't be drawstring velour pants). I honestly always preferred the kilts, though, and many of the other girls that I went to school with did as well.

[Oreo]

Nice to know there is a choice. I was in band and would have hated trying to keep a skirt covering things while playing the French horn. Not to mention I was 98% tomboy.

[Oniya]

Girls are allowed to wear slacks, cargo pants, skirts, skorts, shorts, Capri pants and jumpers with a skirt bottom.  No jeans, sweatpants, warm-up pants, or baggy/saggy pants (even navy ones).