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This brings us to the question "What can we do to get students to have a vested interest in their own educations?"
We have to allow students to choose their own educational path and stop insisting that every single child needs a high school education that leads to college acceptance. Everyone needs some exposure to chemistry, but not every child needs to take honors chemistry.
Back in the stone age when I went to high school we had 3 different levels of chemistry, physics and biology. Basic, Regents, and Honors. Both Regents and Honors would prepare students for college. However, for those who just needed basic science there was a class for that. If you did well in Regents or Honors you could take AP science as a senior. The school offered biology, chemistry and physics.
Students who graduated with a local (non Regents) diploma took many of the same subjects as college bound students but were not held to the same standards as Regents students. They were well prepared to be productive citizens, but not college graduates.
Once we insisted that everyone take higher level classes we had to dumb down the higher level classes so that those who did not belong there could pass. You have to do that. However, it make school drudgery for those who are capable of higher level learning.
It may be difficult to fire an employee but you can write them up and build a case for firing them. You can't do that with students.
You also can't dock their pay because there aren't paid to be there.
While some employees may be lazy, they have some, personal, reason for being at work that you can play to beit a promise of a better position or promotion or just avoiding having their pay docked. There's nothing like this in teaching. There are grades but they only work with students who care about grades. For those who don't, there's no pay to dock or promise of a better position or promotion.
This is the problem with the attitude that if we make it relevent kids will WANT to learn. What we teach often isn't relevent for years to come or it's in preparation for that which is relevent.
Or it's something that will NEVER be relevent....most kids know this...I don't think it's about relevancy, as much as it is about complete lack of stimulation, and absolute boredom...Here...the teachers idea of PE is making the kids all jog around a couple of blocks...what a waste of their time....I think that if lessons were taught in an interesting, fun way...whether the lesson is relevant or not...the kids would do well.
This brings us to the question "What can we do to get students to have a vested interest in their own educations?"
Not much, because lets face it - even kids that know they're going to go nowhere in life without graduating high school don't care. I know a few that dropped out or failed out, have menial labor jobs and are pretty much on a dead end street, that simply don't care or have the motivation to better themselves. Of course, one or two tend to complain because others have it better too, and don't seem to understand why. I blame this on a lack of common sense and home education.
Unfortunately, the majority of the kids that fail, that I see through my wife, come from homes where the parents simply don't care either. They're content to let their kids do their own thing and perpetuate the cycle.
He's got the handle on it. And you can't make students "want to learn" in a society where learning isn't valued and having an opinion is the height of wisdom (at all levels of our society.) So forget that approach.
A few unusually bright and mature young people will manage to become educated adults despite everything, as will a small amount of young people from families who teach them values contrary to those of the society at large - but in a society where education, intelligence and thought are devalued most will live and die in a state of living brain rot and will raise children like themselves.
The U.S. is quickly evolving into the society of Huxley's Brave New World, and it may just end up being the successful model for all post-industrial societies, at least for awhile.
Or it's something that will NEVER be relevent....most kids know this...I don't think it's about relevancy, as much as it is about complete lack of stimulation, and absolute boredom...Here...the teachers idea of PE is making the kids all jog around a couple of blocks...what a waste of their time....I think that if lessons were taught in an interesting, fun way...whether the lesson is relevant or not...the kids would do well.
Indeed...when I was in high school, I had a couple classes my junior and senior year that bored me to death. I had US/VA History my junior year, 1st period, at 7:20am. I would walk in, put my coffee down, put my head on the desk and not wake up until the bell rang. P*ssed the teacher off some kind of fierce too. But guess what? I passed the class with an A and got an automatic A on the final exam because I passed advanced on the state test. I love history, I read the textbook cover to cover within the first week or so of school. The teacher called home twice because I was sleeping. The first time I got a lecture from my parents. The second time, my parents told her that maybe, possibly, she needed to make the class more interesting and then I'd stay awake. Now,when I took US/VA Govt my senior year, that class was fun - the teacher kept us active and engaged. The only time I slept in that class was during movies, and the teacher was totally cool with it. Might have something to do with the fact that I fell asleep on the first day and he kicked the bottom of my desk hard enough to scare the hell out of me. I found out then that he was also the head football coach! I still maintain he was one of the best teachers I had. College was pretty much the same, the only class that bored me to tears was psychology...I pretty much just skipped most of the class and scraped by. My economics teacher was great though, especially for a subject most people don't need. I actively enjoyed his class and have used a few things I learned.
This brings us to the question "What can we do to get students to have a vested interest in their own educations?"
Teach them the value of a dollar. Begin this when they are five.
Drill into them that they will someday have to support themselves. Make sure they know that being an adult means they will have to know certain things to make their way in the world and one of the places they learn those things is in school.
Child: "I don't wanna go to school. It's boring. "
Parent: "Too bad. I don't wanna have you in my basement when you're 37."
Teach them the value of a dollar. Begin this when they are five.
Drill into them that they will someday have to support themselves. Make sure they know that being an adult means they will have to know certain things to make their way in the world and one of the places they learn those things is in school.
Child: "I don't wanna go to school. It's boring. "
Parent: "Too bad. I don't wanna have you in my basement when you're 37."
Motivating students with the consequences of negative outcomes many, no, 32 years in the future...
The adults in our society can barely reason out consequences a few years in the future.
Glad to read this as coming from the parent though. There I agree: love of knowledge comes from the home.
Last edited by robabeatle; 07-11-2012 at 02:43 PM..
Reason: removed snarky-ness
Motivating students with the consequences of negative outcomes many, no, 32 years in the future...
The adults in our society can barely reason out consequences a few years in the future.
Glad to read this as coming from the parent though. There I agree: love of knowledge comes from the home.
I'm starting to think more and more highly of the dad who took his son's car away every time he got less than an 80% on an assignment this past year. Good dad!! He created consequences in the here and now.
Maybe we should tie things like getting a drivers license to passing classes in school.
I'm starting to think more and more highly of the dad who took his son's car away every time he got less than an 80% on an assignment this past year. Good dad!! He created consequences in the here and now.
Nope.
That doesn't do anything to teach the kid that someday Dad is not going to be there and Junior is going to have to be responsible for his own car payment when he's an adult.
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You also can't dock their pay because there aren't paid to be there.
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