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Because parents should have taught "life" skills? Schools only teach "material". Skills have to be learned else where...
I blame parents more than the teachers for any failures of the education system. A kid is stuck with the parents for 18+ years, the teacher only has a student for 8 months unless you get the same teacher the next year, then 16 months.
Honestly I can't think of a single life skill I learned by graduating HS and i grew up in NY NJ MD IL Nothing applicable like a basic finance course, basic course on nutrition. It's no wonder our most lucrative industries have to compete with people from the third world like India routinely. Our education system is HORRIBLE. It doesn't engender any practical or theoretical skills, critical thinking, rhetoric.z
I can't htink of how much better our country would be off we if taught hard or technical skills in high school and put as much emphasis on them as the humanities.
It is the parents job to teach "life skills". If your parents failed you then complain to them.
BTW, most schools do teach finance/ money skills as part of math. It starts as early as kindergarten and first grade when you learned coins and their values. Almost every grade has some type of age appropriate money unit. Where were you each year when these skills were taught?
Nutrition is also taught though out the grades as part of the science and health curriculum. Again, where were you when these skills were taught? I recently subbed in first grade class and their science lesson was on eating healthy foods and having a well balanced diet. This is covered at other grade levels as well.
Critical thinking is another skill that is taught, at an age appropriate level starting in kindergarten and building in complexity as the students get older. Where were you each year when these skills were taught?
Most high schools do have family living (home economics) classes where you can learn cooking skills and industrial arts classes such as woodworking and construction. Most HSs also have a business department where business related skills are taught.
All the high schools in my area do have a class on personal finance, where students can learn about how to use a checkbook, how to buy a car, insurance, loans, money management, etc. Frankly, very few students take the class because most students learn those skills at home from their parents.
Where were you each year when these electives were offered in high school?
Stop complaining about the education system in America and take some personal responsibility for your choices and actions.
Last edited by germaine2626; 04-26-2015 at 07:22 AM..
Our schools are not rigorous enough anymore. Today, we teach to the dumbest students in order to make the schools look better by not having a lower graduation rate. It leaves the brighter students bored, which leads to apathy. Kids today are generally very lazy and lack the ability to think on their own because they are spoon fed.
The reason this all happens is because parents will not let the schools be more rigorous. As soon as little Johnny starts failing a class, the teacher and school are blamed. Yet the problem is likely that little Johnny is not doing any work and playing with his cell phone when he should be studying. So the school in turn makes the curriculum easier so anyone with a pulse can graduate. It gets worst every year.
The only solution I see is to bring rigor back into schools and don't graduate anyone that doesn't deserve it. Sure, graduation rates my drop form 95% to 75%, but too bad. Over a few years when kids see they actually have to work to pass, things will change for the better.
I once fostered a kid who could not tell me who was on the one dollar bill.
Students who were applying for work at the university could not tell me what local municipality they lived in for tax purposes. They handed me their checkbook and asked whether it was a checking or savings account so they could fill out their direct deposit form.
BTW, most schools do teach finance/ money skills as part of math. It starts as early as kindergarten and first grade when you learned coins and their values. Almost every grade has some type of age appropriate money unit. Where were you each year when these skills were taught?
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While they may teach really basic coins and values, many do not teach personal finance such as different forms of bank accounts. Interest rates. Inflation. How to balance a check book. Loans and payments. Never mind higher order stuff, but just the basics are not taught at many schools.
Quote:
Originally Posted by germaine2626
Nutrition is also taught though out the grades as part of the science and health curriculum. Again, where were you when these skills were taught? I recently subbed in first grade class and their science lesson was on eating healthy foods and having a well balanced diet. This is covered at other grade levels as well.
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Maybe at a basic level in 5th grade health, but seldom after that. There are way too many other mandatory subjects they have to get in for this to come up.
Quote:
Originally Posted by germaine2626
Critical thinking is another skill that is taught, at an age appropriate level starting in kindergarten and building in complexity as the students get older. Where were you each year when these skills were taught?
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Does any high school teach critical thinking? Mostly they seem to teach the opposite: Sit down, shut up, do as you're told. Don't think. Don't ask questions. Most schools absolutely do not want or support critical thinking but drill in compliant drones.
Quote:
Originally Posted by germaine2626
Most high schools do have family living (home economics) classes where you can learn cooking skills and industrial arts classes such as woodworking and construction. Most HSs also have a business department where business related skills are taught.
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Oh how I wish that was true. But many/most high schools have dropped those classes. I learned more valuable skills in shop that most of my other classes, but there are few shops classes in high school any more.
Quote:
Originally Posted by germaine2626
All the high schools in my area do have a class on personal finance, where students can learn about how to use a checkbook, how to buy a car, insurance, loans, money management, etc. Frankly, very few students take the class because most students learn those skills at home from their parents.
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Lucky you. But that does not mean schools around the country do the same thing.
Quote:
Originally Posted by germaine2626
Where were you each year when these electives were offered in high school?
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Well, assuming they were even available, if they were like my kids, they were taking the other required classes to graduate. There are only so many hours in a day. Does a kid really need four years of HS English? What if we cut just one year and focused English class more on business English that is used every day rather than diagraming sentences and English theory? Replace that with a semester of shop and a semester of home ec. What if we gave up one semester of foreign language and taught personal finance? What would happen is we would not lower people's grasp of English, nor exposure to foreign language and culture one bit, but would add a lot of critical skills.
Honestly I can't think of a single life skill I learned by graduating HS and i grew up in NY NJ MD IL Nothing applicable like a basic finance course, basic course on nutrition. It's no wonder our most lucrative industries have to compete with people from the third world like India routinely. Our education system is HORRIBLE. It doesn't engender any practical or theoretical skills, critical thinking, rhetoric.z
I can't htink of how much better our country would be off we if taught hard or technical skills in high school and put as much emphasis on them as the humanities.
The core of the majority of America's educational problems stem from Federal government and politicians interference. Politicians can't fight a war and they can't educated our kids successfully. The first step in improving our educational system is to remove the Department of Education from the federal rat's nest and follow the common sense approaches that have made many independent schools successful, despite liberal whining......
Because corporations own America and corporations do not want people to think for themselves.
Thank you. This post is all that needs to be said. The system is designed for those at the top to continue to line their pockets. It is not designed to teach critical thinking skills, life skills, or anything else people in this thread are talking about.
"While they may teach really basic coins and values, many do not teach personal finance such as different forms of bank accounts. Interest rates. Inflation. How to balance a check book. Loans and payments. Never mind higher order stuff, but just the basics are not taught at many schools."
That's because most of that is automatic. Balancing a checkbook is simple due to online banking. Loans and payments are pretty much what can be found with excel. If you actually think much of this is performed by hand it hasn't since the 1990's. When I took accounting in 96/97 as a junior in high school we were the last class to use paper journal entries. I overheard and actually saw a teacher crying while being consoled by another in that we were going to computers
"Most schools absolutely do not want or support critical thinking but drill in compliant drones."
Critical thinking is easy because it is often after the fact. Now creative or lateral thinking might help.
It isn't so much schools but rather the parents and frankly these days if you can google something and prove someone wrong why bother using them? It's not people vs people it's the computer. These days you have to justify yourself against software.
Personally I've used a fair amount of online programs to the point where I can get services provided for free that would have been a part time job 20 years ago. I get unadvertised jobs listings for the New England region, I have a spreadsheet of free movies on youtube, I have messages sent out constantly on new openings from companies I like, notification of the cheapest gas prices within ten miles etc. Google recently made Google Maps Pro free. Pretty soon we'll be able to tell more specifics of how much shade on a lawn occurs in August in a field in a given city, pothole predictions, snowfall predictions, solar predictions and so forth. Knowing now to gather and interpret information is key.
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