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Part of the problem is no one can agree on the goals of education. Just within this thread, there are multiple references that cloud the lines between training and education, between developing critical thought/creative problem solving and knowledge. And to an extent that's okay, perhaps that discussion and conflict keeps us from veering too far in any one direction. Certainly there's a need to educate kids so they can problem solve, but there's also room to train them how to do simple math, or have a knowledge of history. I would contend we can't sacrifice any one component of "education" (in its braodest definition) for another. The problem is measuring success (and I don't mean measuring for teacher pay or school funding, I mean measuring to assess how we are doing and work to improve. Too many moving parts, but I'd rather we work on it, argue about it, than to accept "the curriculum of 19XX was fine, let's just stick with that forever.
The basics have not changed. Math hasn't changed since 19XX (except for reliance on calculators)....Reading hasn't changed since 19XX....Writing hasn't changed since 19XX....Chemistry...Physics....Biology...etc, etc, etc...
What has changed since 19XX that warrants a complete make over of the education system? There are few changes in science that need to be incorporated into k-12....ditto for math... IMO one of the BIG problems is we are changing areas of education that don't need to change. Kids still need to learn to add, subtract, multiply and divide...to write...to spell...to use proper punctuation...to read a text book....to learn the periodic table....to learn about photosynthesis...to use potential and kinetic energy...algebra...ect, etc, etc.... Tell me what has changed so much in k-12 that we need to abandon the curriculum of 19XX and replace it with something entirely new. Has math changed? Science? Reading? Writing? What's so different now? The only real change is the format. Research is done on line instead of at the library. Reports are typed in a word processor instead of written out by hand and then typed. The only real change I see is we teach a lot less today. Sadly, I only teach about 2/3 of the chemistry I was expected to learn back in 1976 when I took high school chemistry. If you ask me, I think we'd do well to return to how we taught in 19XX.
What is really sad about your post here is the fact that our kids were better educated back in 19XX than they are now. As much as people complained about education in the 1970's it was far superior to what passes for an education today. IMO if you want to improve education, go back to when education worked. THAT should be the starting point. Make improvements from there. Throwing the baby out with the bath water and replacing whole programs every 5 years has to stop. You will never improve education this way.
Last edited by Ivorytickler; 07-17-2014 at 01:20 PM..
Yeah, the original poster truly has no idea about John Dewey or the educational progressives. What he is doing is making baseless accusations and slander (libel, technically).
Completely bogus.
If Dewey were in charge today, things would be drastically, drastically different. And the goal for every child would be empowerment of the mind and spirit.
A whole facet of progressive education is based on QUESTIONING assumptions and even the foundations of society and education. Critical thinking is a MAJOR theme in progressive education. Dewey saw education as a means for social consciousness and transformation through individual consciousness and transformation. OP really couldn't be any more wrong here about Dewey and the ed progressives.
Quote:
Originally Posted by NLDad
Part of the problem is no one can agree on the goals of education. Just within this thread, there are multiple references that cloud the lines between training and education, between developing critical thought/creative problem solving and knowledge. And to an extent that's okay, perhaps that discussion and conflict keeps us from veering too far in any one direction. Certainly there's a need to educate kids so they can problem solve, but there's also room to train them how to do simple math, or have a knowledge of history. I would contend we can't sacrifice any one component of "education" (in its braodest definition) for another. The problem is measuring success (and I don't mean measuring for teacher pay or school funding, I mean measuring to assess how we are doing and work to improve. Too many moving parts, but I'd rather we work on it, argue about it, than to accept "the curriculum of 19XX was fine, let's just stick with that forever.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ivorytickler
The basics have not changed. Math hasn't changed since 19XX (except for reliance on calculators)....Reading hasn't changed since 19XX....Writing hasn't changed since 19XX....Chemistry...Physics....Biology...etc, etc, etc...
What has changed since 19XX that warrants a complete make over of the education system? There are few changes in science that need to be incorporated into k-12....ditto for math... IMO one of the BIG problems is we are changing areas of education that don't need to change. Kids still need to learn to add, subtract, multiply and divide...to write...to spell...to use proper punctuation...to read a text book....to learn the periodic table....to learn about photosynthesis...to use potential and kinetic energy...algebra...ect, etc, etc.... Tell me what has changed so much in k-12 that we need to abandon the curriculum of 19XX and replace it with something entirely new. Has math changed? Science? Reading? Writing? What's so different now? The only real change is the format. Research is done on line instead of at the library. Reports are typed in a word processor instead of written out by hand and then typed. The only real change I see is we teach a lot less today. Sadly, I only teach about 2/3 of the chemistry I was expected to learn back in 1976 when I took high school chemistry. If you ask me, I think we'd do well to return to how we taught in 19XX.
What is really sad about your post here is the fact that our kids were better educated back in 19XX than they are now. As much as people complained about education in the 1970's it was far superior to what passes for an education today. IMO if you want to improve education, go back to when education worked. THAT should be the starting point. Make improvements from there. Throwing the baby out with the bath water and replacing whole programs every 5 years has to stop. You will never improve education this way.
I agree with most of what all three posters have stated. There is no agreement on the goals of education. As Ivory states, "What has changed since 19XX that warrants a complete make over of the education system?" You could go back 100 years and see that most of the same subjects are taught. chiMT brings up an interesting point in regard to critical thinking. It is obviously an important objective but is it possible to teach critical thinking to all students?
I tend to agree with Ivory that "education in the 1970's it was far superior to what passes for an education today." Anyone's opinion on this is going to be affected by the teachers they had. I had a combination of some really good and some really bad teachers. Many of my teachers, especially in junior high expected and demanded more. When I think back, some of my junior high teachers would have started teaching in the mid-1930s. They expected you to read the textbook for homework and they called on you in class and expected you to know the answer. We didn't have study guides. That would have been too much work for the teacher since any written materials required a stencil and mimeograph machine.
What I have personally witnessed as the biggest difference since the 1970s is reading ability, basic arithmetic skills and writing ability have all declined.
So why haven't we seen improvements in education? The introduction of technology in the education process should have improved education since the 1970s. Information that would have required a trip to the library and searching through books and journals is now at our fingertips. Why hasn't this translated into at least modest gains in education?
I don't think there is a conspiracy in K-12 education. The issue goes back to what are the goals of education or do we have the right goals in education. This country decided that we need to improve education and it was determined we needed standardized to tests to show that we were meeting that goal. That wasn't good enough and it was determined that K-12 education should prepare every child for college. As someone stated in this thread, a bachelors degree is the new high school diploma and soon you will need a masters degree to find a job.
I went to half day kindergarten but many kids at that time did not go to kindergarten. Now we are hearing that pre-kindergarten is necessary in addition to full day kindergarten where kids are learning math and writing in journals, even though they haven't been taught to write. So instead of 12 years of school that qualified you for a decent middle class job in the 1950s, you now need a year of pre-kindergarten, 13 years of K-12, four or more years to get an undergraduate degree and a couple years of graduate school.
Does this education make the United States more competitive in the global economy or is this just job creation? At some point we have to start thinking about education efficiency. Can this country afford all of these years of education or is there a better way? Should everyone be taught the same subjects and if so, for how many years? Is the K-12 grade concept antiquated?
I don't have the answers. All that I know is the students should become proficient in reading, writing and arithmetic, with some science and social studies thrown in. Beyond that, I think it depends on the student and their motivation to learn. We are never going to force every student to become proficient in algebra, geometry, biology and chemistry.
For those of you that have kids that have recently gone through the school system, did you go through the same school system as them? My kids went to schools in a different state than my husband and I and took much more rigorous classes than I did. I think some things that I learned like cursive and how to diagram a sentence were harder but I learned more European history from them when they were doing AP Euro than I learned. I think we just happen to live in a more affluent district too and there are fairly high expectations. I think you can get a very different education depending on where you live in our country.
I agree with most of what all three posters have stated. There is no agreement on the goals of education. As Ivory states, "What has changed since 19XX that warrants a complete make over of the education system?" You could go back 100 years and see that most of the same subjects are taught. chiMT brings up an interesting point in regard to critical thinking. It is obviously an important objective but is it possible to teach critical thinking to all students?
I tend to agree with Ivory that "education in the 1970's it was far superior to what passes for an education today." Anyone's opinion on this is going to be affected by the teachers they had. I had a combination of some really good and some really bad teachers. Many of my teachers, especially in junior high expected and demanded more. When I think back, some of my junior high teachers would have started teaching in the mid-1930s. They expected you to read the textbook for homework and they called on you in class and expected you to know the answer. We didn't have study guides. That would have been too much work for the teacher since any written materials required a stencil and mimeograph machine.
What I have personally witnessed as the biggest difference since the 1970s is reading ability, basic arithmetic skills and writing ability have all declined.
So why haven't we seen improvements in education? The introduction of technology in the education process should have improved education since the 1970s. Information that would have required a trip to the library and searching through books and journals is now at our fingertips. Why hasn't this translated into at least modest gains in education?
I don't think there is a conspiracy in K-12 education. The issue goes back to what are the goals of education or do we have the right goals in education. This country decided that we need to improve education and it was determined we needed standardized to tests to show that we were meeting that goal. That wasn't good enough and it was determined that K-12 education should prepare every child for college. As someone stated in this thread, a bachelors degree is the new high school diploma and soon you will need a masters degree to find a job.
I went to half day kindergarten but many kids at that time did not go to kindergarten. Now we are hearing that pre-kindergarten is necessary in addition to full day kindergarten where kids are learning math and writing in journals, even though they haven't been taught to write. So instead of 12 years of school that qualified you for a decent middle class job in the 1950s, you now need a year of pre-kindergarten, 13 years of K-12, four or more years to get an undergraduate degree and a couple years of graduate school.
Does this education make the United States more competitive in the global economy or is this just job creation? At some point we have to start thinking about education efficiency. Can this country afford all of these years of education or is there a better way? Should everyone be taught the same subjects and if so, for how many years? Is the K-12 grade concept antiquated?
I don't have the answers. All that I know is the students should become proficient in reading, writing and arithmetic, with some science and social studies thrown in. Beyond that, I think it depends on the student and their motivation to learn. We are never going to force every student to become proficient in algebra, geometry, biology and chemistry.
The problem with trying to teach critical thinking is you can't think critically about that which is not in your head to think about. You can't put the critical thinking horse before the knowledge cart and that's what we're trying to do. How do you teach kids to think when they're been taught to google answers? Google cannot think for you and you can't think about what's on the internet that isn't in your head to think about.
I teach chemistry and I teach a LOT of factual stuff long before we get to the thinking part. I will only have a few students who start making the connections before the end of the year. There is a push to teach less because someone out there believes that learning less will result in thinking more. IMO, it will only give you less to think about. I'll lose this battle and I know it. The NGSS will cut out about 1/3 of my material including some of the stuff where I see connections being made. And then they'll wonder why I didn't teach my kids to think.
I find myself asking how did anyone learn to think before? Take someone like Thomas Edison who cut his inventing teeth in a patent office reviewing other people's inventions. Where would we be if we'd decided to cut that out and teach him to think critically instead? I mean looking at other people's patents? Studying what OTHER people did instead of inventing your own knowledge? How useful could that possibly be?
I know in my own education I had to learn a lot of what other people did before I could even begin to start putting it together in different ways. There's a lot of WHAT to learn before you get to WHY and start thinking critically. We're trying to cut the what (the 19XX curriculum) out and put the why cart in front of the what horse. Before you can think critically you must have something in your head to think critically about.
Education in this country is neither giving us an edge or creating jobs....unless you mean jobs in education. Look at how many online universities have cropped up. We have decided that education is the great equalizer when it's not. In our push to have education give everyone the same leg up, we are pulling a lot of bright minds down. To be honest what's going on in education reminds me of socialism. Make everyone the same. Only you can't.
The decline in public education in America began after World War I, and has continued ever since by design.
Progressives like John Dewey placed less emphasis on facts, knowledge, and scholarship, and believed that any child knowing more than another produces low self esteem in the less knowledgeable.
Department of Education (The Feds), established in '88 or thereabouts, should be closed. That will leave 51 Departments of Education including Washington DC. And NONE of them will be able to blame the federal government.
We went to the moon without the Dep of Ed, maybe we can succeed again.
The problem with trying to teach critical thinking is you can't think critically about that which is not in your head to think about. You can't put the critical thinking horse before the knowledge cart and that's what we're trying to do. How do you teach kids to think when they're been taught to google answers? Google cannot think for you and you can't think about what's on the internet that isn't in your head to think about.
I teach chemistry and I teach a LOT of factual stuff long before we get to the thinking part. I will only have a few students who start making the connections before the end of the year. There is a push to teach less because someone out there believes that learning less will result in thinking more. IMO, it will only give you less to think about. I'll lose this battle and I know it. The NGSS will cut out about 1/3 of my material including some of the stuff where I see connections being made. And then they'll wonder why I didn't teach my kids to think.
I find myself asking how did anyone learn to think before? Take someone like Thomas Edison who cut his inventing teeth in a patent office reviewing other people's inventions. Where would we be if we'd decided to cut that out and teach him to think critically instead? I mean looking at other people's patents? Studying what OTHER people did instead of inventing your own knowledge? How useful could that possibly be?
I know in my own education I had to learn a lot of what other people did before I could even begin to start putting it together in different ways. There's a lot of WHAT to learn before you get to WHY and start thinking critically. We're trying to cut the what (the 19XX curriculum) out and put the why cart in front of the what horse. Before you can think critically you must have something in your head to think critically about.
Education in this country is neither giving us an edge or creating jobs....unless you mean jobs in education. Look at how many online universities have cropped up. We have decided that education is the great equalizer when it's not. In our push to have education give everyone the same leg up, we are pulling a lot of bright minds down. To be honest what's going on in education reminds me of socialism. Make everyone the same. Only you can't.
I agree with everything you're saying. Critical thinking is wishful thinking in a world where textbooks aren't read, teachers aren't supposed to lecture for more than 10 minutes, every class is supposed to include some type of activity and teachers are supposed to have examples of students' work hanging on the walls.
I know the type of class where I learn the most. It is a class where I must read to prepare for each class because there may be a quiz and it will be discussed in class, and you will receive a grade for class participation.
The classes where I learn the least are ones where the instructor is dictating notes or presenting them on PowerPoint and there is little or no discussion; or classes that are all group projects or class activities.
I think this country needs to look at education from a strategic economic perspective. More and more years of education will improve anything in this country. We need to do a better job of providing the best possible education the the brightest and the most motivated. I'm not a fan of the gifted programs. I think it is simply a matter of going back to tracking, where you can use aides and smaller classes with students who are struggling; and move at a faster pace in the more advanced classes.
The bigger question is the problem with low motivation among the majority of students. It starts with teacher expectations, teachers not teaching for the entire class period, teachers not expecting students to be prepared for class, the lack of discipline in many schools and classrooms, and the lack of reading the students do in K-12.
Well, you're wrong about Dewy. He did not want critical thinkers. What the progressives want is a compliant citizenry, who won't question their agenda, but accept it.
Is this a joke? The last time I checked the people sending their kids to whack job private schools to avoid learning basic science and history are about as right wing as you can get
Yes they get educated..........but the smart children have to sit back and watch the ones who crawl around and can't count so they catch up. That is the BS that is destroying our education system. Let the smart kids fly.............let the dummis crawl. Pretty simple stuff unless your a liberal who think everything needs to be fair.
Where do you people come up with this ridiculous stereotypes of liberals? Most liberals I know are quite competitive and have no problem with gifted programs and the like.
Part of the problem is no one can agree on the goals of education. Just within this thread, there are multiple references that cloud the lines between training and education, between developing critical thought/creative problem solving and knowledge. And to an extent that's okay, perhaps that discussion and conflict keeps us from veering too far in any one direction. Certainly there's a need to educate kids so they can problem solve, but there's also room to train them how to do simple math, or have a knowledge of history. I would contend we can't sacrifice any one component of "education" (in its braodest definition) for another. The problem is measuring success (and I don't mean measuring for teacher pay or school funding, I mean measuring to assess how we are doing and work to improve. Too many moving parts, but I'd rather we work on it, argue about it, than to accept "the curriculum of 19XX was fine, let's just stick with that forever.
This is an excellent post. A lot of people seem to think that the ONLY purpose of education is to enable someone to get a good job. They ignore the fact that democracy can not function without an educated citizenry
The problem with trying to teach critical thinking is you can't think critically about that which is not in your head to think about. You can't put the critical thinking horse before the knowledge cart and that's what we're trying to do. How do you teach kids to think when they're been taught to google answers? Google cannot think for you and you can't think about what's on the internet that isn't in your head to think about.
I teach chemistry and I teach a LOT of factual stuff long before we get to the thinking part. I will only have a few students who start making the connections before the end of the year. There is a push to teach less because someone out there believes that learning less will result in thinking more. IMO, it will only give you less to think about. I'll lose this battle and I know it. The NGSS will cut out about 1/3 of my material including some of the stuff where I see connections being made. And then they'll wonder why I didn't teach my kids to think.
I find myself asking how did anyone learn to think before? Take someone like Thomas Edison who cut his inventing teeth in a patent office reviewing other people's inventions. Where would we be if we'd decided to cut that out and teach him to think critically instead? I mean looking at other people's patents? Studying what OTHER people did instead of inventing your own knowledge? How useful could that possibly be?
I know in my own education I had to learn a lot of what other people did before I could even begin to start putting it together in different ways. There's a lot of WHAT to learn before you get to WHY and start thinking critically. We're trying to cut the what (the 19XX curriculum) out and put the why cart in front of the what horse. Before you can think critically you must have something in your head to think critically about.
Education in this country is neither giving us an edge or creating jobs....unless you mean jobs in education. Look at how many online universities have cropped up. We have decided that education is the great equalizer when it's not. In our push to have education give everyone the same leg up, we are pulling a lot of bright minds down. To be honest what's going on in education reminds me of socialism. Make everyone the same. Only you can't.
Do you even know what socialism is? It literally has NOTHING to do with what you are talking about. Why do you and 95% of people who use the word "socialism" have no idea what it actually means?
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