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Could You Modify It ‘To Stop Students From Becoming This Advanced?’

cato-at-liberty.org

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Re: Could You Modify It ‘To Stop Students From Becoming This Advanced?’

#81

Post by niels_olson »

fvryan wrote: post #32
dodo53 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would be very interested if you could find a link (had brief unsuccessful look myself)

http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/07/ff_khan/all/1 the very end is about a proposed private school "For his part, Khan says he’s now considering starting his own private school, as a way to see just how much you could wrap learning around Khan Academy. His ideas are intriguing: Among other things, his school wouldn’t divide kids by age; teenagers would mix in with kindergartners. “I have no research to back this up,…

> younger kids act more mature around older kids, and older kids act more mature around younger kids.

We lived in a fantastic little neighborhood, Perry Circle, in Annapolis where this was routinely observed. It very much nailed the first iteration of Alexander's Pattern Language: 10 buildings, 6 apartments in 3 stories, plus attics and below-ground garages, arranged around a central circle. Those parents who stayed home would congregate on the porches and benches and the kids of all ages would play together very constructively.

I really miss living there. It's what cul-de-sac neighborhoods could have been.

http://goo.gl/e3MNM

Re: Could You Modify It ‘To Stop Students From Becoming This Advanced?’

#82

Post by jshen »

grandalf wrote: post #55
_delirium wrote: post #3

I suppose it's a Cato blog post, but I was hoping for a more interesting discussion than just a random call for private education, with a market-will-solve it assertion. People learning at different paces and on their own is a fairly interesting problem highlighted here, but I think it's wishful thinking to claim that the perfect answer is already known. It's not entirely clear to me that private schools would cater…

You seem to be picturing "ACME Education" creating schools in the model of factories under some scary privatization scheme. In fact, the current "public" model of centralized control, standardized curriculum, and cookie-cutter learning objectives is based on an antiquated understanding of human development, social systems, and motivation. In fact, by forcing a child to endure hours of boredom and conformity it prepar…

Private schools will lead to a marketing driven education system that preys on peoples ignorance.

Here's a simple thought experiment. Look at all the education systems around the world, and ask if the ones with the best results are private or public.

Re: Could You Modify It ‘To Stop Students From Becoming This Advanced?’

#83

Post by carpdiem »

code_duck wrote: post #42

I spent some time with a 6 year old, who was my girlfriend's nephew. I noticed that he spoke well and was very sharp, but wasn't able to read. I suggested that we should read some things and he should learn to read, but no - his mother said that he was going to learn to read in 1st grade, with the other kids. Starting him earlier than that, she said, would stunt his social performance because he would be so far ahead…

As someone who learned to read at a very early age, this is horrifying to me.

Re: Could You Modify It ‘To Stop Students From Becoming This Advanced?’

#84

Post by dantheman »

mdwrigh2 wrote: post #58
yummyfajitas wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the college level, private schools certainly do cater to the individual. I was fast in math, regular speed in everything else. They put me into grad level math and physics classes, while my writing/history/etc classes were still at the normal pace. I don't see much reason why the incentives would be different below the college level. Whenever you want to ask "what would a privatized primary education system do", y…

Except that this is _exactly_ what happens at public colleges as well. In fact, my public high school saw that I was fast at math and got me into college classes early, so it even occurs there to some degree.

Most colleges are competing for students; there are market forces. Public schools have a much stronger monopoly due to the difficulty changing location. Additionally public schools still cost money, if it was useless people would not use it.

Re: Could You Modify It ‘To Stop Students From Becoming This Advanced?’

#85

Post by losvedir »

jshen wrote: post #82
grandalf wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to be picturing "ACME Education" creating schools in the model of factories under some scary privatization scheme. In fact, the current "public" model of centralized control, standardized curriculum, and cookie-cutter learning objectives is based on an antiquated understanding of human development, social systems, and motivation. In fact, by forcing a child to endure hours of boredom and conformity it prepar…

Private schools will lead to a marketing driven education system that preys on peoples ignorance. Here's a simple thought experiment. Look at all the education systems around the world, and ask if the ones with the best results are private or public.

> Here's a simple thought experiment. Look at all the education systems around the world, and ask if the ones with the best results are private or public.

Are we allowed to include universities?

Re: Could You Modify It ‘To Stop Students From Becoming This Advanced?’

#86

Post by grandalf »

jshen wrote: post #82
grandalf wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to be picturing "ACME Education" creating schools in the model of factories under some scary privatization scheme. In fact, the current "public" model of centralized control, standardized curriculum, and cookie-cutter learning objectives is based on an antiquated understanding of human development, social systems, and motivation. In fact, by forcing a child to endure hours of boredom and conformity it prepar…

Private schools will lead to a marketing driven education system that preys on peoples ignorance. Here's a simple thought experiment. Look at all the education systems around the world, and ask if the ones with the best results are private or public.

Your argument is essentially "marketing is bad". Which is a shadow argument for "capitalism is bad".

Take an ad for the Macbook Air. It shows a stylish person happily using the Air to do something fun.

Now consider an ad for a private school that shows a child happily benefitting from something he/she learned at the school being advertised.

Maybe the ad shows a graduate getting accepted into a prestigious college or even YC.

Ads are often aspirational and emotional, and do not necessarily contain false information. Sure, paying tuition at a school won't get you into a prestigious school and owning a MB Air won't make you happy. But an ad communicating the virtues of a great product is a good thing if it informs consumers of the product.

Let's face it, no matter how you view ads, if you think ads are bad then the only solution is for the government to start its own version of 'consumer reports' and to publish a simple list of products ranked according to attributes. Hardly a remotely practical or plausible solution.

Re: Could You Modify It ‘To Stop Students From Becoming This Advanced?’

#87

Post by niels_olson »

sequoia wrote: post #50

I'm a parent of two who does NOT plan on putting his kids in public school because I think they won't be served well there (plan on "home schooling"). My 5yo uses Khan Academy and it seems to be great. Finally, I basically hate most aspects of public school. That said, I get sick of everyone piling on public school whenever something like this comes up. Public school is set to the following task: "take everyone , eve…

I can tell you my daughter did very well in most subjects in private school, but had a terrible time with math. We switched her to a public school this year.* She has done better overall, and her math has improved most of all. There are some other factors involved (I'm not in residency, we like where we live in general, we're not facing the possibility of being upside down in a house, etc), but I can't say enough that public vs private is not necessarily the deciding factor it's made out to be when you get down to individual cases.

By the way, how, exactly, do you use Kahn Academy? My kids got bored with it.

---------

* My wife had worked as a therapist in San Diego schools for years and when we moved back, we targeted a few neighborhoods to move into. Word on the street was that the private schools were no better than the public schools, at least in elementary.

Re: Could You Modify It ‘To Stop Students From Becoming This Advanced?’

#88

Post by Astrohacker »

_delirium wrote: post #3

I suppose it's a Cato blog post, but I was hoping for a more interesting discussion than just a random call for private education, with a market-will-solve it assertion. People learning at different paces and on their own is a fairly interesting problem highlighted here, but I think it's wishful thinking to claim that the perfect answer is already known. It's not entirely clear to me that private schools would cater…

Let's not forget that, in the US, the US government gives enormous amounts of funding to private universities. So the behavior of universities is not exactly the result of a free market with no government intervention... the government has a huge influence on the way universities work.

Re: Could You Modify It ‘To Stop Students From Becoming This Advanced?’

#90

Post by clarkevans »

In 90% of the geography (50% of the population?) of the united states, there is effectively only enough population to support a limited set of teachers & facility. It is nice that we can have magnet schools in urban areas. What about deeply surban or rural areas?

Perhaps the whole idea of competition between schools is incorrect -- should we instead focus on creating a competitive learning platform (under neutral brick & mortar facility) where competition is between classrooms?

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