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US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

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Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#271

Post by programjames »

k2enemy wrote: post #214
lucideng wrote: post #33

The majority of the public school system has devolved into day-care, not education. Most parents just watch TV, stare at their phones and don't want to be bothered by anything that requires effort. A major societal shift needs to happen for this to be reversed. It's many factors... the parents, the food system, various inequalities, social media, technology, healthcare... the solution is multi-pronged. But if I had t…

Maybe. I've definitely seen that anecdotally in some cases. But the school system is also problematic for the families that do value education and the kids that could excel in the classroom. Our district has eliminated programs for the kids at the top end in the name of equity. They've also eliminated separate spaces for kids with learning and behavioral issues for the same reason. So everyone is in the same classroo…

Are your kids old enough to run amok at home instead of going to school? Would the police arrest you if you left them home alone instead of sending them to school?

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#272

Post by programjames »

verteu wrote: post #250
Scubabear68 wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in the US in New Jersey, and here a big problem was the State flooded school districts with money during Covid with no material oversight of its spending. The end result was huge increases in spending. But not on education. The money was spent on more MacBooks, more iPads, more buildings, more smart TVs, more consultants, more School Bullshit System as a Service, more scoreboards, more $50,000 signs in front o…

Hard to conclude much from this, given New Jersey is consistently rated one of the top 2 states in the nation for K-12 education. The lesson may even be the opposite: "If your school's biggest problem is 'too much money', outcomes will be pretty good."

The conclusion I drew is that even schools in the "top 2 states for K-12 education" are piss poor at education.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#273

Post by clipsy »

runjake wrote: post #101

- The Pandemic really set that generation of kids back, particularly kids who were in elementary during that time. - Public school is essentially daycare. They try to integrate special education students more into the regular classrooms, but the teachers end up spending disproportionate time dealing with them and their behavioral issues, which hurts learning for regular students. - I don't have strong, set in stone o…

If public school is essentially daycare, why did the pandemic set a generation of kids back?

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#275

Post by dmix »

paulryanrogers wrote: post #179
lucideng wrote: post #33

The majority of the public school system has devolved into day-care, not education. Most parents just watch TV, stare at their phones and don't want to be bothered by anything that requires effort. A major societal shift needs to happen for this to be reversed. It's many factors... the parents, the food system, various inequalities, social media, technology, healthcare... the solution is multi-pronged. But if I had t…

> Most parents just watch TV, stare at their phones and don't want to be bothered by anything that requires effort. No? Most of the parents around me are busy each working a full time job and doing their best to raise their kids. They now spend some of their free time reading on the phones instead of a newspaper, magazine, or book. Some listen to books while they mow the lawn, clean the house, or do other chores like…

People always want to blame the new thing in culture. Some collective sin if only we had better self control. Every generation has one.

Usually it’s just institutional failure at multiple levels and a whole bunch of people who don’t care about the institution’s output sufficiently.

Every time I read about new education stories they’re busy trying to solve wider social issues instead of being the best place to get an education. Just like how libraries turned into homeless shelters instead of being a place for the community to learn and read.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#276

Post by GrinningFool »

araes wrote: post #258
julienchastang wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Parent here with school-aged kids. I think this sub-thread blaming the parents is particularly depressing and not founded in reality. Here is the way I see it. The social media companies with quasi infinite resources have won. They hired the best and the brightest engineers to hack our minds and steal our attention and they have succeeded beyond expectations. As evidence look that the market capitalization of Meta, e…

Add a couple thoughts to that general idea: - There's also a reward issue, in that reading, especially long form is "soft punished." It's not directly punished, yet there's very little reward, mostly a lot of struggle, not much of the candy feedback of TV, movies, and video games. It requires personal imagination and visualization of often difficult concepts rather than simply taking what someone else has "imagined c…

I wonder how much of the YA uptick is driven by adults who prefer less-challenging reading. If that's the case it just makes the picture appear even more bleak.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#278

Post by trimethylpurine »

potato3732842 wrote: post #219
soulofmischief wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And constraints. To call this a cultural issue is insane. I have firsthand seen the structural problems with institutional education. My scholastic experience was hell and anti-intellectual from day one, and it was all institutional issues.

And the institutions reflect culture. The fact that these institutions can exist at the low-performing state they do is a direct reflection of the culture of the people who run them, send their kids to them, pay taxes to support them, etc. The schools can only do what they do to the degree that people aren't willing to put up with it.

What could people unwilling do?

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#279

Post by yepitwas »

dotnet00 wrote: post #191
yoyohello13 wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish this narrative that memorization is bad would die. Yes, understanding concepts is also important, but memorization is incredibly useful for learning and applying knowledge. The faster you can recall "trivia" the better you are able to make connections. I say this as someone you drank the "no memorization" koolaid. Now I always start new things with memorization first and I learn so much faster.

Yep, the most obvious example (besides language) would be of math. Despite what kids (and unfortunately, some adults) say, it's worth memorizing the tables from 1->10 despite the ubiquity of calculators because the process of memorizing them helps with seeing the patterns that provide a deeper understanding, and it's much faster than pulling out a calculator and plugging the numbers in. There are some subjects where…

Doing math without memorizing some basic arithmetic facts is like reading without knowing what the hundred most common words in the English language mean, and having to look them up every time you encounter one. Sure I guess you can do that, but… you definitely shouldn’t.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#280

Post by jen20 »

programjames wrote: post #272
verteu wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hard to conclude much from this, given New Jersey is consistently rated one of the top 2 states in the nation for K-12 education. The lesson may even be the opposite: "If your school's biggest problem is 'too much money', outcomes will be pretty good."

The conclusion I drew is that even schools in the "top 2 states for K-12 education" are piss poor at education.

Where are you comparing to that has better outcomes?
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