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I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

scotthyoung.com

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Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#241

Post by Dfiesl »

ChaitanyaSai wrote: post #228

Schooling has been trying for ever to institutionalize and standardize learning without really understanding what learning is. In that absence, we've focused on learning proxies, which are tests. And tests resulted in a focus on mechanics. Meaning was and is an intangible so it got leached out. Everything school does starts at the wrong end of meaning > motiviation > mechanics > measurement. It is possible to fix sch…

Im definitely in this camp.

It seems like the biggest frustration from the teachers’ part with modern schooling is lack of engagement from the students. This is clearly telling us something.

Sure some students have not even had their basic needs met, which is a separate issue. But those that have and still don’t engage tells us that their brains have probably assigned the information they’re receiving as “having little or no value”, i.e. meaningless.

I bet if you were to lead a class of teenagers on the subject of relationships or friendship, or even how to host a successful party, suddenly you’d see a lot more engagement. Why? Because it’s actually relevant to their every day existence.

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#242

Post by Danox »

satisfice wrote: post #88
tombert wrote: post #70

I'm not the first person to state this, but it bears repeating: nearly everyone thinks that they know the right way to teach, and most people don't. I'm not exempting myself from this. I was an adjunct lecturer for two semesters. I did have some fun with it, but it was way harder than I thought it would be, and I think that university is probably considerably easier than elementary or high school. I had students that…

I was one of those students. I refused to do homework after the age of 11 (I cited the 13th amendment). Quit school as soon as it was legal to do so. I wrote about this in Secrets of a Buccaneer-Scholar. Now approaching my 60th birthday, I feel certain I was suffering from undiagnosed ADHD. You can't force a brain to think what you want it to think. I couldn't even force myself to think what I wanted to think. I bega…

In America being willing historically depending on where you live still isn't enough for getting an education, healthcare or voting depending on where you live. But no worries there is a country on the other side of the world moving upwards.

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#243

Post by [deleted] »

RealityVoid wrote: post #183
keithnz wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

schooling has to be designed around "average" teachers. Having someone who is gifted at teaching is great, but there wouldn't be many teachers if that was the standard. I often think when people idealize what schooling should be like it always seems like they are imagining teachers who are gifted.

Yes, as always, we like people to be good at their jobs instead of being bad at their jobs. But, I think teaching skills, juuuust like any other skills can be taught and improved. So if we want good teachers and educators we need to build them up, not just relie on a few good ones to carry the day. I personally reject the notion of competency in this as a matter of "giftedness", as something you either have or don't…

[deleted]

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#244

Post by graemep »

anon-3988 wrote: post #114
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think about three strata of students. The stubbornly unwilling, the coaxable, and the eager. I have a real issue dividing kids up along these lines. I've found that virtually all young kids love to explore and learn things, and if anything schooling can extinguish this innate desire when it becomes a source of stress.

> I have a real issue dividing kids up along these lines. I've found that virtually all young kids love to explore and learn things, and if anything schooling can extinguish this innate desire when it becomes a source of stress. This is a very bold claim. I don't think most kids are curious about the multiplication tables

Why learn multiplication tables when everyone carries a computer around with them? My kids never did (ineffective school plus later home education) and are good at maths as adults. A previous HN discussion contained this post

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48395840

and ultimately this about a successful experiment in other approaches to maths:

https://www.inference.org.uk/sanjoy/benezet/1.html

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#246

Post by seu »

I'm skeptical about efforts to discuss changing schools (not even "revolutionizing" them) without even mentioning Ivan Illich or Paulo Freire.

Here some links for the lazy ones: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deschooling_Society https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedagogy_of_the_Oppressed

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#247

Post by fastforwardius »

gampleman wrote: post #245

This is basically why the classical education movement exists. The fact that you can have remarkably better results using thousand(s) year old teaching methods/ideas than using 'modern' educational approaches is actually rather surprising.

Why is it surprising?

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#248

Post by graemep »

tombert wrote: post #70

I'm not the first person to state this, but it bears repeating: nearly everyone thinks that they know the right way to teach, and most people don't. I'm not exempting myself from this. I was an adjunct lecturer for two semesters. I did have some fun with it, but it was way harder than I thought it would be, and I think that university is probably considerably easier than elementary or high school. I had students that…

I think the problem with your argument is that you are placing teaching as something done to students at the centre of your view, rather than something done by students. It assume classroom learning. That rules out any really different approach. The fundamental problem is trying to revolutionise schooling rather than learning.

> They were smart students, but they didn't want to be there.

Then they should not be there. That is the fundamental problem. Especially at that level why is anyone there who is not even motivated enough to study? Someone might not like ever undergraduate level course they need for a degree, but they should be able to push themselves through the boring stuff.

At school level, its difficult to make things work in a classroom setting with a fixed curriculum. Once I took my kids out of school they largely learned what they found interesting until they started studying towards doing exams. I made sure they learned core skills around reading, writing and maths, but they still had a say in what to do and how. A lot of it can be done by pursuing other subjects or hobbies. With the exams they had a choice (discussed, and they had to do maths and English language) but they had a choice) of what subjects to do and made choices that suited them, including some less common subjects (such as astronomy and Latin). Again, motivated and requiring very little actual teaching (they both entirely taught themselves Latin, and did other subjects with minimal help - although we did have tutors for English literature and classical civilisation, and varying amounts of parental help with other subjects).

A lot of the best universities (in the UK, at least) have tutorial systems that rely heavily on small groups rather than lectures (Oxford, Cambridge, Durham, St Andrews - that I know of). A lot more individual attention is a long proven method of getting better results.

At school level it might look very expensive, but that is balanced by needing a lot less time per student. A few hours of one to one a week is cheaper than school.

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#249

Post by graemep »

whiplash451 wrote: post #220
teiferer wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> teach someone who really isn't interested in learning. This is key. If you are interested in a subject, the learning will come more or less automatically. Different ways of teaching still have substantial impact on how efficiently you learn, but you automatically gravitate towards the more efficient methods since you want to learn this out of interest in the subject. Without interest, this is an uphill battle. And…

To a large extent, the onus is on the teacher to generate interest. Most teaching until uni is mostly forced upon students.

> Most teaching until uni is mostly forced upon students.

That is the problem. It should not be forced. People naturally love learning and its a matter of facilitating that. Not going into details here as I have recent comments on this and other threads:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48397182

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48409530

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#250

Post by gampleman »

Vinnl wrote: post #32
psadri wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you had the budget for two teachers, I’d utilize them as one teaching in the traditional way, and the other spending 1:1 times with each student (20 students in a class → 1-1:30 hr / student).

If we had budgets that allowed for one teacher per ten students, I imagine many problems in education would already be solved.

Plenty of places have relatively high teacher pay, relative high staffing (for instance 1 teacher + 1 assistant per 25 children is standard here - not quite 1/10 but pretty close). The educational outcomes are bad and getting worse.
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