I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling • Hacker News Board

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#261

Post by revolvingthrow » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 8:55 AM UTC

graemep wrote: post #244

anon-3988 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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

Why learn to read and write when everyone carries a computer capable of TTS? Why learn anything when your pocket computer has access to AI doing the thinking much better than the average highschooler and has 100x the knowledge?

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#262

Post by watwut » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 9:02 AM UTC

graemep wrote: post #249

whiplash451 wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

People naturally like learning some things and dislike learning others. The idea that if some learning is not interesting to everyone is misguided.

And no, something being useful and relevant does not make it interesting on itself. Even if you know it is useful you can just dislike having to learn it.

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#263

Post by somenameforme » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 9:03 AM UTC

vintermann wrote: post #255

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…

Well, we've all been students, haven't we? And most of us probably have experience with ways of teaching us that worked, and ways that didn't. Of course we're all going to have an opinion. I don't have any grand theory of education, but I have some stories of what worked for me and what didn't. I learned English from a guy with a radical method: the "direct method" or "natural method". After the first lesson explaini…

I'd agree with this conclusion from another angle as well. It seems slightly odd to me that people think there must be a single "right" way to teach. What works for one student, one group of people, doesn't necessarily work well for another.

And it also goes the other way as well. One form of pedagogy might work excellently for one teacher, yet he may do abysmally at another. What's "right" for him may be wrong for another teacher. By striving for something like homogeneity you disadvantage not only students, but also teachers.

This is all even more true in current times as educational outcomes continue to decline even as ever more money is pumped into education, and teacher churn rates are at record highs, with many completely leaving the profession.

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#264

Post by watwut » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 9:08 AM UTC

bwhiting2356 wrote: post #45

freeopinion wrote: post #10

IMO, the best questions around revolutionizing school should address whether children should be coerced into learning something. It seems obvious to me that the answer should be yes. So the follow ups should be figuring out how to move a student from an unwilling participant to a willing participant. I think about three strata of students. The stubbornly unwilling, the coaxable, and the eager. It is pretty easy to de…

It's hard to convince kids why they should learn advanced abstract math, beyond what is necessary to calculate the tip on a restaurant bill. The number of high school students who will use advanced math beyond high school is very small, but those that do will have high impact, which is both in society's interest and their own interest as high earners. The kids that study and apply themselves, I don't think it's so mu…

Motivation to learn has nothing to do with practicality. That was definitely that way for me, especially when I was young.

I know full well that languages are necessary and useful ... and were. I still found learning languages the most boring thing in the world. I liked abstract math despite thinking it is not necessary useful - I did not cared. I could go on, but relation between interesting and useful was never all that straight forward.

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#265

Post by hiAndrewQuinn » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 9:10 AM UTC

I'm surprised no one has mentioned Bryan Caplan's The Case Against Education yet, which basically argues for a revolution in the other direction - get rid of almost all schooling because almost none of it passes a sane cost benefit analysis. It's very well researched, and the author has a long track record of being happy when he moves people even marginally towards his views.

The praise here for Direct Instruction is akin in many ways to a lot of the research Caplan draws on, especially his findings that generally, most work related knowledge is built at work, by actually performing the job.

https://www.amazon.com/Case-against-Education-System-Waste/d...

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#266

Post by rimliu » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 9:17 AM UTC

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…

Understanding learning should start by understanding how much it depends on mechanics.

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#267

Post by rimliu » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 9:18 AM UTC

graemep wrote: post #244

anon-3988 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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

This is very close to "Why use brains".

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#268

Post by AngryData » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 9:18 AM UTC

BurningFrog wrote: post #172

Animats wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We know what works: a 1:5 staff to student ratio. At that ratio, method matters less. Beyond that, it's a productivity problem.

With AIs as most staff, this should be very reachable.

AI lacks both the reasoning and insight needed to teach anybody that isn't already immensely interested in the topic, and even then might leave large knowledge gaps, not to mention how often it hallucinates wrong knowledge. Especially with topics that already have a lot of bad information floating around.

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#269

Post by zipy124 » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 9:23 AM UTC

socalgal2 wrote: post #97

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…

There's also this: https://youtube.com/watch?v=g1ib43q3uXQ which claims data shows students being forced to "figure it out" is not the best way to learn. Most HNer disagree with this.

That's exactly quoted at the start of the article?

"Problem-based learning tends to do worse than traditional schooling in medical education. An influential meta-analysis by Albanese and Mitchell, for instance, found that students required more time studying, had worse exam scores and ordered more unnecessary tests compared to traditionally taught students. "

Problem-based learning is exactly the "figure it out" method.

Re: I'm skeptical about efforts to revolutionize schooling

#270

Post by rimliu » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 9:27 AM UTC

bluGill wrote: post #145

SubmarineClub wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It turns out that when you level the playing field, girls do better than boys. Why is it that when boys/men where outperforming and out-earning women, people were willing to move heaven and earth to correct this terrible injustice, but now when outcomes have reversed (for years at this point) it's considered acceptable to say "Welp, that's just how it goes. Boys just aren't good enough." Hmmm...almost like, it's no…

Until someone can show a real biological difference we should level the playing field. We do know boys mature later which may be reason to not level the field completely, but we should still not allow that as an excuse. If someone shows another difference I will have to think in depth about the details before I can comment.

So you claim that biolgically males and females are the same?