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Stop Penalizing Boys for Not Being Able to Sit Still at School

theatlantic.com

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Re: Stop Penalizing Boys for Not Being Able to Sit Still at School

#41

Post by pessimizer »

pekk wrote: post #27
sarchertech wrote: post #23

School is half education and half babysitting. The problem is that schools aren't aware of that, and they try to cram too much learning/work into a day at school. Kids just don't have the attention span. College isn't taught this way. Colleges realize that even young adults can't handle 40 hours a week of continual instruction, why do we do this kids can? I think the reason, is that we're always behind other countrie…

Historically many, many children have sat still at school and behaved themselves. That doesn't mean that others should be stigmatized, but it's not like this is impossible and unprecedented.

Also historically, many, many children have been thrown out of school or deemed ineducable because they couldn't sit still in school and behave themselves.

Re: Stop Penalizing Boys for Not Being Able to Sit Still at School

#43

Post by sanarothe »

joelhooks wrote: post #12

At least one of my three boys would have an incredibly hard time with this. He's definitely "aspie" in a lot of respects. The decision to home educate our 4 children is hands down the best decision we've ever made. Highly recommend it, if you are able to pull it off logistically. Very rewarding experience so far.

I just want to say that you might want to consider public high school. There's a lot of social development going on there, even if most people come out of the entire system bitter.

Re: Stop Penalizing Boys for Not Being Able to Sit Still at School

#44

Post by tenpoundhammer »

Kids should spend have instruction for a while and then pushed out to play for a while. Alternating back and forth, maybe an hour each way. Then we wouldn't have as many fat kids and we wouldn't have so many kids disrupting classrooms. Our children aren't automatons, they need plenty of time to be kids. There is a lot of value in play.

Re: Stop Penalizing Boys for Not Being Able to Sit Still at School

#45

Post by sarchertech »

pekk wrote: post #27
sarchertech wrote: post #23

School is half education and half babysitting. The problem is that schools aren't aware of that, and they try to cram too much learning/work into a day at school. Kids just don't have the attention span. College isn't taught this way. Colleges realize that even young adults can't handle 40 hours a week of continual instruction, why do we do this kids can? I think the reason, is that we're always behind other countrie…

Historically many, many children have sat still at school and behaved themselves. That doesn't mean that others should be stigmatized, but it's not like this is impossible and unprecedented.

First, historically mass education of the type we now employ is only about a century old, and designed to produce factory workers not to promote creativity. Learning to handle monotonous boredom and obey orders was of primary importance to a factory worker.

Second, much of this is unprecedented. When my parents were children, they didn't attend Kindergarten, and first grade was a half day. When my parents younger siblings were children, Kindergarten was a half day. When I was a child, I didn't attend preschool.

In 3 generations we've added more than 2 years of education for every child, and that education is qualitatively quite different, even from what I experienced (Kindergarten 23 years ago)

When I was in kindergarten the majority of the day was playtime, we had 30 minutes of recess, 45 minutes of mostly freeform PE, 30 minutes of naptime, and a few hours of structured playtime (drawing, making crafts etc...).

From friends of mine who are teachers, since no child left behind, all of that has been removed or severely restricted. Recess is now 15 minutes, PE is more structured and not every day, no more naptime, and they don't have time for freeform activities because the curriculum is so dense.

In Kindergarten we spent almost the whole year learning the Alphabet. Now the curriculum assumes that children already know it.

Teachers know this doesn't work, but schools are obsessed with testing and metrics to the determinant of real education.

Re: Stop Penalizing Boys for Not Being Able to Sit Still at School

#46

Post by webwanderings »

pekk wrote: post #27
sarchertech wrote: post #23

School is half education and half babysitting. The problem is that schools aren't aware of that, and they try to cram too much learning/work into a day at school. Kids just don't have the attention span. College isn't taught this way. Colleges realize that even young adults can't handle 40 hours a week of continual instruction, why do we do this kids can? I think the reason, is that we're always behind other countrie…

Historically many, many children have sat still at school and behaved themselves. That doesn't mean that others should be stigmatized, but it's not like this is impossible and unprecedented.

Because most likely those schools were in the business of producing zombies, or scared shitless kids due to teacher's punishment techniques. Those days are gone for good unless you are in the third world countries.

Re: Stop Penalizing Boys for Not Being Able to Sit Still at School

#47

Post by icebraining »

pekk wrote: post #27
sarchertech wrote: post #23

School is half education and half babysitting. The problem is that schools aren't aware of that, and they try to cram too much learning/work into a day at school. Kids just don't have the attention span. College isn't taught this way. Colleges realize that even young adults can't handle 40 hours a week of continual instruction, why do we do this kids can? I think the reason, is that we're always behind other countrie…

Historically many, many children have sat still at school and behaved themselves. That doesn't mean that others should be stigmatized, but it's not like this is impossible and unprecedented.

They used to behave here 30-40 years ago as well. Getting your hands beaten with a wooden ruler is a hell of an incentive.

Re: Stop Penalizing Boys for Not Being Able to Sit Still at School

#48

Post by btilly »

dllthomas wrote: post #4

As a youth, I was only able to sit still by focusing on sitting still. If I was paying attention to the teacher, I was fidgeting, and would be told to pay attention...

There has been research on this with adults.

People who fidget in meetings pay attention better and retain more information.

Re: Stop Penalizing Boys for Not Being Able to Sit Still at School

#49

Post by freehunter »

speeder wrote: post #39
eli_gottlieb wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, to have grown up in an education system where homework and in-class participation aren't counted as some huge part of the grade!

class participation and whatnot counted, and I had not a problem with that, when a teacher asked a direct question and I was not sleeping deeply enough (if I was half-sleeping and heard the question I woke up) I would usually be the first to reply. Only later I figured this was bad idea (here in Brazil at least, the norm is to noone ever try to reply to the teacher, as a kind of weird social convention, and since I a…

In high school (in the early 2000s, in the US), class participation didn't mean just answering a question when called on, in my school most of the time it meant preemptively offering an answer without being called on. You got graded on having the initiative to answer without the teacher asking you directly.

Re: Stop Penalizing Boys for Not Being Able to Sit Still at School

#50

Post by Puer »

sarchertech wrote: post #23

School is half education and half babysitting. The problem is that schools aren't aware of that, and they try to cram too much learning/work into a day at school. Kids just don't have the attention span. College isn't taught this way. Colleges realize that even young adults can't handle 40 hours a week of continual instruction, why do we do this kids can? I think the reason, is that we're always behind other countrie…

How come they don't seem to have this problem in China, India or Germany? It isn't that kids can't handle the workload, the problem is the boring curriculum.
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