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Why Is American Teaching So Bad?

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Re: Why Is American Teaching So Bad?

#61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not following the cause and effect of your logic. Are you missing a point or two? Perhaps "The ones who are paying for it are paying less than they need to"? or maybe "The ones who apportion those taxes have no financial incentive to apportion them wisely"? Even in those cases, there should be enough distance between those paying the tax (in whatever portions) and those spending the tax to ensure that the governm…

As I understand what the parent post's author wrote, the ones who pay for the US school system aren't the ones who use it: their kids go to private schools. Perhaps this point was missing or too implicit: contrary to what occurs in Europe, there is no "How is my money being spent?" effect as a result of this.

I'm still not getting it. Are you saying that some taxes should be ringfenced and only used for the specific purpose of education (and by extension other taxes to other things), and that taxpayers get to see precisely how their proportion of taxes are being spent on that particular thing?

In any representative democracy that I know of, the budget (including tax income and government outgoings such as education) is handled by elected representatives of the people. There is no direct connection between a specific tax dollar and a specific public service. Rather, these things are budgeted for in aggregate.

The elected representatives are accountable to their electorate for these budgets, not to individual taxpayers. The concept of "How is my money being spent?" is a feature of this aggregated budgeting rather than any specific tracking from specific taxpayer to specific service. Going back to the parent posting, which implied an accountability of legislation (or at least educational administration) to its funders, I don't see how this works in representative democracies such as the US, because the funders are not stockholders in the traditional sense: Their extra tax dollars do not give them extra voting rights. The only way I can imagine that they would have more voting rights is through lobbying and other such methods that bypass traditional electoral accountability.

In short, an argument in the form of "Higher net tax payers are not net consumers of government spending, therefore government spending that does not help them does not efficiently help others" assumes either that citizens have an electoral power relative to the tax they pay (which is undemocratic) or that wealth redistribution is broken (in this case or in general).

Re: Why Is American Teaching So Bad?

#62
My wife is a teacher in China. She taught me that the difference is 2 things: One is the single child is pushed into competing by the parents who fear the other parents are pushing their child. Second is she says the Chinese children can "see" the future is bad without something to change it and that is getting an education. She says we just don't see that here in America - the child that is.

Re: Why Is American Teaching So Bad?

#63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I wrote in my reply to mkohlmyr, methinks the bigger problem is that parents no longer have the material time to parent their own kids. Who should step in to fill the gap? Gangs? Militarized cops? Someone else? It seems to me that teachers and educators spend the most time with kids apart from parents (or one would hope), and are the least bad candidates to second parents in parenting kids.

> It seems to me that teachers and educators spend the most time with kids apart from parents (or one would hope), You mean the hour, maybe two they see a child during the day? > are the least bad candidates to second parents in parenting kids. No, they're not even a candidate.

This isn't about your friend specifically. In elementary school, it's common for kids to only have two teachers for the entire school year. My sister, on one occasion, moved up in the grade she taught and ended up teaching the same kids for two years. Many of these kids spend more awake time around their teachers than their parents. Given how the government forces kids to attend schools I don't see how one can't think that they and their employees share a huge part of the burden.

On the other hand, my sister makes it seem like there are just a lot of bad parents out there. Even the ones that mean well, will often act in a way destructive to their child's education. Many of them are rude and self-righteous. Honestly I no idea what to do about that.

Re: Why Is American Teaching So Bad?

#64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It seems to me that teachers and educators spend the most time with kids apart from parents (or one would hope), You mean the hour, maybe two they see a child during the day? > are the least bad candidates to second parents in parenting kids. No, they're not even a candidate.

This isn't about your friend specifically. In elementary school, it's common for kids to only have two teachers for the entire school year. My sister, on one occasion, moved up in the grade she taught and ended up teaching the same kids for two years. Many of these kids spend more awake time around their teachers than their parents. Given how the government forces kids to attend schools I don't see how one can't thin…

You cannot be a proper parent to 20+ kids (hell, I'd argue 5+ kids of elementary school age would be difficult) simultaneously. I just don't know what more you expect out of teachers. Additionally, teachers only have children for 3/4 of the year and then the parents have them, and then a new teacher has them.

Parents are important; if you see your parents acting bad, neglecting you, are even encouraging you to act in these manners, then what can someone who spends 1/2 of 3/4 of a year with you really change that?

Re: Why Is American Teaching So Bad?

#65
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Arguments like this make me wonder whether we should pursue homeschooling. My kids are 2 and 4, and we've been going back and forth on the decision. We couldn't afford private school, and my wife is already staying home. Our county's educational system is one of the best in the state, but it still suffers from the bad practices that plague our national education system.

I live in France but I always wonder how homeschool could work. How can one parent (or even both) be as efficient than a whole school?

Efficiency isn't the question, of course it isn't efficient. You're giving up one person's salary to teach a couple kids. The effectiveness of homeschooling is what's important, which, I think, is largely determined by the education of the parent. I've met several non-college educated parents who don't seem qualified to teach their children through higher grade levels, but others who quit engineering jobs to homeschool who I know are always on the ball and will produce great results in their kids. With a well-educated and energetic parent, the results of homeschooling will far surpass that of the public school system. Research into homeschooling effectiveness is still in early stages, but the studies produced by my google results show homeschooling producing sociable, independent kids who do well in college.

Re: Why Is American Teaching So Bad?

#66
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You've been given the task of controlling lots of kids, squishing their natural learning desires and ways. This should be draining as it is against the ways of how we evolved. See for example http://www.salon.com/2013/08/26/school_is_a_prison_and_damag... Despite your best intentions, coercive schooling is not a good thing. There are better ways, such as Sudbury schooling, that are both respectful of children and act…

Arguments like this make me wonder whether we should pursue homeschooling. My kids are 2 and 4, and we've been going back and forth on the decision. We couldn't afford private school, and my wife is already staying home. Our county's educational system is one of the best in the state, but it still suffers from the bad practices that plague our national education system.

I would say that homeschooling is better than traditional schooling, but it really lacks the freedom, responsibility, independence, and socializing that Sudbury schooling has to offer. A good article trumpeting this up is http://blog.sudburyvalley.org/2014/02/sudbury-schools-unscho...

I was fortunate to discover the model a year ago with a functioning school. They are fairly rare so probably not an option for you, but if it is, they are often in a price range of 6-8k. Before that, I was going to homeschool my daughter (she's 3.5). Now I work for Baltimore's urban Sudbury school and the place is fantastic.

I also recommend reading Zero to One and think about in the context of traditional schooling. I am working on a series of posts highlighting the connections starting with http://blog.aisudbury.com/post/102537221611/educational-prep...

Re: Why Is American Teaching So Bad?

#67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I understand what the parent post's author wrote, the ones who pay for the US school system aren't the ones who use it: their kids go to private schools. Perhaps this point was missing or too implicit: contrary to what occurs in Europe, there is no "How is my money being spent?" effect as a result of this.

I'm still not getting it. Are you saying that some taxes should be ringfenced and only used for the specific purpose of education (and by extension other taxes to other things), and that taxpayers get to see precisely how their proportion of taxes are being spent on that particular thing? In any representative democracy that I know of, the budget (including tax income and government outgoings such as education) is ha…

I think school are better to be public. But I'm a bit of a socialist when it comes to schools (and healthcare, and justice).

When all (or nearly all) schools are public, then everyone pays for what they get.

Re: Why Is American Teaching So Bad?

#68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I understand what the parent post's author wrote, the ones who pay for the US school system aren't the ones who use it: their kids go to private schools. Perhaps this point was missing or too implicit: contrary to what occurs in Europe, there is no "How is my money being spent?" effect as a result of this.

I'm still not getting it. Are you saying that some taxes should be ringfenced and only used for the specific purpose of education (and by extension other taxes to other things), and that taxpayers get to see precisely how their proportion of taxes are being spent on that particular thing? In any representative democracy that I know of, the budget (including tax income and government outgoings such as education) is ha…

> I'm still not getting it.

In Europe, the main group of tax payers are eating their own dog food by sending their kids to public schools. When the public schools their kids go to sucks, they know first hand and lobby to get it fixed.

In contrast, the main group of tax payers in the US are sending their kids to private schools. When the local public schools sucks, it doesn't have the slightest immediate impact on their kids and they therefor will not care much.

Re: Why Is American Teaching So Bad?

#69
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is dishonest. Education is segregated by geographic proximity to school in the states. Of course, poor people live in poor areas and rich people live in rich areas so there is a strong correlation. Within a given school system, which is at the county level in this state (and I think most states), the same amount of tax money is generally spent per student so the rich schools get the same amount of the poor schoo…

You are either igonorant or are being dishonest. Most states don't have county-level school districts; and definitely heavily populated ones do not. The district is either rich or poor. Example: mercer island is just across I90 from Seattle in king county, and is one of the richest districts in the nation (since mercer island is rich). The PTA BS is just made up libertarian propaganda (blame the poor people for being…

I live in the 10th most populated state and our school districts are at the county level. I know the 24th most populated state also has districts at the county level.

I tried to find statistics based on state, but could not find any data. (A quick google seems to imply that CA, NY, and WA do not do it based on county, but it's hard to say that most states do with only 5 measurements.)

I'm not really sure why your posts are so angry about this topic, but your original assertion was that schools were segregated by wealth, which is obviously not how are schools districts are devised. I understand that your jaded worldview may keep you from accepting this fact.

Re: Why Is American Teaching So Bad?

#70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't about your friend specifically. In elementary school, it's common for kids to only have two teachers for the entire school year. My sister, on one occasion, moved up in the grade she taught and ended up teaching the same kids for two years. Many of these kids spend more awake time around their teachers than their parents. Given how the government forces kids to attend schools I don't see how one can't thin…

You cannot be a proper parent to 20+ kids (hell, I'd argue 5+ kids of elementary school age would be difficult) simultaneously. I just don't know what more you expect out of teachers. Additionally, teachers only have children for 3/4 of the year and then the parents have them, and then a new teacher has them. Parents are important; if you see your parents acting bad, neglecting you, are even encouraging you to act in…

> You cannot be a proper parent to 20+ kids (hell, I'd argue 5+ kids of elementary school age would be difficult) simultaneously.

Agree wholeheartedly. But that's the sorry reality today.

> Parents are important; if you see your parents acting bad, neglecting you, are even encouraging you to act in these manners, then what can someone who spends 1/2 of 3/4 of a year with you really change that?

But you're missing my entire point here: parents nowadays spend very little time with their children compared to a half century ago. Where they used to get half a day of parenting (typically from house moms), kids are now only getting a few hours per day -- and that's provided whichever parent comes back from work first don't sit them in front of a TV while making dinner.

Blaming bad society or whatever is akin to sticking one's head in the sand. The kids need to be parented somehow, and it's pointless to blame the parents considering they both need to work in both households to make the mortgage, tax burden, and various other fixed cost work out; but nobody has stepped in to fill the gap left by societal changes. Who should?

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