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Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

thesunmagazine.org

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Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#11

Post by tboyd47 »

> Using school as a sorting mechanism, we appear to be on the way to creating a caste system, complete with untouchables who wander through subway trains begging and sleep on the streets.

Wow, he nailed that one, didn't he?

> But keep in mind that in the United States almost nobody who reads, writes, or does arithmetic gets much respect. We are a land of talkers; we pay talkers the most and admire talkers the most, and so our children talk constantly, following the public models of television and schoolteachers.

In 2022, replace talking with dancing.

> The children I teach are cruel to each other; they lack compassion for misfortune, they laugh at weakness, and they have contempt for people whose need for help shows too plainly.

Played any multiplayer FPS recently?

> But no large-scale reform is ever going to repair our damaged children and our damaged society until we force the idea of “school” open — to include family as the main engine of education.

As he proves a few paragraphs later, this is the one thing the school system will never do because the two institutions (school and family) are in direct competition with each other for the hearts and minds of children.

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#12

Post by ok_dad »

I have another recent comment where I lament that the rise of intelligent machines will lead to humans being looked on as just another machine to do a job by those with ultimate power in our society, but according to this, we have already become those machine cogs.

Instead of trying to produce a "whole person" out of the schooling system in America, we are trying to produce specialized devices for the performance of certain tasks. Some of the students are sorted into the "high power devices" bin (lawyers, programmers, etc.), some into the "low power device" bin (manual labor), and some into the rubbish bin (physically disabled, mentally ill, etc.). Much like Intel bins their chips, in fact. Once you bin the parts from the school system, then you start to ship those parts throughout the workforce, or perhaps do some modifications to them in a university to achieve the most optimal output.

I guess there were a lot of people who saw this before me, and I am sure that like them my view will never get mainstream traction. Someday, perhaps, an AI will be developed to read our internet comments, and I'll be labeled as someone who needs maintenance and shipped off to a re-education facility.

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#13

Post by PartiallyTyped »

hourago wrote: post #4

> But our society is disintegrating, and in such a society, the only successful people are self-reliant, confident, and individualistic — because the community life that protects the dependent and the weak is dead. Too many people has apocalyptic views of the world. And to push for individualistic behavior when you think that your society is disintegrating seems to just accelerate any problems that may exists. 30 yea…

> And to push for individualistic behavior when you think that your society is disintegrating seems to just accelerate any problems that may exists.

This can not be understated. Coming from a country that would be considered "Eastern European", there is an astounding amount of individualism pushed in schools, and yet, it seems that the most prosperous and "equal" countries take the opposite approach.

What I cherish the most from my time in Scandinavian Universities is how much emphasis there is on collective work. Those who work in group will always achieve and learn a lot more than those who do it alone, unless the latter are truly exceptional.

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#14

Post by ch4s3 »

auslegung wrote: post #7
hourago wrote: post #4

> But our society is disintegrating, and in such a society, the only successful people are self-reliant, confident, and individualistic — because the community life that protects the dependent and the weak is dead. Too many people has apocalyptic views of the world. And to push for individualistic behavior when you think that your society is disintegrating seems to just accelerate any problems that may exists. 30 yea…

> you need some war-level trauma to stop children curiosity See inner city, ghetto living experiences

Those kids aren't incurious it's just directed other places.

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#15

Post by hintymad »

> The children I teach have almost no curiosity, and what little they do have is transitory

Maybe kids are just not curious about what the author teaches? As a parent, I have to admit that kids are not necessarily curious about what we value. My kids are not curious about STEM, at least not yet. They are, however, are very curious about how to use TNT in minecraft, or how to learn cartwheel. It's unfortunate (or forutnate?) that not every one is born curious about STEM or any subject like their teachers or parents do.

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#16

Post by ch4s3 »

hourago wrote: post #4

> But our society is disintegrating, and in such a society, the only successful people are self-reliant, confident, and individualistic — because the community life that protects the dependent and the weak is dead. Too many people has apocalyptic views of the world. And to push for individualistic behavior when you think that your society is disintegrating seems to just accelerate any problems that may exists. 30 yea…

> And to push for individualistic behavior when you think that your society is disintegrating seems to just accelerate any problems that may exists.

I don't think individualism and participation in community are necessarily at odds with one another. Communities of choice can be really powerful and meaningful in peoples' lives. I think the tricky part is figuring out how to equip young people to find and build communities in a society that no longer provides it by default.

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#17

Post by kansface »

grendelt wrote: post #10
Spivak wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is nothing more sure to kill your love of anything than to have it be taught at school. Like come on, we were stuck in the boredom cube for 6ish hours a day, the alternative is nothing and most of us still didn't pay attention.

> than to have it be taught at school. than to have it be taught IN A BORING WAY WITHOUT CONTEXT Learning my multiplication tables was fun when it was turned into a race with my friends. Memorizing the state capitals and abbreviations was fun when it was turned into a game. You can turn most anything into a fun way of learning it with just a modicum of effort. One problem is too many teachers get beat down to only te…

Is fixing the stifling bureaucracy is out of the question?

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#18

Post by A4ET8a8uTh0 »

hourago wrote: post #4

> But our society is disintegrating, and in such a society, the only successful people are self-reliant, confident, and individualistic — because the community life that protects the dependent and the weak is dead. Too many people has apocalyptic views of the world. And to push for individualistic behavior when you think that your society is disintegrating seems to just accelerate any problems that may exists. 30 yea…

I think I agree. Some time ago I was doing volunteering at a HS. We were basically teaching basic computer skills ( Excel, Word and so on ); helped with problems with resume or something along those lines. I think 9/10 kids logged onto FB and/or played Plants vs Zombies. I did try to engage them, but their goals were clearly different. They were interested, but in nothing that those volunteer hours could offer. The kid that is interested will seek this stuff out. The rest will play Plants vs Zombies.

I will admit it was a little disheartening for me and I stopped doing it for a while. I am debating proposing something similar now at my local library, but I am worried the results will be about the same.

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#19

Post by xboxnolifes »

hintymad wrote: post #15

> The children I teach have almost no curiosity, and what little they do have is transitory Maybe kids are just not curious about what the author teaches? As a parent, I have to admit that kids are not necessarily curious about what we value. My kids are not curious about STEM, at least not yet. They are, however, are very curious about how to use TNT in minecraft, or how to learn cartwheel. It's unfortunate (or foru…

Very much this, and it shouldn't even be a shocking revelation to most people. Nobody I know in my life enjoyed every subject they were taught in school. At best, they had 1 or 2 subjects they could be called curious about. Many had none (that were taught in school).

And even then, the schooling I went through hardly rewarded curiousness. You were incentivized to cram information to pass tests, so that you could get good grades, to get into good colleges, to cram more information to the pass more tests, to get good grades.

Even when my teachers seems to enjoy curious students, the curriculum was certainly not structured to incentivize it.

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