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Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

thesunmagazine.org

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Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#101

Post by Consultant32452 »

zozbot234 wrote: post #94
TaupeRanger wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure...when you pay for good schools with small class sizes you get better education. The point is that this doesn't work for 99% of children who are going to be in classes of 25-35 kids, and I wouldn't count the child of a smart HN reader as representative of the average "Montessori" kid.

Class sizes in traditional schools were not always small. However, large classes would be taught differently, usually based on the students memorizing their daily "lessons" and chanting them out word-for-word. These "direct instruction" methods have only fallen out of use relatively recently as teachers sometimes felt them to be somehow demeaning, compared to more formal or intuition-driven teaching practices.

They would also break into smaller groups and the older/advanced children would teach the younger children lessons.

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#102

Post by fineIllregister »

giantg2 wrote: post #44
nus07 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Totally agree. Which countries are dominating STEM education? Israel, Russia, China , India and a few others which have strict schedules, competition and discipline. Looking at the failing US model I am starting to believe that finding your path and self motivation may work for 5% while leading the other 95% to slacking , cheap entertainment and failure.

Discipline is dead here (US). Very few people have discipline as adults, so the kids don't learn it either. Society doesn't value it, so it generally doest pay off. I used to show up early to work, took my responsibilities seriously, and not take shortcuts. Guess what? I get paid the same either way, so what's the point? We're "fat and happy", so something would have to change culturally.

> I used to show up early to work, took my responsibilities seriously, and not take shortcuts. Guess what? I get paid the same either way, so what's the point?

What do you imagine happens in Israel, Russia, India, or China when people do that? They get profit sharing? Seems unlikely.

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#103

Post by Natsu »

ravenstine wrote: post #89
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 have yet to see a child that is not curious, you need some war-level trauma to stop children curiosity. I hope you're right and I'm wrong, but that doesn't reflect my experience at all. Some children are indeed curious, but I wouldn't say anywhere near most. Saying that only serious trauma stops curiosity comes off as overly optimistic, but what do I know. After all, would you make the same statement about adults…

For curiosity, it helps if they're doing something they actually want to do. Being forced to do things tends to kill this off. When kids are into something because they think it's cool and fun and it sparks their imagination, they can go really far beyond what kids are 'supposed' to learn at some age.

I learned very little in school, myself. Instead I read my brother's textbooks long before I was 'supposed' to because I thought it was fun and spent the bulk of my time in school devouring the parts of the library I found engaging.

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#104

Post by bcassedy »

fiziks_hckr wrote: post #46
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've taught in schools from all corners of San Francisco, and can't agree more with majority of what was said in this article, except maybe the money part*, I'll leave a footnote for this. One day when I was volunteering at one of these schools, a student came up to me showing a picture of a robot how cool it was. When I mentioned that it was relatively easy to build, he got super stoked, told his friends and before…

You have a viewpoint that is shaped by a very niche experience. Your experience was with students that happened into an interest that was itself a project that can drive learning in a handful of subjects. This kind of approach doesn't work so well when the subjects that need to be learned don't lend themselves so well to exciting projects or even when the students don't get to self-select based on their interests.

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#105

Post by dieselgate »

jazzyjackson wrote: post #71
dieselgate wrote: post #68

This is a really well written article though I’m mixed in my agreements with it. Thought it was funny they mentioned the author “growing garlic” in the forward. It’s also curious to read about literacy rates before/after “compulsory” education and how they seemingly dropped - is this potentially because of different “standards” in defining literacy? I feel everything I’ve ever learned was “taught to myself” even thou…

> “you can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink” this is an especially apt metaphor for compulsory education, because when a horse is thirsty, it is perfectly capable of finding water on its own

I agree with you and thanks for bringing it up. My reasoning for only "partially" applying the metaphor is classrooms are often at least a couple dozen students and potentially if "a few horses or more are drinking" others might follow their lead.

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#106

Post by hot_gril »

The author compares American education to other industrialized nations at the start but never brings up those comparisons again. The radical ideas he proposes aren't implemented in other countries AFAIK. What makes the US different?

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#107

Post by hitpointdrew »

bjornsing wrote: post #36
hitpointdrew wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We have seen world wide that schools are THE most effective tool for lifting people out of poverty. This is false. Schooling has had nothing to do with it, capitalism is what has lifted the most people out of poverty, not schooling.

Isn’t basic schooling a prerequisite for successful capitalism though? (May sound snarky but a genuine question.)

This is a fair question. I would argue no. As the article alludes, schooling in general hinders/squishes the entrepreneurial (independent) spirits and instills a risk aversion behavior not conducive to starting a business. There an impressive list of billionaires that either dropped out of college, or didn't even attend (Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Richard Branson, Michael Dell, Larry Ellison, Walt Disney, Debbi Fields, Mary Kay Ash, and Wayne Huizenga, just to name a few).

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#108

Post by hot_gril »

lordnacho wrote: post #54
ravi-delia wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which countries are dominating STEM research? You know, the part that is actually useful instead of just coersive? America, by a long shot.

Aren't the actual PhD students often from those other countries?

Yeah. I've heard many times that the US has the best college and higher education but not so great K-12.

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#109

Post by hitpointdrew »

vkou wrote: post #45
hitpointdrew wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We have seen world wide that schools are THE most effective tool for lifting people out of poverty. This is false. Schooling has had nothing to do with it, capitalism is what has lifted the most people out of poverty, not schooling.

> capitalism is what has lifted the most people out of poverty This is false. Access to cheap energy, in the form of fossil fuels is what has lifted the most people out of poverty, not capitalism. Without burning through millions of years of oil and coal in the span of a few centuries, we'd all still be farming and eating mud, regardless of which economic system were in play. Remove capitalism, and industrialized soc…

I agree that cheap energy is vital, but I would argue that my statement is still true and that cheap energy is part of capitalism. It is, no pun intended, the oil the allows the free market capitalist machine to run. It starts with cheap energy, but having cheap energy alone is useless and doesn't lift anyone out of poverty. It's the cheap energy that enterprises can build upon that lifts people out of poverty.

> Remove capitalism, and industrialized society will still limp along, in a relatively prosperous manner compared to centuries past.

Barley limp along, maybe. As I mentioned above cheap energy alone is pretty much useless. North Korea has cheap energy, they aren't doing very well. Japan has cheap energy, and they are doing fantastic. The USSR had cheap energy, there were still bread lines. There has been no other institution, other than capitalism, that is done more to lift mass quantities of people out of poverty in such a short period of time. That said I do whole hardheartedly agree that cheap energy is the foundation and that if cheap energy goes away there will be millions of people that will die (but that is true weather a nation is capitalist or not).

Re: Why Schools Don’t Educate (1990)

#110

Post by giantg2 »

fineIllregister wrote: post #102
giantg2 wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Discipline is dead here (US). Very few people have discipline as adults, so the kids don't learn it either. Society doesn't value it, so it generally doest pay off. I used to show up early to work, took my responsibilities seriously, and not take shortcuts. Guess what? I get paid the same either way, so what's the point? We're "fat and happy", so something would have to change culturally.

> I used to show up early to work, took my responsibilities seriously, and not take shortcuts. Guess what? I get paid the same either way, so what's the point? What do you imagine happens in Israel, Russia, India, or China when people do that? They get profit sharing? Seems unlikely.

"What do you imagine happens in Israel, Russia, India, or China when people do that?"

They don't get fired, maybe get a raise or promotion. In the US, you won't get fired for doing the minimum because they don't have anyone to replace you with who would be better.

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