Why not teach kids something they can use?

I've always felt like almost everything I learned in grade schools was irrelevant to real life. I understand the point of learning history, math, science, english, etc... but making those classes mandatory every year of high school seems over-whelming.

So much of the information is lost because it's never used or because it doesn't pertain to the person's future. Why not instead require mandatory politics or general living classes. Classes where you learn to balance a check book, or pick a career that fits you, or dulge deep into the realities of politics, or economics and stock markets.

The funny thing is, you get to college and learn most of the things you learned in high school over again. College is the "institution of higher learning". If one is interested in rounding out their level of education or becoming an expert in a field, then they can go to college.

High school should be there to teach people to be smart and to survive. It should help students become confident individuals with a well-round personality. It shouldn't, however, be there to drown the student in information that will soon be irrelevant. The general base needed to pick a career and start a college education can be learned in the first 1-2 years of high school

[edit on 21-8-2005 by white4life420]

Well, the reason we're taught so much now, most likely has to do with the cold war, kids were taught more, so ther'd be really smart next generations, that were good with rocket science and such.

But I agree somewhat, there are some things that do seem unneeded in schools.

But I think there are also things that should be taught that arnt, like more languages, and higher sciences.

It's about time that we upgrade our education system to include a basic college degree as standard and offer
vocational skills training for those who do not wish to persue an academic career.

Like the saying goes. What if the military was forced to have a bake sale each time they wanted
a new bomber and schools had all the funds they could ever need.

Originally posted by iori_komei
Well, the reason we're taught so much now, most likely has to do with the cold war, kids were taught more, so ther'd be really smart next generations, that were good with rocket science and such.

But I agree somewhat, there are some things that do seem unneeded in schools.

But I think there are also things that should be taught that arnt, like more languages, and higher sciences.

Well, yes, I'm in agreement with that. I thinking more languages would be a great requirement. This country is so ignorant towards other countries. Foreign politics should be taught more also. Everyone knows our president but most of us can't even name Britain's Prime Minister.

I personally think these schools are setting kids up to fail and not be as intelligent as they could be. Also, it seems that many intelligent kids drop out of college due to boredom. It's quite a shock to leave for college expecting such a different environment, then you get there and you are learning the same exact material.

[edit on 21-8-2005 by white4life420]

[edit on 21-8-2005 by white4life420]

Originally posted by FallenFromTheTree

It's about time that we upgrade our education system to include a basic college degree as standard and offer
vocational skills training for those who do not wish to persue an academic career.

Like the saying goes. What if the military was forced to have a bake sale each time they wanted
a new bomber and schools had all the funds they could ever need.

Speaking of that... I've also wondered why more companies don't offer straight-out-of-school training programs. They could recruit some of the smartest kids out there by offering a free training program to learn the job. It would cut down on time and costs.

Most of the training you get in jobs could be cut down severely if the rest of the college fluff was cut out. Even complicated engineering jobs could be taught fairly quickly without the added content.

The two environments serve purposes that are greater than the sum of their parts.

High school is all about peer group interaction, college is also, to a lesser extent. The important thing in college is learning personal responsibility, and how to manage your own freedom so as not to hang yourself with every length of rope you find. (not literally - just a saying)

I, for one, didn't LEARN any textbook material in High School or college, I did that on my own time. I still came away with knowledge though, so I'd say the environments served their purposes.

In any case, English is not taught enough. Most COLLEGE graduates can barely write to save their life, and I'm not even talking about spelling, I'm talking about basic sentence construction and vocabulary.

How can you survive if you can't communicate properly?

It's a fundamental skill that's fallen by the wayside.

Originally posted by WyrdeOne
The two environments serve purposes that are greater than the sum of their parts.

High school is all about peer group interaction, college is also, to a lesser extent. The important thing in college is learning personal responsibility, and how to manage your own freedom so as not to hang yourself with every length of rope you find. (not literally - just a saying)

I, for one, didn't LEARN any textbook material in High School or college, I did that on my own time. I still came away with knowledge though, so I'd say the environments served their purposes.

In any case, English is not taught enough. Most COLLEGE graduates can barely write to save their life, and I'm not even talking about spelling, I'm talking about basic sentence construction and vocabulary.

How can you survive if you can't communicate properly?

It's a fundamental skill that's fallen by the wayside.

That's exactly my point... many people walk out of high school without gaing any real knowledge. Sure they gain social skills, but just because high school is important for gaining social skills doesn't mean teaching material that can actually be of use wouldn't be more logical.

While this may not exactlly be on topic, I feel we should teach more music in school?

Why? Because music has great effects on a person. Not only does it keep kids busy, entertained and out of trouble, but it effects event the way their brains work.

news.bbc.co.uk...

It changed my life.

It doesnt matter if your playing Mozart or Hendrix, music is a great tool.

Originally posted by Dulcimer
While this may not exactlly be on topic, I feel we should teach more music in school?

Why? Because music has great effects on a person. Not only does it keep kids busy, entertained and out of trouble, but it effects event the way their brains work.

news.bbc.co.uk...

It changed my life.

It doesnt matter if your playing Mozart or Hendrix, music is a great tool.

I agree again. High school and basic education should be about enriching lives.

Originally posted by white4life420
I agree again. High school and basic education should be about enriching lives.

And you are right. The problem is money. Where's it going to come from? We've asked enough of the real teachers, do they not deserve a life as well?

That's the real conundrum.

Yeah, I think people suffer from unreasonably high expectations of the public school system. If you're going to delegate the education of your children to outsiders, you can't expect the best. Well, you can expect anything you want I suppose, but prepare for a letdown.

People should educate their own children if they want it done right. No bones about it.

Something I forgot to mention in my post too, reading and writing really need to be pushed harder, last year in my english class (11th grade Jrs.) a bunch of kids had trouble just reading, like they couldnt pronounce alot of words, that considering there educational level, should be easy for them to an example word being "Allegation", alot of kids could'nt even spell things correctly, and had trouble with basic punctuation (Which I myself am not to great at), the problem to is that theres not enough funding for schools, and the funding they are getting keeps getting shortened, and that money syphoned off to build prisons, and that kind of stuff.

Another problem is the "No child left behind act" its furthering the tendencie of schools to just pass the kid onto the next grade, even when they need to be held back, a good amount of kids at my high school, and my old middle school, were just passed onto the next grade, and they had failed either most or all of their classes. This kind of thing is done alot because the teachers dont want to have to deal with them again.

[edit on 8/21/2005 by iori_komei]

In general, I think schools choose the subjects, with the idea of a generalists education, and choose the subject matter with the most narrow vocational slant. For instance, this is exactly what happens when a math class revolves around how to use a specific calculator.

However, there are general principles that apply to many things. These probably consist of: Rhetoric, Dialectic, Logic, and Cybernetics/Systems Theory. Likewise, science helps with engineering, and biology helps with medicine.

Rhetoric is concerned with how to persuade people, and be a good bull#ter. The dialectic concerns how the make sense of contradictory, opposing arguments, and where they lead, which is the domain of traditional philosophy. Logic is closely associated with mathematics, and has its foundations with geometry, and more recently with notions of computing like Turing machines.

In more recent times, new methods have been evised for dealing with complex, changing systems. Electronics have improved the ability to analyze these things, and allowed for greater complexity. Based on the modeling of electronic circuits, powerful techinques have been devised for analyzing fast-changing situations.

In order to apply these things, it also helps to have an understanding of technology. In order to understand technology, you end up needing to know at least something about how it works, which requires general knowledge.

Crontab's got the right idea.

The jobs that children will go to when they leave school may not even exist when they are in school. Therefore schools have to teach students how to learn, so they can go on to fit into a fast changing society.

The slowest most hidebound societies in the world are the ones that just teach students by rote. Its no suprise that the asian socieites traditionally lack creativity and innovation in their techology when their education system is "read the book and memorise it".

Schools are also not here to teach you about everything you need for life. If that was the case then all the serious subjects would be elbowed out for less serious ones.

You actually have a family, and a society, and heaps of free time in which to learn the things you want outside of school.

Maybe if you feel your kid isn't learning the right stuff, or if you feel you arn't learning the right stuff, the answer is to take some personal responsiblity and learn it yourself.

Schools are not surrogate parents.

It wasn't too long ago (60's -70's) when some schools, inner citiy ones in particular, just turned out people equiped for work in the factories, blue collar workers, that became factory fodder. THAT was the kind of education that you are espousing.

The things that seem stupid to learn now, like english, maths, etc, come back and help you at later times, they become embedded into your psyche, and you use them without realising it. So many time I have thought back to my woodwork, maths, english, physics classes, and sciences to understand stuff now.

I sometimes work with refugees who come into the school system without having the background that locals have.

Sure they act like they understand everything that happens in school. Certianly they are just as intelligent and can pass exams like the local kids, but if you show them some basic things you can quickly see their lack of education in the early years.

Basic concepts are often missing. A student could learn how to make an excel piechart by folowing the instructions but if you ask them "what does this piechart mean" they don't know. Even the ability to follow instructions in a 1 -2 -3 -4 fashion is missing.

The things you take for granted now are things learned in school and cemented into your psyche.



[edit on 28-8-2005 by Netchicken]

There is one near you......

It is that test that determines whether a student is learning what the government watchdogs feel are necessary skills to be citizens.

It includes math, science, english......and it determines whether one receives a diploma.....

Just another law we have to change before we can make any necessary changes to an outdated system...so add another social issue to the bonfire.....



[edit on 28-8-2005 by garyo1954]

Originally posted by white4life420

Originally posted by FallenFromTheTree

It's about time that we upgrade our education system to include a basic college degree as standard and offer
vocational skills training for those who do not wish to persue an academic career.

Like the saying goes. What if the military was forced to have a bake sale each time they wanted
a new bomber and schools had all the funds they could ever need.

Speaking of that... I've also wondered why more companies don't offer straight-out-of-school training programs. They could recruit some of the smartest kids out there by offering a free training program to learn the job. It would cut down on time and costs.

Most of the training you get in jobs could be cut down severely if the rest of the college fluff was cut out. Even complicated engineering jobs could be taught fairly quickly without the added content.

I totally agree.

Perhaps what we need to explore further is a much greater emphasis on corporate sponsorship
of student apprenticeship programs.

This would provide jobs for students recruited directly out of high school helping both the student and the employer.

I'm sorry... but general knowledge to prepare is a load of bs. Let me explain...

In High School, I took Chemistry, Calculus, Expository Writing, History, etc. Now take a guess at what I was taking my freshman and sophomore year at college.

General knowledge of sorts can be gained through watching TV, talking to friends, and reading a book. I find the exact dates of WWI and WWII to be quite inconsequential at this time, however, even though they seem to be jammed in my head.

A general knowledge of electronics is something that children are practically born with these days. I currently work for Earthlink, and it seems whenever a person needs technical support, their 10 year old kid is the one running the operation.

High School needs to prepare people for the world. It needs to teach people how to survive and live enriched lives. Most of these classes are too broadly aimed, and by summer break half of the information is lost.

Picture this: Instead of teaching "general knowledge", these schools should be promoting life skills. Kids seem to be maturing at a decreasing rate these days, and by the time college rolls around, they are generally unprepared.

I did not finish college. Nor did I pay much attention in High School. I have a lot of general knowledge, but I mildy attribute it to schooling. I found it to mind-numbing and useless.

Imagine most kids walking out of high school and being able to read every section of the newspaper front to back. Imagine them learning how to make a life on a low-budget. How about being taught general social skills? Or why not teach them politics, economics, etc.

How many out-of-high-school kids do you know that vote, understand politics, or the business section of a newspaper? How many could behave properly in a business environment? These are skills that could each be taught in one focused semester of school.

General knowledge should certainly be taught, but to an extent. It would be pounded over and over into these kids heads the second they step foot into college anyway.

This way, individuals can more effectively decide what career is best for them. It would be more productive of their time. They could take general english, math, science, and history classes in high school, but if the general courses were more focused and less mandated, they would still have time for life skill classes. This would allow college, if the individual so chose to go, to then effectively train them for the future.

And for the souls who feel college is not the place for them, they will walk out of high school as well-rounded individuals who can keep up with the world and act as adults.

[edit on 29-8-2005 by white4life420]

[edit on 29-8-2005 by white4life420]

I've heard the "well rounded education" argument far too many times myself.

In reality, almost everyone has something they are very good at, "a gift" if you will, be it math,
creative writing, computer skills, music and so on.

In many ways the current education system completely ignores these capabilities rather than supporting them.

This is not saying that students should not expand their horizons, but the key to success is
taking what you're good at and finding a way to get paid for it.

I'm beginning to think our education system is due for a major overhaul.

With high speed internet and interactive training DVD's, students of any interest now have the capability to learn almost any subject from the comfort of their home, saving an untold fortune in tuition and room and board expenses.

There is still a desperate needs for better career training, but that doesn't seem to
register with most university administrators.

Sometimes I think the cost of todays education benefits the institution more rather than the student.

Some sports fans may disagree, but I would prefer to see an advanced career training facility
built rather than a new football stadium if that money is coming out of my pocket.




[edit on 29-8-2005 by FallenFromTheTree]

Yes, FallenFromTheTree, and it seems as if the number of geniuses that fall through the cracks grows by the year. My friend got a 1450 on the SATs and he's a forrest ranger now.

Not to say there is anything wrong with that, but he had so much untapped potential. High School was a waste of his time, community college was worse than high school, and by the time he got to a real school, his interests had drifted elsewhere.

I'm reminded of the old saying

Those who can't do, teach.

I wish our education system would put less emphasis on conformity
and more on innovation.