Posted on 01/07/2006 12:45:10 PM PST by wagglebee
Children are very adaptive if allowed to be.
Discipline. As a student I can tell you it is lacking. I can also tell you simply why...self-esteem. Sadly, schools, even private ones, are worried about damaging the state of a student by bringing that student down. I guess the idea of operant conditioning has never caught up to them. If you reward someone for incompetence or laziness or a poor attitude, what do you expect to get in return...more of the same ol' thing. You can't just pat someone on the back, blame their environment, or blame any other exterior variable for their actions. Personal responsibility must be instilled. Rousseau must have snuck in through a back door of the American school system. So, on top of a free market, refined school systems must execute discipline. Is it any wonder why the work ethic of many students in Amercica is going down the drain and looking more like the French each day?
Exactly. It's not a question of basic ability to learn - although a few, no doubt, are stupid - but of the system's failure to provide decent instruction for the overwhelming majority who are perfectly capable of benefitting from it.
The problem with education in the district I taught was parents' attitudes. Kids who get labeled with a learning disability and get an IEP, qualify for social security disability. The student and parent then have NO incentive to do well in school because they get their monthly check. The parents make demands about the kinds of tests, etc the students take. If the students do well on the state test, there is a chance that they could test out of their disability, bye-bye check, so of course they fail, bringing down the school with them. We had students that were basically a warm body and did nothing in class. They didn't care, the parents didn't care if/when they failed everything. They got paid for it!!! Dumb like foxes is what the teachers called them. What do you do with that. Everyone likes to dump on teachers (and I know there are bad ones, and the NEA sucks) but we have developed an entire entitlement system based on non-performance being rewarded. Until that is changed, how can it get better?
Don't believe me? I had a sixth grade student in Title 1 math. As part of my job, I gave an assessment test at the beginning and end of every year. When I was in the room with the student (who tried to not be there for it amazingly well) he did not miss one problem. Since I had to travel, I was a couple of minutes late when the boy had to make up the final part. He missed all 6 problems, then when I came, he didn't miss any. I will admit that he had a crush on me which made him try harder. This student was smart, but had a family history of being lowlifes. Two years later he went to the local Dr. Bob (he only went by his first name, which tells ya something) and got labeled with a learning disability. There was no record of him ever taking a state assessment test, he was always absent, and he of course failed his classes. On a side note, he was socially promoted at his parent's demand, of course. I showed his test he took for me where he was at or above grade level to the special ed. teacher and she was furious. She knew he didn't belong there. My test was unofficial though, so of course, he stayed in special ed and received his check.
No kidding. I live a few blocks away from a small public school. I can set my watch by the shouts of "f-you", "f-this", and "f-that" spewing loudly from the mouths of these charming, undisciplined nine, ten, and eleven year-olds every afternoon when school is dismissed.
How much time and money is wasted in our schools teaching English, or teaching in Spanish?
Precisely. Unions are NOT about the product produced...anything but.
Wasn't one of GWB's campaign promises to abolish the U. S. Department of Eduation?
Or, was I delusional?
that's so sad
That's right...the more money they can extort from us for 'public education'; the more money that flows into the coffers of the Democrat party. When will people finally put two and two together? I forgot...they can't add.
Instead he just pumped billions more taxpayer dollars into it.
bump - we need to check the NEA's budget on how they are helping with the epidemic of their union members sexually molesting the children they are trusted with. The Catholic Church had a nation-wide coverup. The NEA has isolated incidents.
This TV report identified exactly what slow learners need to suceed.
High standards
Extra tutoring, presumably in small group or 1 on 1
Academic support--I assume this is in the are of how to study, take notes, etc.
The problem? It's outrageously expensive to do this on a large scale.
How would W do that with "No Child Left Behind"? I really don't see that happening when your education policy is supported by Ted Kennedy.
I had a chance to work with a bunch of suburban kids, about half were homeschooled, recently. Even though the homeschooled kids liked to play video games and acted like kids, when they were challenged to do something new and different, they took on the challenge and were successful for the most part. When I did the same thing with a bunch of public-schooled city-kids, I had trouble getting through the basics of the activities. One group acted like a group of young humans, the other group acted like a group of patients off their meds.
It's true that some of the blame lies on the shoulders of the parents. But lord forbid if any child in our school system is made to feel stupid - so they treat them ALL as if they were.And look where it's getting us.
I know my kids hated school. Why? They were bored silly.
I would take them to the goodwill store and let them buy books about subjects they wanted to learn. They chose computer books, books about China and calculus and science. I think kids love to learn, they just aren't learning at school!
Trying to find it now. Was a huge scandel in France when it hit (In fact the government suppressed the UNESCO findings as they applied to teachers and teaching methods so as not to piss off the HUGE teachers unions).
We took God out of public schools. We took paddling out of public schools.
However, we did put prescribed psychotropic medications in.
Very interesting! Maybe another problem is our class sizes are too big. Kids need more personal attention. I'm not sure how we'd solve that in a public school.
The kids are smart; the system is stupid. The neat choices are law school, or welfare. They know all the math that is necessary.
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