EPTUS Politics Mega-thread - Page 443
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Read the rules in the OP before posting, please. In order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a re-read to refresh your memory! The vast majority of you are contributing in a healthy way, keep it up! NOTE: When providing a source, explain why you feel it is relevant and what purpose it adds to the discussion if it's not obvious. Also take note that unsubstantiated tweets/posts meant only to rekindle old arguments can result in a mod action. | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
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ziggurat
Canada847 Posts
On September 16 2013 11:44 DoubleReed wrote: Well, I googled it, and I found things pointing both in favor and against merit pay, so I can't say whether it is effective or not. The general consensus I found is that it hasn't been effective at all so far, and proponents say it needs to be tweaked. I don't quite know why it doesn't work. One thing is that teachers are more motivated by social pressures, not financial pressures. By shifting it to financial pressures it actually diminishes their care of the social pressure. In general I think teachers should be treated with a lot more respect in our society than we give them. Parents and administrators are very quick to blame teachers for everything, including their own issues. That's the main problem, and merit pay really doesn't address that. It's a band-aid at best. Hey Doublereed, I thought I would never agree with you about anything but here I think you're making sense. My wife is a teacher though so maybe I'm biased ... I think the biggest problem with merit pay is that it's hard to measure a teacher's merit. The class does well, but that could just be because the teacher is in a district where all the parents make their kids spend two hours a night on homework. Classes aren't that big so there's really not that big a sample size. I would totally support some kind of merit pay for teachers but only if it was demonstrably on real merit, instead of who the principal happens to like. | ||
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ziggurat
Canada847 Posts
On September 16 2013 13:13 sam!zdat wrote: the problem is you create pressure to teach to the test which gets in the way of education. Education is not about learning to fill bubbles Not sure about this. There are some core things that every kid should learn. It's great if your kid is a special snowflake but he still needs to learn how to write and do math, and he can't learn to do it his own way. | ||
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Sermokala
United States13925 Posts
If you just dig a hole in the ground and plant the tree its not going to grow well. you can't just expect it to produce fruit at the start so you need to keep it in a tree training program for a few years. When you get the tree you need to dig a very deep hole in the ground and fill it with the best soil there is. then you lower your tree into an indentation. then you must put more good dirt over the tree and then again protect the tree with wood chips at the bottom of it. Then you have to support your trees with water and food. showing them vocal support also helps. as en example with student teaching if you take the fruit off the branches at the early years it will grow faster and be better quicker for you at the start. Clearly the time to make the tree preform better isn't at the very start of the trees existence nor is it at any point after its acclimated to the new ground you've decided to put it in. Even if the example was just apple trees there are tons of different apple trees and tons of differences regionally to them. They all spend time away in a tree farm befor they're said to be ready and then sold to you. Teachers should be considered the largest and best economic investment the nation has. the Problem is that most of the focus about teachers isn't until well and after they've been planted and cannot be transplanted again. they should be taught better and taken care of better at the start. How many schools have to cut promising new teachers because of budget cuts and tenure? | ||
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IgnE
United States7681 Posts
On September 16 2013 12:57 sam!zdat wrote: standardized testing teaches kids to think like cogs where there is standardized testing, there is no education, there is the opposite of education. The purpose of standardized testing is to terrorize children into hating school and make them think learning is something you do on an assembly line. It's hard for people who were graded A prime meat on the assembly line to understand why standardized testing is such a bad thing. Besides, that might involve the realization that education is an assembly line producing canned meat from the capitalist abattoir for the good of the Economy. | ||
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JonnyBNoHo
United States6277 Posts
On September 16 2013 13:13 sam!zdat wrote: the problem is you create pressure to teach to the test which gets in the way of education. Education is not about learning to fill bubbles That's true, but isn't that also a function of how you design and implement the test? | ||
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sc2superfan101
3583 Posts
On September 16 2013 13:22 IgnE wrote: Besides, that might involve the realization that education is an assembly line producing canned meat from the capitalist abattoir for the good of the Economy. Ignoring the emotional language, how is this an inherent flaw in education? Should society not want to produce effective, efficient workers and citizens? | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
sermo I like you rant about the tree, a plus for the day | ||
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Danglars
United States12133 Posts
On September 16 2013 13:21 Sermokala wrote: If you've ever tried to grow a tree at your house you'll understand this better... BUT If you just dig a hole in the ground and plant the tree its not going to grow well. you can't just expect it to produce fruit at the start so you need to keep it in a tree training program for a few years. When you get the tree you need to dig a very deep hole in the ground and fill it with the best soil there is. then you lower your tree into an indentation. then you must put more good dirt over the tree and then again protect the tree with wood chips at the bottom of it. Then you have to support your trees with water and food. showing them vocal support also helps. as en example with student teaching if you take the fruit off the branches at the early years it will grow faster and be better quicker for you at the start. Clearly the time to make the tree preform better isn't at the very start of the trees existence nor is it at any point after its acclimated to the new ground you've decided to put it in. Even if the example was just apple trees there are tons of different apple trees and tons of differences regionally to them. They all spend time away in a tree farm befor they're said to be ready and then sold to you. Teachers should be considered the largest and best economic investment the nation has. the Problem is that most of the focus about teachers isn't until well and after they've been planted and cannot be transplanted again. they should be taught better and taken care of better at the start. How many schools have to cut promising new teachers because of budget cuts and tenure? I'm with you on the tree analogy to the testing, except for showing vocal support to a tree helping it. It has had no such effect in my garden. The rest of it is in line with my own thinking on the subject. I'd like to reduce some of the up-front pressure on new teachers to acclimate quickly and produce expected results. It generates significant pressure to teach to whatever test will directly impact their future tenure. | ||
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sc2superfan101
3583 Posts
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
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farvacola
United States18825 Posts
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JonnyBNoHo
United States6277 Posts
On September 16 2013 12:53 Jormundr wrote: So dumb. You obviously just pay the farmer more so he can synergize the trees better. Or import trees from mexico for a fraction of the cost and keep two sets of books. I don't like the idea of just paying the farmer more or keeping two sets of books. That sounds expensive  I'm open to importing, but let's not make any final decisions without data and a rigorous discussion. | ||
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IgnE
United States7681 Posts
On September 16 2013 13:31 sc2superfan101 wrote: Ignoring the emotional language, how is this an inherent flaw in education? Should society not want to produce effective, efficient workers and citizens? "Effective, efficient workers?" No, thanks. I'm not a robot. I'd rather be a more fully realized human being who works for myself, thinks for myself, and exists in an organic social community rather than a more efficient cog churning out more widgets so that I can buy more widgets in a society where even social interaction is commoditized. | ||
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Sermokala
United States13925 Posts
On September 16 2013 13:34 Danglars wrote: I'm with you on the tree analogy to the testing, except for showing vocal support to a tree helping it. It has had no such effect in my garden. The rest of it is in line with my own thinking on the subject. I'd like to reduce some of the up-front pressure on new teachers to acclimate quickly and produce expected results. It generates significant pressure to teach to whatever test will directly impact their future tenure. They did it on myth busters and proved that plants even as small as possible have a clear benifit when noise is around them. | ||
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JonnyBNoHo
United States6277 Posts
On September 16 2013 13:50 IgnE wrote: "Effective, efficient workers?" No, thanks. I'm not a robot. I'd rather be a more fully realized human being who works for myself, thinks for myself, and exists in an organic social community rather than a more efficient cog churning out more widgets so that I can buy more widgets in a society where even social interaction is commoditized. I don't consider those mutually exclusive goals. We should be educating people to be smart, creative thinkers. That's also what the economy needs more of. We don't need cogs in the US, we have China for that now and robots in the future. | ||
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IgnE
United States7681 Posts
I remember one time after my Latin class when an Education class came in and started teaching how to make venn diagrams to the Education majors. I was dumbfounded. Moreover, my impression from talking to family and friends who are teachers is that it often becomes more about classroom management than actually teaching any substantive material. Teachers in poorer areas are often glorified nannies and deal with ridiculous shit. | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
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JonnyBNoHo
United States6277 Posts
On September 16 2013 14:07 sam!zdat wrote: the economy doesn't want smart, creative thinkers. Smart creative thinkers cause trouble by asking dangerous questions about the purpose of economies Smart, creative thinkers are the ones companies want to hire these days. Stakhanovites fell out of favor a while ago. | ||
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IgnE
United States7681 Posts
On September 16 2013 13:56 JonnyBNoHo wrote: I don't consider those mutually exclusive goals. We should be educating people to be smart, creative thinkers. That's also what the economy needs more of. We don't need cogs in the US, we have China for that now and robots in the future. The system doesn't actually want smart, creative thinkers. They want people who buy into the cultural ethos and are capable of selling things. The economy doesn't want smart, creative people to make better things, things that don't need replacing, things that are better in the long run. The economy needs people to make more things. Or at least to spend more money. Education in this country is about fully integrating the American Dream Myth into students' worldview to become good consumers. Always hustlin'. | ||
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