On January 09 2014 04:10 opisska wrote: In my opinion, the problem is that this is completely impossible to judge without meeting the blue guy and his children in person. I would say that with most parents, school is probably a better option, simply because most people are useless idiots and being subject only to their teaching would be detrimental for anyone. But the guy can actually be a good exception - and if he is not just boasting about the children being ahead of the curve, the children themselves could be exceptionally smart and for such children, school is an incredible waste of time. I for one would have deeply appreciated to have had an alternative to school, where in 13 years (elementary + high) I learned mainly how to kill time while surviving through absolute boredom (which ironically came in very handy when I started to spend half of my time in airplanes or airports some 10 years later) - but the problem would have been that the alternative definitely wouldn't be my parents ...
Depending on the school there is gifted programs you can join. At my school if you had an IQ above the 98th percentile you were allowed to do extra things outside of class that were at a level above what the other kids were doing. For example, making rockets, higher level sciences, math, etc. If you were invited you were obviously allowed to decline if you didn't want to put that effort in.
On January 09 2014 06:21 babylon wrote: @ Birdie: Wrt social life, I think it depends on the kid. Being homeschooled would not have done my brother and I any good, and both of us were actually bullied in public school. Not that I think that was a good experience for either of us, but it was more than made up for by the friends we did actually make throughout elementary/middle/high school (I met some of my best friends in 2nd grade). This isn't to say that you can't make good friends outside of school, but for my brother and I, it wouldn't have happened, whether it's because we were naturally inclined towards solitude or because our parents weren't very big on social activities/gatherings either (and so never encouraged us to socialize with the other kids to begin with).
I think you touched on the reason at the end there: It depends more-so on the parents than the kids. It's the parent's responsibility to make sure the kids are receiving adequate education in all facets of life.
On January 09 2014 04:10 opisska wrote: In my opinion, the problem is that this is completely impossible to judge without meeting the blue guy and his children in person. I would say that with most parents, school is probably a better option, simply because most people are useless idiots and being subject only to their teaching would be detrimental for anyone. But the guy can actually be a good exception - and if he is not just boasting about the children being ahead of the curve, the children themselves could be exceptionally smart and for such children, school is an incredible waste of time. I for one would have deeply appreciated to have had an alternative to school, where in 13 years (elementary + high) I learned mainly how to kill time while surviving through absolute boredom (which ironically came in very handy when I started to spend half of my time in airplanes or airports some 10 years later) - but the problem would have been that the alternative definitely wouldn't be my parents ...
Depending on the school there is gifted programs you can join. At my school if you had an IQ above the 98th percentile you were allowed to do extra things outside of class that were at a level above what the other kids were doing. For example, making rockets, higher level sciences, math, etc. If you were invited you were obviously allowed to decline if you didn't want to put that effort in.
I think that's the exception rather than the normal. No school in my area had anything for gifted kids, my high school did not even have AP classes (although it was private and the average class was above what you'd see in a public school).
I would rather stab myself in the arm, multiple times with a rusty fork than carry on a discussion like this with some random person online.
Fact of the matter remains, you can foster unique fairy creatures or accept the rules of the game we all play.
School isn't for learning quantifiable knowledge. I learned pretty much jack shit from early school years, got all of it from home. The value of school is learning to deal with idiots. Not everyone is as great as your family and sooner or later you're gonna have to confront them if you choose to live in society. You deal with teachers, other kids and most importantly the system. You can't have your parents, books or movies tell you how the system works, you have to live it before you can make an informed decision on whether you want to accept it.
Choice is a privilege and the choice of accepting society in particular. Society is built around the idea of providing a safe environment for children to grow without the constant attention of their parents. Children happen. They're born and when they are - they impact the ability of their parent(s) making a choice in regards to society.
All this is of course irrelevant to your little facebook discussion. That numbskull questions the point of having schools at all. Well, believe me, if i learned a lot from having to deal with the idiots, that's nothing compared to the absolute necessity of the idiots being exposed to other sources of authority than their even more hopeless parents. We're talking the worst form of parents here. The ones who have given up and embraced some pseudo-suicidal logic of life being one long slope down toward inevitable disappointment. The one dream they put in the heads of their sons (yeah, daughters are just downright given up on form the get-go, though that often serves them well as the complete absurdity of their parents defeatism and disproportion to reality of their situation may cause an earlier break from family) is a haphazard vision of becoming a sports star.
Now most of these kids will live out the self fulfilling prophecy they were born into, but some can be saved thanks to the miracle of school. Actually this pretty much only applies to daughters as well. While young boys may come to terms with the idea of school being a prison, time that has to be served before entering into brief military service followed by a life doing construction work, their endurance may be explained by comradery. As others around them follow the same path, it must be sane. Girls however are presented with no vision of a future whatsoever and may either be born with looks sufficient to fit the vision of becoming a young mother and house wife. Or not - in which case rather than following a beaten track along with their "bro's" they question what they want to do with their lives. School is often one way out for them. What will be their way out of home schooling?
My arm is getting quite sore from the fork now so i'll stop writing/stabbing but yeah in conclusion - you've basically been arguing over the concept of rumspringa. Is there potential for a happy life being Amish? Sure, but choosing to limit ourselves is choosing a mild form of lobotomy, it's a choice that's perhaps ok to make for yourself but not for your kids.
Rumspringa is not a functioning concept. Nor is homeschooling. They're denial at the expense of your children, limiting their most precious gift and your main responsibility to grant them as a parent - choice.
To me there's no shittier feeling in the world than being forced to try to teach an unmotivated student. I don't think it's realistic to let unmotivated students just not show up, but it would provide a much better experience for teachers and motivated students alike.
@Birdie - just because YOU had a positive experience with home schooling doesn't mean it's inherently superior to attending a formal learning institution. Likewise simply because schools in your place and time are awful doesn't mean all schools have to be such. Not all parents have time or money to put their children into numerous sports clubs or take them on constant trips to parks and museums; similarly, not every school is filled with cliques of bullies and smokers.
You also have to consider that even smartest of parents don't always know what they should teach to their kids, and even smartest of children don't always know what they want to learn until they at least try their hand at it. There are millions of parents who firmly believe liberal subjects are a waste of time; likewise there are millions of parents who are sure that maths is useless because their kid is destined to become a carpenter or a lawyer.
I wholeheartedly agree that modern educational institutions are very flawed in a number of ways, but that doesn't mean you can just do away with it completely. It's like saying, 'well you know what, the legal system in USA isn't very good, let's just replace it with anarchy.'
Thrill I don't know what you're talking about but it's completely different from what happened to me.
On January 09 2014 06:45 Salazarz wrote: @Birdie - just because YOU had a positive experience with home schooling doesn't mean it's inherently superior to attending a formal learning institution. Likewise simply because schools in your place and time are awful doesn't mean all schools have to be such. Not all parents have time or money to put their children into numerous sports clubs or take them on constant trips to parks and museums; similarly, not every school is filled with cliques of bullies and smokers.
You also have to consider that even smartest of parents don't always know what they should teach to their kids, and even smartest of children don't always know what they want to learn until they at least try their hand at it. There are millions of parents who firmly believe liberal subjects are a waste of time; likewise there are millions of parents who are sure that maths is useless because their kid is destined to become a carpenter or a lawyer.
I wholeheartedly agree that modern educational institutions are very flawed in a number of ways, but that doesn't mean you can just do away with it completely. It's like saying, 'well you know what, the legal system in USA isn't very good, let's just replace it with anarchy.'
I see what you're saying, but from my knowledge of schools in New Zealand, homeschooling is far superior for most people, and most people would benefit from home schooling. You don't have to pay to do a lot of social things, too. I didn't have to go to sports clubs to gain social experience, as it were.
With regards to your second paragraph, the good thing about homeschooling is that the parents are completely responsible. They can teach their children whatever they want. Some may teach badly, some may teach well, but from the moment of conception children are their responsibility; it's quite artificial to then place them in schools from the age of 5 to 18 as if suddenly the state is responsible for their children's education.
I don't know if it's necessarily a good idea to do away with schools entirely, I'm not sure enough yet as to how that would work out.
I would rather stab myself in the arm, multiple times with a rusty fork than carry on a discussion like this with some random person online.
Fact of the matter remains, you can foster unique fairy creatures or accept the rules of the game we all play.
School isn't for learning quantifiable knowledge. I learned pretty much jack shit from early school years, got all of it from home. The value of school is learning to deal with idiots. Not everyone is as great as your family and sooner or later you're gonna have to confront them if you choose to live in society. You deal with teachers, other kids and most importantly the system. You can't have your parents, books or movies tell you how the system works, you have to live it before you can make an informed decision on whether you want to accept it.
Choice is a privilege and the choice of accepting society in particular. Society is built around the idea of providing a safe environment for children to grow without the constant attention of their parents. Children happen. They're born and when they are - they impact the ability of their parent(s) making a choice in regards to society.
All this is of course irrelevant to your little facebook discussion. That numbskull questions the point of having schools at all. Well, believe me, if i learned a lot from having to deal with the idiots, that's nothing compared to the absolute necessity of the idiots being exposed to other sources of authority than their even more hopeless parents. We're talking the worst form of parents here. The ones who have given up and embraced some pseudo-suicidal logic of life being one long slope down toward inevitable disappointment. The one dream they put in the heads of their sons (yeah, daughters are just downright given up on form the get-go, though that often serves them well as the complete absurdity of their parents defeatism and disproportion to reality of their situation may cause an earlier break from family) is a haphazard vision of becoming a sports star.
Now most of these kids will live out the self fulfilling prophecy they were born into, but some can be saved thanks to the miracle of school. Actually this pretty much only applies to daughters as well. While young boys may come to terms with the idea of school being a prison, time that has to be served before entering into brief military service followed by a life doing construction work, their endurance may be explained by comradery. As others around them follow the same path, it must be sane. Girls however are presented with no vision of a future whatsoever and may either be born with looks sufficient to fit the vision of becoming a young mother and house wife. Or not - in which case rather than following a beaten track along with their "bro's" they question what they want to do with their lives. School is often one way out for them. What will be their way out of home schooling?
My arm is getting quite sore from the fork now so i'll stop writing/stabbing but yeah in conclusion - you've basically been arguing over the concept of rumspringa. Is there potential for a happy life being Amish? Sure, but choosing to limit ourselves is choosing a mild form of lobotomy, it's a choice that's perhaps ok to make for yourself but not for your kids.
Rumspringa is not a functioning concept. Nor is homeschooling. They're denial at the expense of your children, limiting their most precious gift and your main responsibility to grant them as a parent - choice.
You seem to have a very poor grasp on what homeschooling actually is, and automatically assume the worst case scenario. The problem is that not enough people thoroughly understand what it means to homeschool a child, and obviously those individuals should not be homeschooling. The only benefit of schooling you really listed was "learning to deal with idiots" but there is no reason why you have to go to school to learn it, and that's assuming that it's something you even need to learn directly. Want to really learn how to deal with idiots? Get any service job anywhere.
No one is arguing homeschooling is for everyone (except maybe Blue), but rather for qualified individuals instead.
Honestly, from my experience as someone who went to public school, I have to say that 'schooling' (at least in my experience) was probably the most detrimental thing to learning I and a majority of my classmates had to go through. The way (again, from my experience) schooling works right now is entirely about memorization rather than understanding, and this leads to huge gaps in learning (especially in fields like mathematics where understanding the underlying concepts of the formulas is thousands of times more important than memorizing the formulas themselves) and people abusing the system (i.e. memorizing things for the test then promptly forgetting them). The result is that school becomes not a place of learning things, but a place of learning how to bullshit your way through things so you can spend most of your time doing 'fun' things (i.e. hanging out with friends).
I've always been great at learning, but I'm horrible at school. From my experience, students who are great at learning but bad at school loved classes that were graded heavily on the test and hated classes that were graded heavily on assignments, because if you genuinely understood the material there was very little chance you would fuck up on a test but having to suffer through the 'busy work' of assignments was a chore, while students who did really well at school wanted assignment heavy classes because the assignments were garunteed points if you spent the time to do them and lessened the 'randomness' of studying for a test (oh god, nothing I studied was on the test!).
I actually didn't learn I was doing essays wrong until my Junior year in high school, where I took a Theory of Knowledge class with an absolutely amazing teacher whom I was actually quite close to (she was more like a college professor in the sense that we would actualy go out to coffee together and talk about random things ect, she was a great resource and really helped me with some self study things I was doing at the time). I got really interested in one of the topics we had and ended up going way above and beyond the requirements of the asssignment, doing lots of outside research to confirm / oppose my arguments and explaining why I believed one way, but I only ended up getting a C on the essay. I was obviously quite confused and a bit hurt because of this, because I respected her and put a lot of effort into the work, so I talked to her after class trying to understand why I got the grade I did.
Apparently essays in high school are supposed to be regurgitating what we talk about in class; I had assumed that was knowledge we all knew (since we had learned it in class) and used it as the basis for starting my essay which was about things I wanted to learn about that built upon the basic concepts that we learned in class. She admitted that the work I did was really amazing and that she knew I knew the material we had discussed in class, but that my essay didn't explain that to her so she couldn't give me full marks. I ended up getting A's on the rest of my essays in high school, and felt it was a waste of effort every time. I always wanted to be exploring new concepts rather than just regurgitating what I already knew on paper.
I was really lucky to have an older teacher in elementary school who broke her hip and ended up getting assigned a TA (or student teacher or something along those lines) who pretty much did her work for her. As a result, she took a couple students aside who were excelling (This was just before the No Child Left Behind act, which was garbage) and offered to let them learn whatever they wanted. I think one of the best things she did was that she would always present the work in the form of a puzzle (i.e. presenting me with 5-10 examples of a math problem I had never seen before with all of the work shown and telling me to figure how it worked). Since I love challenges / puzzles like this, I would spend hours outside of class thinking about it, trying to understand how it worked. In fourth grade, I went from being able to do multiplication faster than my peers to 'rediscovering' the basics of exponents, logs, along with a pretty deep understanding of trigonometry, even some rudimentary calculus and exploring in depth the flaws / limitations of a base 10 math system and the metric system. And it wasn't memorization that I was learning either; I understood how math worked, and as a result I was able to start figuring out problems I had never seen or encountered before (notation aside) just by thinking about the problem rather than memorizing a formula.
I went from this to having a math teacher in high school who actually created a problem that was unsolvable with trigonometry (the numbers on the angles / sides made it impossible for that triangle to exist) and when I pointed it out to them told me to 'just plug in the formula anyway and dont tell the other students since it would only confuse them more'. I died a little bit inside and had to suffer through the only trigonmetry class my school offered just to get enough math credits to graduate.
Maybe college is better, I don't know, but honestly I've just started viewing school as a barrier to entry for jobs rather than a place of actual learning. I wont go to college unless I decide theres a job I want that requires a degree. School (at least from my experience) is far too formulaic and results based to be a place of genuine learning, and it's only moving more and more in the wrong direction. Teachers can be a great resource, but they're still forced to make sure you know only what they teach and can't give you anything (in terms of results in their class) for learning beyond that. And in the end, the only thing that matters in school is if you have an A, B, C, D or F on your report card, not if you've actually learned anything.
edit: I guess to formulate my response to the OP, from my experience in school it's hardly and ideal place of learning, and I feel like 'homeschooling' in the way your friend described it has the potential to be a better learning environment. However, not all parents are created equal, some would definitely just make things worse for the children. I also feel like it's likely to create a very independently minded child who isn't willing to 'conform' to society when situations demand it, and I think that's an important lesson you have to learn (i.e. you HAVE to go to college and get good enough grades to become a X, Y or Z, regardless of if you have the skills). But it's certainly not one worth suffering through public education for.
With regards to your second paragraph, the good thing about homeschooling is that the parents are completely responsible. They can teach their children whatever they want. Some may teach badly, some may teach well, but from the moment of conception children are their responsibility; it's quite artificial to then place them in schools from the age of 5 to 18 as if suddenly the state is responsible for their children's education.
You can't possibly be serious.
First of all, tons of families don't raise their children until the age of 5 - they have to look for creches or nannies which eventually transition into schools, which then transition into universities. Secondly, are you saying that if a kid is born to some trailertrash fuck-up parents, it's okay for them to grow up with zero chance of ever achieving anything? If a couple of working-class parents without any background in education or sociology or whatever want to have a child, they should give up any hope of their kid ever doing anything else than following in their footsteps? If you're a single parent stuck in two jobs to pay the bills, you should give your child up for adoption because you can't teach them or take them out to socialize? How about families that live in the middle of an urban metropolis, like New York or Seoul, where there literally is no place for kids to play outside?
There is nothing good about making parents 'completely responsible'. More often than not, parents make rather poor educators - even the best of parents tend to try and make what 'they' want out of their children, rather than truly respecting what their children want and need the most. Giving kids at least a basic 'foundation' education, with an introduction to various disciplines in a formal setting is not a bad thing. It's not often done well - hence my comment about improving schools - but in most cases, it is for everyone's benefit.
One more point to consider;
People saying schooling is bad due to so and so, what makes you think that your parents would make better educators than the teachers you had in school?
School was very detrimental to my career and a complete waste of time.
Everything that mattered to my career could not be learned at school, and I knew that and not even my parents respected that at the time.
I knew exactly what I wanted to to be from the age of 9 and what I needed to learn to get there. In the end I spent all my hours outside of school learning what I actually needed to learn to become successful. To the point of skipping classes to do so.
In the end, the only metric that mattered for my career was what I learned outside of school, and not in school.
If school is about learning social interaction then why isn't organisational behaviour being taught? let alone the tiny lunch breaks we get and the fact we aren't allowed to talk in class.
A high school teacher is not going to be able to show me the path to success, if they could, they wouldn't be high school teachers they would be entrepreneurs. Yet most teach as if what they know is valuable and worthwhile.
Thank god I was one of those "lazy" troublemakers who didn't turn up to class because if it wasn't for that I would be earning half of what I am now.
On January 09 2014 06:25 Thrill wrote: I would rather stab myself in the arm, multiple times with a rusty fork than carry on a discussion like this with some random person online.
Fact of the matter remains, you can foster unique fairy creatures or accept the rules of the game we all play.
School isn't for learning quantifiable knowledge. I learned pretty much jack shit from early school years, got all of it from home. The value of school is learning to deal with idiots. Not everyone is as great as your family and sooner or later you're gonna have to confront them if you choose to live in society. You deal with teachers, other kids and most importantly the system. You can't have your parents, books or movies tell you how the system works, you have to live it before you can make an informed decision on whether you want to accept it.
Choice is a privilege and the choice of accepting society in particular. Society is built around the idea of providing a safe environment for children to grow without the constant attention of their parents. Children happen. They're born and when they are - they impact the ability of their parent(s) making a choice in regards to society.
All this is of course irrelevant to your little facebook discussion. That numbskull questions the point of having schools at all. Well, believe me, if i learned a lot from having to deal with the idiots, that's nothing compared to the absolute necessity of the idiots being exposed to other sources of authority than their even more hopeless parents. We're talking the worst form of parents here. The ones who have given up and embraced some pseudo-suicidal logic of life being one long slope down toward inevitable disappointment. The one dream they put in the heads of their sons (yeah, daughters are just downright given up on form the get-go, though that often serves them well as the complete absurdity of their parents defeatism and disproportion to reality of their situation may cause an earlier break from family) is a haphazard vision of becoming a sports star.
Now most of these kids will live out the self fulfilling prophecy they were born into, but some can be saved thanks to the miracle of school. Actually this pretty much only applies to daughters as well. While young boys may come to terms with the idea of school being a prison, time that has to be served before entering into brief military service followed by a life doing construction work, their endurance may be explained by comradery. As others around them follow the same path, it must be sane. Girls however are presented with no vision of a future whatsoever and may either be born with looks sufficient to fit the vision of becoming a young mother and house wife. Or not - in which case rather than following a beaten track along with their "bro's" they question what they want to do with their lives. School is often one way out for them. What will be their way out of home schooling?
My arm is getting quite sore from the fork now so i'll stop writing/stabbing but yeah in conclusion - you've basically been arguing over the concept of rumspringa. Is there potential for a happy life being Amish? Sure, but choosing to limit ourselves is choosing a mild form of lobotomy, it's a choice that's perhaps ok to make for yourself but not for your kids.
Rumspringa is not a functioning concept. Nor is homeschooling. They're denial at the expense of your children, limiting their most precious gift and your main responsibility to grant them as a parent - choice.
I don't understand why people are so quick to say that school's purpose is to teach you how to deal with idiots or put up with crap. People are going to learn about that no matter what; we've been learning it for thousands of years so far, and universal education has only been a popular concept for a couple centuries. I think the principle focus of school should be education, above anything else. Not sports, not school spirit, not teaching you how the real world works. Unfortunately, most people don't really care about education, and schools are also incredibly important in many communities for the welfare opportunities they provide (I don't say this in opposition, but in acknowledgement) in the form of transportation, daycare, and free food.
Obviously homeschooling is not for every family, or even for most families. I actually think that it should be encouraged that parents send their kids to school, if only because the average person is retarded, and the only way their children might not be retarded is if they are taught by someone less retarded than their parents. Nobody is advocating that everybody homeschool, but rather that homeschooling is a way to escape from the stupidity that you mentioned, like girls not having futures and men only being able to be sports stars.
I've always been great at learning, but I'm horrible at school. From my experience, students who are great at learning but bad at school loved classes that were graded heavily on the test and hated classes that were graded heavily on assignments, because if you genuinely understood the material there was very little chance you would fuck up on a test but having to suffer through the 'busy work' of assignments was a chore, while students who did really well at school wanted assignment heavy classes because the assignments were garunteed points if you spent the time to do them and lessened the 'randomness' of studying for a test (oh god, nothing I studied was on the test!).
??? Perhaps our school environments are different but I have never experienced this. Maybe it is because I go to an all-male school with mostly male teachers, but most of my courses have been at least 50% (usually more like 60-70%) of your final grade determined by the tests and quizzes you take throughout the year + midterms and finals. I get what you mean about tests, and I don't know what kind of busy work you are talking about, but honestly most classes are 0min - 30min per night of work, and I take the hardest classes possible. There is reading, but not too much. I always feel like the tests have made sense and the smart people (not the "OMG I studied for like four hours" -> 82 kind of people) have always made good grades. TBH it is kind of a trope for young males on the internet to think that they are these as yet undiscovered geniuses destined to be great physicists. I have yet to meet these "geniuses" who somehow do not manage to get good grades in HS in real life.
What a great discussion! I voted in agreement with Red more than Blue, but right about now I actually am not sure and find myself thinking there isn't enough evidence to support either side.
Some people in this thread have commented on how unschooling has worked out great for them; that's obviously great, but I think the real question is how true is it in general?
For some intelligent, self-sufficient kids, who read about a wide variety of subjects (or simply *know* what they want to be and have a passion for it), school may easily slow their development. And if they're able to join clubs and organizations that make up for the loss of social interactions at school, then there really is no problem. But there is also the equal possibility that some kids may not have the drive to learn and explore a variety of subjects, who may prefer to enclose themselves and play games and not learn certain fundamental skills that will be required when they get older and need to start supporting themselves. They may discover they want to pursue certain studies and find themselves unprepared. Additionally, if they tend to be shy, introverted children, it may be much more difficult to make friends outside of a school setting, in spite of the bullying that may be present.
I think both sides should acknowledge that there is a place for schooling and unschooling, and it really depends on the child and their parents.
It is a very difficult question to answer whether schooling is still necessary. We would need to study kids in general, and see how capable they truly are when left to explore the world on their own. In theory if they are capable (i.e. they expose themselves to a wide variety of subjects, and learn well on their own or with a tutor), and can find ways to socialize outside of a traditional school setting, then unschooling is better when compared to formal schooling (ignoring formal requirements needed to gain entrance into university - I think the question being asked is more fundamental).
But then a new question arises - what if we significantly modify school to be more of a place where students can socialize, and where they are free to learn whatever they want, and when they decide on an area, there is an educator available to instruct that student? Then that would be even better than unschooling, and would become the new ideal choice (I know some of these schools already exist in Europe and elsewhere).
I guess to finish off, what we can say about school as it exists today is that it is a safe bedrock, and that kids are more or less guaranteed to gain the necessary tools to work and communicate in the world.
Whether its necessary really requires scientific study and understanding of how capable children are. And if they are capable, I think we need to make schools much more open and flexible for the student.
On January 09 2014 07:13 radscorpion9 wrote: But then a new question arises - what if we significantly modify school to be more of a place where students can socialize, and where they are free to learn whatever they want, and when they decide on an area, there is an educator available to instruct that student? Then that would be even better than unschooling, and would become the new ideal choice (I know some of these schools already exist in Europe and elsewhere).
This is definitely the best option, if not just for the sole reason that it's extremely common now that both parents will be working. This takes the responsibility out of the hands of the parents and into the hands of trained professionals. If class sizes were a lot smaller and curriculum could be significantly more flexible to meet the needs of students individually then school would be better than homeschooling in almost every case.
Of course this is miles away from where our current school system is, and is a very ideal scenario and may not really be economically feasible unless it's a very expensive private school.
I am in favor of homeschooling by competent parents over the current school system, but as far as the government's role in it: they should be improving the school system much more rapidly than the embarrassment of what is happening at the moment (hint: standardized tests are not the solution).
On January 09 2014 07:13 radscorpion9 wrote: What a great discussion! I voted in agreement with Red more than Blue, but right about now I actually am not sure and find myself thinking there isn't enough evidence to support either side.
Some people in this thread have commented on how unschooling has worked out great for them; that's obviously great, but I think the real question is how true is it in general?
For some intelligent, self-sufficient kids, who read about a wide variety of subjects, school may easily slow their development. And if they're able to join clubs and organizations that make up for the loss of social interactions at school, then there really is no problem. But there is also the equal possibility that some kids may not have the drive to learn and explore a variety of subjects, who may prefer to enclose themselves and play games and not learn certain fundamental skills that will be required when they get older and need to start supporting themselves. They may discover they want to pursue certain studies and find themselves unprepared. Additionally, if they tend to be shy, introverted children, it may be much more difficult to make friends outside of a school setting, in spite of the bullying that may be present.
I think both sides should acknowledge that there is a place for schooling and unschooling, and it really depends on the child and their parents.
It is a very difficult question to answer whether schooling is still necessary. We would need to study kids in general, and see how capable they truly are when left to explore the world on their own. In theory if they are capable (i.e. they are exposed to a wide variety of subjects, and learn well on their own or with a tutor), and can find ways to socialize outside of a traditional school setting, then unschooling is better when compared to formal schooling (ignoring formal requirements needed to gain entrance into university - I think the question being asked is more fundamental).
But then a new question arises - what if we significantly modify school to be more of a place where students can socialize, and where they are free to learn whatever they want, and when they decide on an area, there is an educator available to instruct that student? Then that would be even better than unschooling, and would become the new ideal choice (I know some of these schools already exist in Europe and elsewhere).
I guess to finish off, what we can say about school as it exists today is that it is a safe bedrock, and that kids are more or less guaranteed to gain the necessary tools to work and communicate in the world.
Whether its necessary really requires scientific study and understanding of how capable children are. And if they are capable, I think we need to make schools much more open and flexible for the student.
I completely agree with this. The main problem is choice I think, we just don't have it.
There are a few problems in education that need to be fixed
- Children need more flexibility in schools, right now every child is treated like an item on a manufacturing line. Only problem is kids learn different things at different rates and classes soon become either too boring or too difficult for them, causing them to hate it.
- All subjects, and I mean ALL OF THEM (except for the last 2 years of high school), have no real world applicability. Maths geeks can yell to their hearts content but how many of them make 6 figure sums and can market like Steve Jobs? This makes the classes seem completely pointless to students.
- We need to stop using grades as a metric. The biggest problem with the "social" schools you talked about is that the students almost inevitably end up having worse test scores compared to other schools. So even if it is more beneficial later in life, a lot of parents will freak out and pull their kids out and put them back in traditional schools.
I would also support an alternative to testing generally . I think its necessary at the moment to have some way of gauging development, but it would be great if we didn't place so much stress on one or two big exams. Europe once again trying out things in this area...I always forget which country though
On January 09 2014 07:30 radscorpion9 wrote: I would also support an alternative to testing generally . I think its necessary at the moment to have some way of gauging development, but it would be great if we didn't place so much stress on one or two big exams. Europe once again trying out things in this area...I always forget which country though
I personally love tests since I excel at them, but I agree that school needs to be changed to play to the strengths of different people rather than just rewarding people who learn and demonstrate knowledge in a particular way.
On January 09 2014 07:26 sluggaslamoo wrote: - All subjects, and I mean ALL OF THEM (except for the last 2 years of high school), have no real world applicability. Maths geeks can yell to their hearts content but how many of them make 6 figure sums and can market like Steve Jobs? This makes the classes seem completely pointless to students.
Schools are not about 'real world applicability' - they're about showing you the basics in a variety of disciplines so you can make a better choice for further education. Heck, even colleges / universities don't really teach anything 'directly applicable' to workplace tasks, that's really not the point of it at all. Neither is teaching people to make 6 figure sums - you do realize that the world needs other things than an army of Steve Jobses, surely.
On January 09 2014 07:13 radscorpion9 wrote: What a great discussion! I voted in agreement with Red more than Blue, but right about now I actually am not sure and find myself thinking there isn't enough evidence to support either side.
Some people in this thread have commented on how unschooling has worked out great for them; that's obviously great, but I think the real question is how true is it in general?
For some intelligent, self-sufficient kids, who read about a wide variety of subjects, school may easily slow their development. And if they're able to join clubs and organizations that make up for the loss of social interactions at school, then there really is no problem. But there is also the equal possibility that some kids may not have the drive to learn and explore a variety of subjects, who may prefer to enclose themselves and play games and not learn certain fundamental skills that will be required when they get older and need to start supporting themselves. They may discover they want to pursue certain studies and find themselves unprepared. Additionally, if they tend to be shy, introverted children, it may be much more difficult to make friends outside of a school setting, in spite of the bullying that may be present.
I think both sides should acknowledge that there is a place for schooling and unschooling, and it really depends on the child and their parents.
It is a very difficult question to answer whether schooling is still necessary. We would need to study kids in general, and see how capable they truly are when left to explore the world on their own. In theory if they are capable (i.e. they are exposed to a wide variety of subjects, and learn well on their own or with a tutor), and can find ways to socialize outside of a traditional school setting, then unschooling is better when compared to formal schooling (ignoring formal requirements needed to gain entrance into university - I think the question being asked is more fundamental).
But then a new question arises - what if we significantly modify school to be more of a place where students can socialize, and where they are free to learn whatever they want, and when they decide on an area, there is an educator available to instruct that student? Then that would be even better than unschooling, and would become the new ideal choice (I know some of these schools already exist in Europe and elsewhere).
I guess to finish off, what we can say about school as it exists today is that it is a safe bedrock, and that kids are more or less guaranteed to gain the necessary tools to work and communicate in the world.
Whether its necessary really requires scientific study and understanding of how capable children are. And if they are capable, I think we need to make schools much more open and flexible for the student.
All subjects, and I mean ALL OF THEM (except for the last 2 years of high school), have no real world applicability. Maths geeks can yell to their hearts content but how many of them make 6 figure sums and can market like Steve Jobs? This makes the classes seem completely pointless to students.
Math geeks don't make six figure wages? This is news to me.
I've always been great at learning, but I'm horrible at school. From my experience, students who are great at learning but bad at school loved classes that were graded heavily on the test and hated classes that were graded heavily on assignments, because if you genuinely understood the material there was very little chance you would fuck up on a test but having to suffer through the 'busy work' of assignments was a chore, while students who did really well at school wanted assignment heavy classes because the assignments were garunteed points if you spent the time to do them and lessened the 'randomness' of studying for a test (oh god, nothing I studied was on the test!).
??? Perhaps our school environments are different but I have never experienced this. Maybe it is because I go to an all-male school with mostly male teachers, but most of my courses have been at least 50% (usually more like 60-70%) of your final grade determined by the tests and quizzes you take throughout the year + midterms and finals. I get what you mean about tests, and I don't know what kind of busy work you are talking about, but honestly most classes are 0min - 30min per night of work, and I take the hardest classes possible. There is reading, but not too much. I always feel like the tests have made sense and the smart people (not the "OMG I studied for like four hours" -> 82 kind of people) have always made good grades. TBH it is kind of a trope for young males on the internet to think that they are these as yet undiscovered geniuses destined to be great physicists. I have yet to meet these "geniuses" who somehow do not manage to get good grades in HS in real life.
Maybe I phrased that poorly / too generally, but it seems like you assumed when I said 'liked' I meant 'did well in'. I actually got pretty good grades throughout high school and did most of the assignments ect, I just hated classes that were 50% test 50% assignments because it meant just learning / knowing wasn't enough for me in that class, I had to spend lots of time putting that on paper even though my teachers knew I knew it. Generally speaking people who thought about what they learned in class beyond memorizing it for the next test weren't afraid when the final tests rolled around because they had actually learned the material.
i don't think you should tell people you are red before they vote, it creates bias.
i do think that with the internet and proper motivation, children will develop more useful life skills that are suited for the 21st century workforce than those who are currently participating in the education system out of forcible necessity. however, i do think that blue's ideals are a little extreme and he is walking a fine line between home schooling and negligence. i believe that most children stand to gain more from school than the select few that would benefit from being outside of school.
one thing in particular that i have always pondered was the effect of sleep deprivation on adolescents. teenagers are growing and it's natural for them sleep upwards of 9 hours - this is a biological fact. i don't remember any student from high school that got more than 9 hours of sleep on weekdays. they would have to go to bed before 10.
EPT
. I think its necessary at the moment to have some way of gauging development, but it would be great if we didn't place so much stress on one or two big exams. Europe once again trying out things in this area...I always forget which country though
