Reforming the educational system

[jarofthoughts]

Some ways to achieve them, one is overhaul the format of text books, so they have a more indepth approach to a topic rather than what is simple too much information to have even a good look at a subject. Even in college, my world history book covers from the earliest civilizations up to 1650 CE, and the book is not much over 300 pages long. Needless to say, after you read a chapter you feel like you know very little about the civilizations or cultures that was covered.

Agreed.
While an overall view of human history is useful for completeness, one should endeavor to treat some of the periods/civilizations more in depth and thus making them more interesting, possibly spurring an interest for the pupils to learn more.
The same goes for science, although I have major beefs with how science is taught in general...
Not nearly enough focus on methodology and the logic behind them.

The ciriculum for teachers to become teachers needs to be more advanced, and they should all be made to have at least a masters degree.

Agreed, and we are moving towards a system like that in Norway, at least for upper elementary school and above.

Schools also need more funding, but the government building a few less bombs and war machines would easily help many schools. As well as schools also need to be more responsible with their money, and stop choking multiple departments so the sports teams can have more than what they need (such as letting players have regular jerseys instead of fancy and flashy looking ones.)

Also agreed.
Investing in education is one of the best investments a country can make.
However, and I assume you agree based on what you have said, it is equally important to make sure that money is well spent.

And then keeping religious morality out of what should be a secular institute really isn't that hard, and by doing so you open the doors for proper sex ed, keeping religious mythos out of science classes, and so on. This also enables teachers to teach about people and ways of life that may be controversial, even if they shouldn't such as teaching a child about Middle Easterners and Islam in a way that doesn't demonize them, or that some people love someone that is the same sex as them without fear that some parent will get offended because they have a narrow world-view.

In Norway this isn't much of a problem.
Any teacher who organized prayer in school would find themselves in a lot of trouble, and we already have proper sex-ed.
The pupils learn about puberty and reproduction in fifth grade and contraceptives and STDs in the eight grad.
It's all very clinical and factual, and it gets the message across.
More often than not, the school nurse helps out and (usually being female) holds classes just for the girls explaining how tampons and suchlike work.
Homosexuality is also talked about in a simple 'some boys fall in love with boys, and some girls fall in love with girls, and that's alright' kind of way.
The sex-ed classes are mandatory and there is no opting out of them.

The Teachers Union also needs to have a check and balance against them, that way schools can actually fire bad teachers without having the teachers union coming after them.

While I agree in principle I am also well aware that measuring how good or bad a teacher is can be a challenge in and of itself.
Don't get me wrong, I've seen plenty of 'colleagues' who should never have set foot in a classroom, but one must realize that at some schools the teacher is doing a damn good job if non of their pupils become criminals at the end of the semester, while at others they're doing badly if their class has less than a B+ average.

 

[jarofthoughts]

Yes, indeed. I've been out of the classroom now for 4 years, but much of what has been said here is being implemented already, at least by younger teachers here in Canada. One of the problems was always getting older teachers to buy into a new 'system'. Stuck in your ways was indeed a problem.

The acceptance that kids are all individual in the head as much as in the body is a great start. We can see it in the body, but not so in the head. They are all wired differently, and teachers need to individualise as much as is functionally possible. The lower class sizes the better. Fifteen would be nice. Kids can self-learn, and learn from other kids as much as thy can from any teacher. We need to teach them how to learn, not teach them. Its impossible to teach them very much at all of what there is to know.

Here in Canada there is a tremendous disconnect between the theory guys (read university professors) and the policy makers (read government people in charge of education) and those guys should be spending at least one third of their job either in a classroom working, or at the very least, observing. They tend to forget what children are after awhile, and need constant reminders.

Many places here are doing without textbooks now, although they are handy things if you're lazy. They don't allow for enough room top go way off topic if the kids get interested in something. Curricula needs to make room for that, and often it doesn't.

So yeah, I wasn't an ordinary teacher, and I have a lot of ideas, but implementation of anything is a heckuva lot harder than it sounds.

I agree with all of the above, but as you say, implementation is difficult, especially when the system is working against you.
For instance, I have not once heard of the policy-makers actually ask the people doing the job (i.e. the teachers) how they think it should be done.
As for individual adaptation, teachers in Norway are actually required to teach the curriculum individually adapted to the various pupils in their class, but as you mentioned, this is all but impossible in a class with 30+ pupils.
15-20 pupils (max) is a more realistic approach.

 

[Alceste]

I'm just going to say, as someone who fell through the public school system without really much of any notice, and who eventually ended up at a ****** Christian "school", and ended up dropping out (I got my G.E.D. within a year though), that I really think that I, and many people I saw fall through the cracks too in that journey, would of benefited so much from such concepts that it would of impacted our lives in such a way that so many of us wouldn't be where we are now, dropped out, stuck in poverty, or whatever. Right now, if someone was there to actually help me back when I everything started to go so drastically downhill (it wasn't as if there were not a million signs), I would NOW, RIGHT NOW-be in my THIRD year of college. But I'm not, I'm stuck below the poverty line, with simply a G.E.D. and enough emotional problems to ensure that holding any jobs I am lucky enough to be hired to (if I can find them in this economy!) is difficult at best.

Sorry to revive the zombie thread, but I never responded to this. You're not alone, bro! I had a bad experience with education myself, which is what got me thinking seriously about the subject. I didn't go to university because I did not think I could endure 4-7 more years of the extreme boredom I experienced for the previous 12 years. The system we have doesn't really serve anybody very well, and outliers (the very intelligent, the learning disabled, the highly curious, the under-achievers, the misfits, the kids who have more important issues at home to deal with, etc) are particularly badly served. When I graduated, all I wanted to do was get away.

But here, have a free pep talk: You're young. Don't give up on education. In retrospect, I kind of wish I had gone to uni when I was your age and studied any damn thing, and endured the boredom, because for the last 20 years my income has been seriously hampered due to the fact I don't have a degree. ANY degree is better than none. I'm almost 40 now and I've just about decided I'm going to get me one of those damn things (in music, which is what I do, mostly), but I'm going to be in school with a bunch of freaking teenagers. TEENAGERS! Do it while you are one, before you begin to understand why that is going to be a huge pain in the ***. That's my advice.

 

[Mathematician]

Computer science should be the fifth 'core.' We live in a society reliant on the Internet and electronics but the population is mostly ignorant about the functional aspect of the technology.

 

[Î Î¿Î»Ï Ï€Î­ÏÏ‡Ï‰Î½ Γʹ]

One thing that I would change is I would have more options for those who want to go into vocational school or learn a trade. I get the feeling that a lot of schooling is to prepare people to get a 9-5 desk job or to prepare them for college, but not everyone is cut out for that or wants to do that.

The curriculum should also change to involve learning a foreign language at an earlier age.

I think that a system similar to what currently exists in East Asia or in some parts of Europe should become more prevalent: after middle school, students participate in entrance exams for senior high schools, and are assigned to different schools based on how well they do. In my opinion this could have the benefit of allowing a promising but poor student to attend a better school, instead of sending him to one which is not so good because he happens to live in the wrong place.

Those who wish to can enter into vocational school if they want.

These are just a few thoughts, but not my whole take on the matter.

 

[Noaidi]

Too many schools are concerned with attainment of grades and how the grades of their school compares with those of others (we call them League Tables here in the UK). This idea of success based purely on grades needs to be removed for the sake of both pupils and teachers.

The definition of the word 'education' is to draw out or to bring forth. If we teachers are to truly be educators, then we must allow our pupils to take responsibility for their learning and allow them to understand the subject, to make mistakes and learn from them, to formulate and then change their opinions. We should be there as facilitators, allowing them to draw upon their own experiences and views within the context of the subject we are teaching. All too often, the focus is on getting them to remember stuff long enough to get it down on paper in order to get a grade. That isn't education.

I'm in favour of philosophy, critical thinking and methods of analysis being taught from an early age, not as topics to be tacked on to the later years of secondary school.

 

[Storm]

As I am writing a book on the rethinking of education, in particular the essential elementary school period, I figured it might be interesting to see what others think about this subject.

So, if you were to completely redo the educational system from scratch, how would you do it and what changes would you make?

Well, gotta say, I'm kind of stumped. The system in the USA is crap, and I have lots of ideas, but you're in Norway, and I have no clue what to recommend. Don't know what your problems are.

 

[Penumbra]

As I am writing a book on the rethinking of education, in particular the essential elementary school period, I figured it might be interesting to see what others think about this subject.

So, if you were to completely redo the educational system from scratch, how would you do it and what changes would you make?

I went to an average public school in the U.S. and I consider my public education to have been optimal. There's very little I would have changed about my education.

Many people say that the schools in the U.S. need to be redone, but in my opinion the biggest part of the problem has to do with culture and parents not valuing education enough, rather than the fault of the schools. There are some really poor inner city or rural schools that need improvement, but in my view the average school is not particularly terrible, but rather that students don't care enough and don't get enough push from home.

In my school, like many schools, there were different levels of difficulty for different students. So two students would receive considerably different heights of education at the school based on their aptitude and effort. So while the average results from my school system weren't great, the potential and opportunity was certainly there for students that had the aptitude and effort. So it's not the school I'd change; it's the parents and the culture.

That being said, I can observe two big improvements I'd like to see, which did not apply to me but would apply to others:

1) I had a whole class called "Critical Thinking", which most students did not have. It was about logic and strategy. I believe this should be standard for everyone. Learn fallacies, learn logic, learn the outlines of major philosophies, etc.

2) I think the U.S. system should be a bit more like some European systems where students start branching off into vocational schools earlier and more often. Teaching technical skills to students that are not going to go through four or more years of college seems pretty important in today's highly technical world.

 

[jarofthoughts]

One thing that I would change is I would have more options for those who want to go into vocational school or learn a trade. I get the feeling that a lot of schooling is to prepare people to get a 9-5 desk job or to prepare them for college, but not everyone is cut out for that or wants to do that.

Which vocations or trades would you include as options?

The curriculum should also change to involve learning a foreign language at an earlier age.

In Norway we teach English in the first grade (6 year olds).
Early enough?

 

[Penumbra]

I'll add:

3) Learning a language earlier. That's one area where I think my school system screwed up, as we had zero options for language until the ninth freaking grade.

 

[jarofthoughts]

Too many schools are concerned with attainment of grades and how the grades of their school compares with those of others (we call them League Tables here in the UK). This idea of success based purely on grades needs to be removed for the sake of both pupils and teachers.

Agreed.
Grades are nearly worthless as an incentive to learn and can in fact act as a deterrent and discourage some students.
I'm working on a completely different system of determining the various pupils' curricular progression.

The definition of the word 'education' is to draw out or to bring forth. If we teachers are to truly be educators, then we must allow our pupils to take responsibility for their learning and allow them to understand the subject, to make mistakes and learn from them, to formulate and then change their opinions. We should be there as facilitators, allowing them to draw upon their own experiences and views within the context of the subject we are teaching. All too often, the focus is on getting them to remember stuff long enough to get it down on paper in order to get a grade. That isn't education.

Also agreed.

I'm in favour of philosophy, critical thinking and methods of analysis being taught from an early age, not as topics to be tacked on to the later years of secondary school.

In Norway we teach philosophy from the second grade of elementary school, although I must admit, in a very wishy-washy manner...

 

[jarofthoughts]

Well, gotta say, I'm kind of stumped. The system in the USA is crap, and I have lots of ideas, but you're in Norway, and I have no clue what to recommend. Don't know what your problems are.

Doesn't matter.
How we do education shouldn't be a national or cultural thing.
Minds are minds and what works in one country should work in another.

 

[jarofthoughts]

I went to an average public school in the U.S. and I consider my public education to have been optimal. There's very little I would have changed about my education.

Many people say that the schools in the U.S. need to be redone, but in my opinion the biggest part of the problem has to do with culture and parents not valuing education enough, rather than the fault of the schools. There are some really poor inner city or rural schools that need improvement, but in my view the average school is not particularly terrible, but rather that students don't care enough and don't get enough push from home.

I would love to see more parents get involved in their children's education.
For some, it is viewed mostly as a place they send their kids for a number of hours every day, and not something they should really care about.
My observation is that the kids who have parents who engage them regarding their education do much much better than those who have parents who do not.
Pretty obvious, right?

In my school, like many schools, there were different levels of difficulty for different students. So two students would receive considerably different heights of education at the school based on their aptitude and effort. So while the average results from my school system weren't great, the potential and opportunity was certainly there for students that had the aptitude and effort. So it's not the school I'd change; it's the parents and the culture.

I'm hoping to design a system in which individual progression is built into the system and not so dependent on what the individual teacher or school is putting in place, in in which the pupils to some degree can decide for themselves which paths to take.

That being said, I can observe two big improvements I'd like to see, which did not apply to me but would apply to others:

1) I had a whole class called "Critical Thinking", which most students did not have. It was about logic and strategy. I believe this should be standard for everyone. Learn fallacies, learn logic, learn the outlines of major philosophies, etc.

Agreed.

2) I think the U.S. system should be a bit more like some European systems where students start branching off into vocational schools earlier and more often. Teaching technical skills to students that are not going to go through four or more years of college seems pretty important in today's highly technical world.

Which vocations do you think should be included?

 

[Penumbra]

I would love to see more parents get involved in their children's education.
For some, it is viewed mostly as a place they send their kids for a number of hours every day, and not something they should really care about.
My observation is that the kids who have parents who engage them regarding their education do much much better than those who have parents who do not.
Pretty obvious, right?

I'm hoping to design a system in which individual progression is built into the system and not so dependent on what the individual teacher or school is putting in place, in in which the pupils to some degree can decide for themselves which paths to take.

Agreed.

In my school system, students could decided for themselves which paths to take if they met the qualifications.

Some of the paths had no qualifications. Others had qualifications for grades. One type had a qualification based on an IQ test in person with a counselor (although unlike the other paths this one needed an invite).

These were long-term paths in separate classrooms, not just students being given extra work on the side. The names changed throughout the different schools but it was basically like "basic", "accelerated", "honors", and "gifted", with different teachers, different class sizes, and different material to learn, or often the same material but at different paces and to a different depth. It was standardized throughout the school system, but other school systems had similar approaches. (Ours was noted for putting a slightly stronger emphasis on it than is typical.)

And personally, almost none of my motivation came from teachers. It came from my parents, instilled at kindergarten age. I didn't need a reason to do well in school; it was expected by my family. The idea of not striving to do well in school just literally didn't cross my mind. In my school system, there were all sorts of levels and resources available to students but a large percentage of them did not care, did not take advantage of them, did not put in effort, and had disciplinary issues or a lack of motivation to learn. So I view that almost entirely as a parental issue rather than an issue with the schools.

When people complain about the school system I think they should just focus on their own household, at least for the most part. Maybe the rise in double-income-earning households has affected it, or maybe even parents that are home just don't put in the effort. There are specific schools that certainly need improvement in especially impoverished areas, but the overarching problem is something I view to be broadly cultural.

Which vocations do you think should be included?

Well I'm not the best person for that but basically things like electrical work, computer work, mechanical shop proficiency, etc. Things that are professions that require more hands on experience and less class room schooling, and that can pay a living wage due to the genuine skill and experience it takes to be good at it.

Lots of people get college degrees that don't work well in industry. That's fine and all, unless students are going into debt to get them because it's considered normal to do so. Others just aren't college material, for any number of reasons, and different schooling and professions work better for them.

In my school system, students could choose between two different high schools: the "regular" one and the vocational one. I think the vocational one could be highlighted more and started earlier. The students that didn't graduate from the regular one, or who graduated with poor grades and didn't go to college, ended up mostly working minimum wage jobs. So if it's understood that only a subset of them will go to college, there has to be good plans in place for those that don't go to college, which means skilled trades.

 

[Noaidi]

"Before he went to school he could read the bark of trees, leaf veins, seashell-convolutions, footprints, and the touch of fingers.

Now he goes to school and he can only read words."​

Jennifer Farley