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Thread: What was wrong with how kids were taught 40 to 50 years ago?

  1. #16
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    Quote Originally Posted by Save Us View Post
    Kid's need to educated to what the public demand will be for their services. There are tens of millions of kids at home that got degrees in fields for which there is no demand. Consequently there will be a student loan default now up to 1.3 trillion because college prices are ridiculous and there is no work for people that have sociology, political science, communication, english, history etc.

    Yeah, math is hard and requires work but getting kids to love math, engineering, technology, science, robotics, is where the jobs are and will be for some time. There is no mystery here.
    Well, we have a severe shortage of domestic engineers for sure, but lets be real here. There is no way for the educational system to adjust to the market demands. This is why we give children a holistic Primary education, and let them begin selecting areas of interest in high school with the assistance of guidance counselors. Of course since there is no money for counselors anymore and they have been cut to the bone, we have a large gap in that area throughout the country. No counselors, no direction. Just another casualty of "Race to the Top".

    Teaching kids with the focus on 1 particular area seems like a terrible idea that sets them up for even more failure.

  2. #17
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jeff View Post
    Well, we have a severe shortage of domestic engineers for sure, but lets be real here. There is no way for the educational system to adjust to the market demands. This is why we give children a holistic Primary education, and let them begin selecting areas of interest in high school with the assistance of guidance counselors. Of course since there is no money for counselors anymore and they have been cut to the bone, we have a large gap in that area throughout the country. No counselors, no direction. Just another casualty of "Race to the Top".

    Teaching kids with the focus on 1 particular area seems like a terrible idea that sets them up for even more failure.
    I suppose there are several definitions of failure... Fundamentally college or schooling is an investment with anticipated return. Depends on what you want your return to be. Getting a degree or skill in something with public demand is not a race to the top, it's called employment.

    There is absolutely a way to adjust the educational system to meet market demands. Place an emphasis on math, science. It's a matter of redirecting, the same way we have been doing since the little red single classroom schoolhouses.

    I am not saying to eschew core well rounded curriculum, I am saying that we need to expose kids to those fields that will be in demand, which means getting comfortable with math, science engineering, technology. We have to ask ourselves why there are record number of college graduates living at home these days and how that can be avoided.

    Simply put it means pursuing those careers for which there is public demand.. Johnny might want to be an archeologist,, but there are no jobs he may have to go to trade school which actually trains you to do something with practical application. Many kids are lazy and simply do not want to put the effort into things, there are no shortage of chinese, vietnamese, indians, koreans that come here for an education that get the picture, and ultimately employment. In Germany the trades are big thing and not looked down on. The US is math weak, and there are record numbers of college graduates that had a wonderful college experience , but are now living at home.

    There are no right or wrong choices, just consequences, you may love History just be prepared to have to hone your culinary skills at Mickey D's. The plumber, electrician etc is putting food on the table.
    Last edited by Save Us; April 16th, 2015 at 01:27 PM.

  3. #18
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jeff View Post
    Well, we have a severe shortage of domestic engineers for sure, but lets be real here. There is no way for the educational system to adjust to the market demands. This is why we give children a holistic Primary education, and let them begin selecting areas of interest in high school with the assistance of guidance counselors. Of course since there is no money for counselors anymore and they have been cut to the bone, we have a large gap in that area throughout the country. No counselors, no direction. Just another casualty of "Race to the Top".

    Teaching kids with the focus on 1 particular area seems like a terrible idea that sets them up for even more failure.


    False. The education system can adjust but the various unions will not allow for the necessary changes to happen.

    An example of a critical change is language studies in your 'holistic' primary education. Students should be offered, if not required, courses in development languages. The value teaching Spanish or French has considerably less value to a programming language. Similar to the cross-pollination value found in taking latin, programming languages help with math related materials.

    The challenge with implementing technical languages in schools is it requires ongoing education for teachers to keep up. Unlike Spanish or French, where they can hit cruise control for 30 years, these languages require a commitment.

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    Quote Originally Posted by leftWNYbecauseofBS View Post
    False. The education system can adjust but the various unions will not allow for the necessary changes to happen.

    An example of a critical change is language studies in your 'holistic' primary education. Students should be offered, if not required, courses in development languages. The value teaching Spanish or French has considerably less value to a programming language. Similar to the cross-pollination value found in taking latin, programming languages help with math related materials.

    The challenge with implementing technical languages in schools is it requires ongoing education for teachers to keep up. Unlike Spanish or French, where they can hit cruise control for 30 years, these languages require a commitment.
    No, you missed my point when I was responding to Save Us.

    If at the time a child begins schooling, there is a large need for profession A, and then half way or three quarters the way through that child educations Profession A becomes obsolete its almost too late to start teaching to Profession B.

    What you are pointing out is a need for additional curriculum. Specifically something along the lines of programming. I agree that these should be offered and in fact they are offered in schools throughout WNY along with additional technical programs such as Cisco CCNA courses.

    These need to be in place in addition to the current foreign languages. One of my current clients is constantly seeking technically skilled resources that speak multiple languages.

    The best and brightest people I have ever worked with speak multiple languages and/or are musically fluent in multiple instruments. There are known correlations between the two.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Save Us View Post
    I suppose there are several definitions of failure... Fundamentally college or schooling is an investment with anticipated return. Depends on what you want your return to be. Getting a degree or skill in something with public demand is not a race to the top, it's called employment.

    There is absolutely a way to adjust the educational system to meet market demands. Place an emphasis on math, science. It's a matter of redirecting, the same way we have been doing since the little red single classroom schoolhouses.

    I am not saying to eschew core well rounded curriculum, I am saying that we need to expose kids to those fields that will be in demand, which means getting comfortable with math, science engineering, technology. We have to ask ourselves why there are record number of college graduates living at home these days and how that can be avoided.

    Simply put it means pursuing those careers for which there is public demand.. Johnny might want to be an archeologist,, but there are no jobs he may have to go to trade school which actually trains you to do something with practical application. Many kids are lazy and simply do not want to put the effort into things, there are no shortage of chinese, vietnamese, indians, koreans that come here for an education that get the picture, and ultimately employment. In Germany the trades are big thing and not looked down on. The US is math weak, and there are record numbers of college graduates that had a wonderful college experience , but are now living at home.

    There are no right or wrong choices, just consequences, you may love History just be prepared to have to hone your culinary skills at Mickey D's. The plumber, electrician etc is putting food on the table.
    Yes, history is a dead profession that has not taught anyone anything.....

  6. #21
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    Quote Originally Posted by Save Us View Post
    There is absolutely a way to adjust the educational system to meet market demands. Place an emphasis on math, science.
    I've read way to many tech manuals written by very bright scientist who lacked any comprehensible language art skills. The mind is not a computer. Feeding it only science and math will result in a decreasing creativity and social skills. A liberal arts education is what aids us in using plain old information to create knowledge.

    Now, I do agree that there is a large part of the population that are not capable of moving pass acquiring information into the realm of creating knowledge - but again, a liberal arts education focus in the mandatory education years lets us filter out those who can from those who can't. Those who can't will end up working for those who can. Nothing wrong with that - it's the way of the world. But we shouldn't eliminate the opportunity for those who can to find out they can simply because those who can't also find their limitations in the process.

    "The value of an education in a liberal arts college is not the learning of many facts but the training of the mind to think something that cannot be learned from textbooks." —Albert Einstein

    Steve Jobs famously had a street sign on stage as he gave one of his presentations at Apple. One street was named “Technology” and the cross street was named “Liberal Arts.” Jobs said, “It’s in Apple’s DNA that technology alone is not enough—it’s technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the result that makes our heart sing, and nowhere is that more true than in these post-PC devices.” Jobs even credited a course in calligraphy that he audited at Reed College as the source of his vision for the design of Apple products.

  7. #22
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jeff View Post
    No, you missed my point when I was responding to Save Us.

    If at the time a child begins schooling, there is a large need for profession A, and then half way or three quarters the way through that child educations Profession A becomes obsolete its almost too late to start teaching to Profession B.
    I can see the spectrum on this. On one site you're correct. Schools should not be teaching to a specific profession. However, and in my opinion as well, schools should move away from trying to teach such a wide spectrum for all of K-12.

    The primary and secondary education system today places to much emphasis on college. I think in part this is done to pass off the burden of having a child prepared for the 'real world' once they leave High School.


    Quote Originally Posted by Jeff View Post
    What you are pointing out is a need for additional curriculum. Specifically something along the lines of programming. I agree that these should be offered and in fact they are offered in schools throughout WNY along with additional technical programs such as Cisco CCNA courses.

    These need to be in place in addition to the current foreign languages. One of my current clients is constantly seeking technically skilled resources that speak multiple languages. The best and brightest people I have ever worked with speak multiple languages and/or are musically fluent in multiple instruments. There are known correlations between the two.
    Both programming and secondary languages are key examples of why schools are broken.

    Take the changes in how math is being delivered to students. The kickback from parents is they don't understand it. The challenge for students is they don't know how to apply it. When we were in school you could find reward in memorizing tables and finding answers. The ability to understand and implement theory came much later in high school. By this time, you either had it or you didn't. Looping programming into the core with kids is necessary to have them understand how connectivity works. The parents are still not going to get it but the students would. The problem is you don't have schools setup to teach these changes correctly, both from a structure and a teachers perspective.

    I love the idea of common benchmarks and evaluations. I love the idea behind standardized curriculum. But as someone who also needs to consider throughput and results on a daily basis, I know you don't change the product without completely rebuilding the process. This is the game the teachers are playing. They are refusing to change the process and then point the finger at the product.

    To your point on languages and music, I disagree. Not in the value of each but rather the ability to actually deliver results. If you can't deliver results you either change the process or change the product. Trying to provide HS graduates with a secondary language has never really worked in our education system. Almost everyone I know who knows multiple languages did so in a simultaneous learning process. As you know, US schools focus on a sequential process and that's why the results are not there. For sequential to work you need language immersion and that does not happen unless your family also speaks the same languages. It's not like you can send kids off to Mexico or Spain when they are 12.

    Beyond this, a secondary language needs to be used to retained. A family member of mine was fluent in (Mexican) Spanish for years due to living there for over a year but now has lost most of her ability. On the other side, a friend of mine did learn Spanish via a sequential process but they also scored an almost perfect score on the SATs and is now an doctor who uses the language on a daily basis.

    My point is a secondary language should not be reached for if you can't deliver it. So it should in my opinion be something that is started in college and done with immersion and only for people who have gotten to a point in their lives where they know they are going to not only need it but use it.


    The best and the brightest you and I both know are not the best and the brightest because they know a secondary language or are musically fluent. Rather, they are musically fluent and know a second language because they are the best and the brightest. That said, everyone needs math and soon everyone will need to have some foundation to understand code. It's not a profession...it's just humanity.

  8. #23
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    Quote Originally Posted by nogods View Post
    I've read way to many tech manuals written by very bright scientist who lacked any comprehensible language art skills. The mind is not a computer. Feeding it only science and math will result in a decreasing creativity and social skills. A liberal arts education is what aids us in using plain old information to create knowledge.

    Now, I do agree that there is a large part of the population that are not capable of moving pass acquiring information into the realm of creating knowledge - but again, a liberal arts education focus in the mandatory education years lets us filter out those who can from those who can't. Those who can't will end up working for those who can. Nothing wrong with that - it's the way of the world. But we shouldn't eliminate the opportunity for those who can to find out they can simply because those who can't also find their limitations in the process.

    "The value of an education in a liberal arts college is not the learning of many facts but the training of the mind to think something that cannot be learned from textbooks." —Albert Einstein
    A perfect example of why the liberal mindset is so dangerous. You can't talk about the value of something without considering the cost.

    Sure there is benefit to one truly spending time to try and understand Kant. There is benefit for everyone in reading the works of Shakespeare. But to suggest their is value in that against someone going in debt to the point where you run have difficulty exploring the world on their own and applying what they learned is the problem. We need to change the way people find this knowledge. We need to modify the opportunity to how they apply that knowledge. Spending 4-5 years at a University and then 10-15 years chasing debt does not deliver any value. Either to the collective whole or the individual.

    A liberal arts education, IMHO, should be something that is done over a lifetime. The personal perspective is crucial to learning and the reality is many who receive a 'liberal arts' education are not learning but rather mirroring what they are told when they are 18-21. When they have almost no personal experience to relate to. What's the value of Hegel or Locke when all you know is living in your parents home or a dorm room? What's the value when you have never worked to support yourself or had the responsibility of supporting someone else? The answer is very little.

  9. #24
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    Quote Originally Posted by nogods View Post
    I've read way to many tech manuals written by very bright scientist who lacked any comprehensible language art skills. The mind is not a computer. Feeding it only science and math will result in a decreasing creativity and social skills. A liberal arts education is what aids us in using plain old information to create knowledge.

    Now, I do agree that there is a large part of the population that are not capable of moving pass acquiring information into the realm of creating knowledge - but again, a liberal arts education focus in the mandatory education years lets us filter out those who can from those who can't. Those who can't will end up working for those who can. Nothing wrong with that - it's the way of the world. But we shouldn't eliminate the opportunity for those who can to find out they can simply because those who can't also find their limitations in the process.

    "The value of an education in a liberal arts college is not the learning of many facts but the training of the mind to think something that cannot be learned from textbooks." —Albert Einstein
    There are two main reasons to get a college education, First, is personal enrichment independent of economic need. The second is return on investment. Smart people look at what the needs of society are when they are choosing a major.
    The law of the universe is supply and demand, it's what caused law degree salaries to decline for the first time in a decade not too long ago. Yet this is a degree that is the epitome of teaching you how to critically think and analyze. College ostensibly should teach one how to think along some specific subject lines, It may not necessarily train you to do anything.

    Exposing young people at an early age to those concepts that will be in demand is just plain smart, so we can avoid record numbers of college graduates living at home because they have chosen poorly with regard to what society is willing to open up their wallet to pay for regardless of how many degrees of separation in the transaction.

    It depends on what you want your return on investment to be.

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