(no subject)
Why is it that most of my friends hated school?
Growing up in the US means that you are required to obtain a certifiable education. The government provides for a huge, lumbering public school system that has the kind of momentum you might associate with a small planet, but you don't necessarily have to attend it. This doesn't prevent everyone from paying for it, but that's not really the point. It is good to have a freely available system of education; this is one of those things that just *is*. Knowing more helps you to do more, to understand more, to be deliberate in avoiding harm and promoting well-being. Given enough time and a sufficiency of paper I could write up explanations linking every school lesson I remember to its useful-in-life, so-what meaning. I could write up explanations for the ones I don't remember, but I would need to look them up first (and really, the ones I remember almost have to matter in real life, or I wouldn't remember them...)
" 'Well, the traveling teachers do come through every few months,' said the Baron.
'Yes, sir, I know, sir, and they're useless, sir. They teach facts, not understanding. It's like teaching people about forests by showing them a saw. I want a proper school, sir, to teach reading and writing, and most of all thinking, sir, so people can find what they're good at, because someone doing what they really like is always an asset to any country, and too often people never find out until it's too late.'...
'Learning is about finding out who you are, what you are, where you are and what you're standing on and what you are good at and what's over the horizon, and, well, everything.' "
--Terry Pratchett
I am not saying that the public school system is wrong because that would ignore the fact that people come out of it capable, knowledgeable, and willing to learn still more. What I am saying is that our public school system is not right enough. It shouldn't be such a war to change the things we teach and the way we teach them, as if evolution and adaptation only happen to things that contain DNA. Considering the size, completely rebuilding the school system would involve an unacceptable stretch of down-time, and redesigning the system would be like expecting a man with a peg leg to remain standing when you snatch it out from under him to exchange it for a more modern prosthetic.
Growing up in the US means that you are required to obtain a certifiable education. The government provides for a huge, lumbering public school system that has the kind of momentum you might associate with a small planet, but you don't necessarily have to attend it. This doesn't prevent everyone from paying for it, but that's not really the point. It is good to have a freely available system of education; this is one of those things that just *is*. Knowing more helps you to do more, to understand more, to be deliberate in avoiding harm and promoting well-being. Given enough time and a sufficiency of paper I could write up explanations linking every school lesson I remember to its useful-in-life, so-what meaning. I could write up explanations for the ones I don't remember, but I would need to look them up first (and really, the ones I remember almost have to matter in real life, or I wouldn't remember them...)
" 'Well, the traveling teachers do come through every few months,' said the Baron.
'Yes, sir, I know, sir, and they're useless, sir. They teach facts, not understanding. It's like teaching people about forests by showing them a saw. I want a proper school, sir, to teach reading and writing, and most of all thinking, sir, so people can find what they're good at, because someone doing what they really like is always an asset to any country, and too often people never find out until it's too late.'...
'Learning is about finding out who you are, what you are, where you are and what you're standing on and what you are good at and what's over the horizon, and, well, everything.' "
--Terry Pratchett
I am not saying that the public school system is wrong because that would ignore the fact that people come out of it capable, knowledgeable, and willing to learn still more. What I am saying is that our public school system is not right enough. It shouldn't be such a war to change the things we teach and the way we teach them, as if evolution and adaptation only happen to things that contain DNA. Considering the size, completely rebuilding the school system would involve an unacceptable stretch of down-time, and redesigning the system would be like expecting a man with a peg leg to remain standing when you snatch it out from under him to exchange it for a more modern prosthetic.