Is Traditional Schooling a Thing of the Past?

A very good answer! Communication skills may look different as the media change, but the basics remain.

Going by the spate of recent posts in CR4, i do believe that traditional education is well and truly dead. In fact, education itself, in any form !

i am convinced that there is a small bunch of some sort of beings out there who have access to computers and are randomly typing posts to CR4 on it

Ron, you must have had school television also in your days, not?

I went to school in the 40's and 50's. No TV. Maybe a 16mm training film now and then. Teachers back then were respected. Most of us hated school, but we learned. The school system back then made sure you did. You didn't graduate to the next class if you failed. You had to repeat the entire semester.

Very thought provoking question Ronseto.

When I was growing up, Education was about how to find the information that you needed. Once you found it in a book or journal in a library somewhere, you knew it was good information (or at least how to judge it) because someone had made quite an investment to get it into print.

Today, The internet and electronic tools make it easy to publish any and all sorts of hogwash, and slick sometimes seems more impressive than authentic.

So I see the fundamental problem to day to be the oppositie of the one we had earlier of finding info.

Today the problem is sorting out the crap in all the info so easily available. Editing and critical thinking.

WHich by the way, Is why I teach a course in Critical thinking for first term MBA;'s so that they can sort the BS from the Diamonds as they proceed in their education.

Editing. Critical thinking. Not so much finding and knowing. Evaluating, and understanding how to use.

Milo

Of course there is a lot of crap on the internet that needs to be separated from the valuable stuff. When looking for good information, I search various "books-on-line" sites for reference material by reputatable authors. Google has a great site where you can read entire books that are out of print. I believe there is a project going on (or might be up and running) to digitize the Library of Congress collection. I don't rely on chat rooms or gossip columns for good info. The internet can be a "one stop shop" for good info.

I wonder sometimes how much of the 'traditional education' came with the punctuation provided by a yardstick slapping on the desk? My point being, learning is intensified when focus is intensified. More people have learned foreign languages due to lust than... again.. focus is key. Learning in context of reality, especially under duress, (combat?) produces working knowledge far superior to a simple conglomeration of information.

There is a system called super-learning that I've read about, that reports that specific rhythm music helps the mind dilate into a zone (alpha frequency)... a learning focus, very easily, and that the information learned has far better retention and recall.

What you learned as a child tends to be what you remember the most as an adult, especially as a senior, while the events of today can be a blur. (wheress my denturss honey?) The young mind tends to experience life with greater intensity. (generally)

The mind has a great deal of influence over the intensity, integrity, and overall usability of the material learned. Find the interest or excitement in the knowledge or experience, and you will retain the information.

Chris

Major (but politely) disagree. We homeschooled our brood up to high school. One graduated in top percentages of her class at West Point, Other got a free ride for her Masters in Education because of her scholarship and academic ability, My son is currently in university.

Socialization is not the issue, "proper socialization" could be.

My wife was scout leader for the girls so that they would have "socialization," plus they did summer stock and had leading roles- ie. "Annie" in Annie., And all worked 3 days a week part time at local charities United way, red cross, local history center- where they could get positive social interaction with caring adults.

The universities that my kids attended, their academic performance, and their subsequent employers all ratify the success of our homeschoolng experience.

You might know some slackers gaming the system, But when the system cannot actually educate a student because they are well above average, Its time to leave that system. (Since it isn't fixable by one family.) Sweeping generalizations are Dangerous. Home schooling is not. Milo

You seem to have been the exception so congratulations. You took the necessary steps to overcome the disadvantages.

I maintain that all too often and in a majority of cases it is harmful for the child as the parents do not do as your family did.

Thanks Russ123. Further caveat.

I give all the credit to my wife. She had a plan, organized the day around it, and made it work. We all knew what we were responsible for, but she OWNED IT.

Milo

She had good common sense and probably looked around to determine the best way to go about it. Hats off to the lady/teacher of the house!

The way she did it was a tremendous amount of work but it paid of for your family.

Home schooled kids DO interact with other kids. The difference is that all the kids (other home school kids) they interact with actually want to learn.

Internet is useful to adults or working population.For kids schooling is a must.There they learn co-existance with others from various levels of the society,obedience to teachers and parents,open their eyes/minds,good manners,to understand each other,how to think,how to solve a problem etc. But in the present system there are many short comings like location of schools, communities/schools w/o facilities, poor parents unable to send kids to school,ineffective supervision leading to bullying by some,children of parents known to teaching staff/principal or rich or influential dominating,cruelty by teachers,teachers neglecting teaching during school hrs and giving private tuition,racism etc The internet is available for may be 20% of students worldwide.The majority of human population is in the undeveloped third world. Systems,except legal systems, to be developed to suit local conditions of each country

There is two part of education

Part one is basic which is learning to read, write and math and that will stay as long as world exist.

Some will lag in this and will pay price for that like USA did more to applied let kid sit on computer and let computer do the math. This resulted in USA to be backward over other countries in Asia and Europe and Russia.

Other part is how to get information and use it and USA is good on that

IF you are good part 1 you will do better than any one part 2. This is reason India was able to put call center because of good in both basic and applied.

India is a call center because of cheap labor costs only - for low wages the companies got a reasonably intelligent worker. I have seen the education system quite closely. Rote learning is not the way to go. The kid that survives and manages to learn to think for himself will do good while the rest languish behind and wonder why.

@Ronseto - Information on the net - I have little interest in the out of print books but technical information from various sites is what I was talking about. Depending on what the site is trying to sell information can be and is slanted in one way or the other quite often.

Blogs can provide decent information if one knows what they are after. Just like it is here. On a technical subject information can be good but on the oil spill is gets silly.

Is Traditional learning a thing of the past.....

I would argue that we get an education.... To be happy and secure in this boat of permanent uncertainty.

<The traditional way...... seems inefficient.

The traditional way is a thing of the past … and will be long into the future,...Seeming is mask we wear.

<With the crisis in the public school system, what changes could be made to make learning an enjoyable task> a clear path from learning to reward may be all that is needed.

Education will always require good learners and helpful Guru's. The methods will vary from time to time, in differing locals. Thank you for your good questions, since that is where learning begins.

I think you have two distinct groups of learners.

Those of us who are older (Ronseto, I think you've got me by a year or two, but there's no point in quibbling when we both can remember Before TV) have developed a large set of skills and abilities in the process of living and working. When we want to learn something, it is almost always because we see an immediate need for it (even if that need is just something silly like the helium ballooon challenge). What we learn has to make sense in the context of what we already know.

So, we tend to look at the fastest, easiest way to learn that is consistent with what we've done before. For me, that usually means that I head down to the shop, rig up a jury-built experiment and try something, then go look it up on the internet so I can see the theory that goes with what I've just seen. I can learn maybe ten times faster than when I was fifteen; on the other hand, I've got over a half century of experience and accumulation of facts to help me.

But, just because something is in a book no longer impresses me. I got a new physics book the other day (from the publisher) and it has almost 700 pages and links to the web, and simulations, etc. Ye God! I expect a good engineer could summarize general physics in 100 pages, with two left over for pinups of Helen Mirren.

Younger students, say 14 or so, need a structured, authoritarian style education. They lack the experience to sort the wheat from the chaff, so if they see something on YouTube that says an alien saucer caused the Deepwater explosion, they are apt to believe that just as much as if they read that F=ma. I think they still need the bricks and mortar, formal school. Now, if you could just find some people to get tough about the standards there. I'm in one of the better school districts in PA. Every time they publish the honor roll in the newspaper, it's all Indian and Korean names, where the families still expect the kids to actually do something in school other than text to facebook.

Just some random thoughts.

This is a very good and accurate picture for a rational world. However I believe circumstances now evolving within the political world, specifically in the US will run over and skew any outcome that depends on rational thought. The facts for the individual to learn on how the world works will be replaced by "current PC perceptions". that of course change by simple pronouncements motivated by political objectives. History will be rewritten daily.

The Utopian world painted now by AA, PC, and Social Justice in the US BHO government will soon turn the economic engine in the US into a 3rd world country and a new large dependent class that will simply overwhelm the needed individual development, individual responsibility and integrity that is needed for US citizens to maintain the American culture. A culture that has like a tide raised all of the boats and provided a safe, rational and ordered world for the rest of the world to also pull themselves up. At least it allowed individuals to do so any where in the world. They could look to America as an example.

However America is now being cannibalized by the US government that has been taken over by "progressives" or Communists, or Socialists, or Just in the name of Social Justice---any name will do but the reality is the same.

Can you answer the question: When this American cultural high water mark is gone what do you think will be needed to survive and get the education needed in that world--the coming new world of interlocking dependency of different race and classes with the divisions being static and fossilized and government largess that is concerned with indoctrination and control and not education and individual responsibility.

A ruling class of government bureaucrats is quickly being formed under the BHO takeover. Any mistake now made by business becomes an opportunity for seizure of privately held assets by the US Government. Nothing new here about methods.

It will no longer, at least for a while depend on what the individual knows but by how successful can he integrate himself into the social programs that take care of him---He will need to identify with his/her "group" be radicalized and at the same time maintain his sanity. The system will eventually fail but until it does untold damage will be done. How to survive this. Can we find a Russian to ask this question of, a Cambodian?, maybe a North Korean?, a Vietnamese?, a Cuban still in Cuba? What will be needed to survive?

What will be needed under those circumstances? It will no longer be a melting pot based on merit but something else. Something the world has seen more of than the relatively short span of America in the wold as it was founded. The current politicians that hold office in America today have overseen this destruction of America. Even if the majority of Americans would vote them out the voting places are now being compromised and ballots are stuffed by the "Acorns or what ever they are now calling themselves. The media is supporting this "takeover" and fraud, the DOJ is not and will not process criminal cases involving voter intimidation or fraud.

Maybe one should now look to the Martial arts training to survive in the coming new world.

Jack,

My post was not meant to be political, except in the sense that everything is political at some point. I was posting about education.

Whether any of us agree or not, the world has become very flat. Multinational corporations and a global economy are not only the future, but often the present. We Americans have to "fish or cut bait." We will see our share of the pie shrink, and the shrinkage will all too often depend on how hard we work and how much we learn.

If I had to answer your question about where people would go, other than America, to get the education needed to succeed, I might suggest the Finnish public schools, the University of York, Oxbridge (I can barely stand to type that scrunched-up name), ENS Paris, Osaka University, or Tsinghua University, just to name a few.

I agree about government bureaucrats being a hindrance as often as a help. I recall thinking President Coolidge's veto of a plan to produce cheap electricity on the Tennessee River was a good idea as electricity was probably not gonna be all that useful anyway. Coal oil was good enough for grandpap and it was good enough for me.

A reasonable response and helpful. You want to take the "high ground". However it will not fix America, and it would fit only a small % of those now being impacted by the pace of change and the slide into a Utopian abyss. This new Utopian world of "Hope and Change" taking place in the US will be a Hell on earth. Like a hangover from a binge when the recognition of what has been done in the name of "social justice" sets in. In the name of PC and AA.

I believe the problem now lies not in what the new education system will look like but what has already gone on for the last 50 years "unnoticed" that has to be eliminated.

America has been subverted from within and we are now looking at the results. Turning it around is about looking at where we went wrong in the first place. That means going to original sources and not the rewritten history, and identifying the revolutionary and idiot social theories that has totally perverted the education process for political power gains.

The above process has subverted education for the last 50 years in America and we are now dealing with the incompetent results of that process. The Bill Ayers, Rev. Wright, BHO and his cult followers and all the "progressive" politicians that do not even recognize that what they have been indoctrinated in over the last 50+ years is a simple renaming of worn out and failed Marxist theory. They are not smart enough even to see the Utopian language as nothing but fraudulent and manipulative use of language being used to overthrow the American Democratic republic without firing as shot. Eliminating and destroying the Bill of Rights and the Constitution as it was intended.

Marxist theory originated on the west bank of Paris by immature wine drinking idiots. These idiot theories then costing millions of lives over the last 100 years. Not even counting what the Socialist Nazis did. This idiot belief in Marxist ideas is what has to be eliminated.

We don't need any "new stuff" we need to get rid of the "bad stuff." We need to go back and understand history and then eliminate the bad stuff. If only the good remains American exceptionalism will reinstate itself on its on. Normal people do that if they are free and individually responsible. It they can win but also lose. The founding fathers of America were much smarter than the immature childlike Marxists--the results speak for themselves. All one has to do is take your head out of the sand and look around. Where are human beings the most safe, happy and prosperous.

All those in the scientific community need to get on it. Unless of course they are not really scientists but immature, indoctrinated place holders in the existing subverted University Systems now in place within the USA. Tenure, PC and AA keeps the idiots in place and their parasitic pronouncements going into immature ears. Part of the problem that will need to be eliminated. Lets all get on it.

What drivel. What is that short word for nationalism again?

Is that how you spell it? Missisipi? I would have to have lived their myself just to know how to spell it. Who would bet against using just the spelling of Miss.... to measure if one can spell or the level of education one has. The trouble with spelling Mississippi is you forget the tricks you had to learn to spell it right in the first place. Grade school was a long time ago for me.

The current education system is going for a loop. No respect for the teachers and the internet era makes the kids lazy. They (the kids) tend to think anything can be found on the internet by a push of a button. Thus they do not do any propper research. With the sms era they do not know how to spell.

No problem! The kids can do what they want -

But - if they do not choose to study and do good things then they better take a course on rag picking as that will be the job available to them - or possibly shoveling sh*t out of barns.

If I recall correctly the book Freakenomics had a section on education that I found very interesting. To sum it up the author found that the worst schools could still turn out some of the best students. There was no direct corellation between a school's "ranking" and the future "value" of the students who graduated. It all depended on the person not the system. Now if we could discover what put that spark in the person we would be getting somewhere. For me it was a passion for reading, instilled by my mother constantly reading books to me and my siblings. Once you begin to read, everything becomes accessible. Issac Asimov taught me more about science and math than all my school courses.

My experience was that school taught me how to learn, and that has served me well. It was not just a bunch of facts and figures to be memorized. This is all important when we live in a world where what is "truth" today is often found to be BS tomorrow.

The book Freakonomics featured all sorts of wonderful discoveries - most of which were unsupportable.

Sold a lot of copies but that does not say much about the quality of the 'facts' it contained.

Book gives knowledge and even worked examples. Websites gives knowledge not found in school or books. School give many other aspects-teacher to clarify doubts,group work,projects, library, sports,debates,socialisation,understanding other cultures etc Internet forums give much more.

Wish I had time right now to add thoughts... at work, though, so can't.

Good'un.

Milo

Well said!

Russ

Your excellent reply brought to mind a method used by the military, called "programed instruction" which in my case, was very effective. Out of curiosity, I Googled this and the Wiki answer for programed learning closely paralleled the points you made.

I have been looking for methods to utilize for product training sessions given to customer's personnel in some of the most adverse conditions (as far as training is concerned) that you can imagine, with the major hurdle being one of holding attention.

It is interesting to see how the mind works.

An outstanding answer (CR4 should have a voting system for this!)

What do you and others think of what makes a great teacher? Expertise in the subject being a given, some teachers bored us to distraction, while a few (very, very few) made us sit up and take notice... they made the subject come alive...they lived the subject. Thinking back 40+ years, these teachers drew such simple joy in admiring the beauty of the subject they were teaching, that it communicated (that joy i mean) to all of us....

Long live such teachers.

an excellent example of comparison in action as a teaching tool was the 'cub car' which was those wooden designs we made as wolf cubs. The comparison aspect was racing against the other boy's cars..

another one was a science class that studied paper air plane design. we all had competitions for distance, stability, etc.. and it really taught aerodynamics while being fun.

I have several teachers who really stood out.. always teasing with humour, always positive, and using physical examples whenever possible.. not afraid to discipline, but in a creative and positive way, and gently insinuating that wonder and joy you speak of.

thank you.

Chris

I think that you are spot on on this Chris.

When I do presentations I generally do Contrast, not just comparisons.

But the point is the same.

Milo

I don't know about the upper lattitudes, but down here in the lower 48, school districts have many restrictions placed upon them. The feds are one. The restrictions don't allow a whole lot of individualism by teachers. I'm talking about the public school system only. Teachers must teach a set sylibus. They don't have the freedom or the time to try new experimental teaching methods. We are bogged down with high costs. We have to teach according to "no student left behind". One must remember the public school system is a socialist institution.

This is an interesting discussion. I agree with a lot of what has been already said here.

I do think that we in the USA are at a critical point when it comes to education. An increasing number of our population see education for others as something for which they are unwilling to provide sufficient tangible support. At the same time the education process is getting more expensive at all levels. Lots of reasons for this that we hear about on an almost daily basis.

We can attack the problems one at a time seeking the many individual solutions. But this all seems like an exercise in futility. Every solution seems to cause some level of intolerable discomfort to one or more of the stakeholders.

I think then that the answer to Ronseto's question in the OP is "yes".

Seems to me that we need to reexamine just what we want education to accomplish and what we are willing to "pay" to achieve those results. Only when there is a connect between the mission and the resources can we expect a decent result.

The name of the game looks like major cost reduction. Putting aside the future social and economic costs of a poorly educated populace, low priority abstractions to most taxpayers, the big cost saving opportunity is educator salaries. At some point in the growth/education of a child he/she should become mature enough to shed a good piece of the need for learning to be supervised by a teacher that collects a paycheck.

Without further commentary at this point I'd like to suggest spending some time on this website:

http://www.khanacademy.org/

Ed Weldon

Thanks for the great link. GA to you.

Thanks, kvsridhar. At least someone is interested in this idea.

In previous topics I've taken some criticism for advocating the idea of children maturing more quickly and then educating themselves via well designed and available low cost or even free sources. IMHO that is the only practical future for education.

We can coddle overage children for 16 years with the sole objective of sorting out the 10% of the best and brightest innorder that short sighted (the demon quarterly results phenomenon here) international businesses can pick and choose with minimal effort expended.

Sure, kiddies; this is going to fail, big time. What do we do with the other 90%? And where will the support for Medicare and Social Security etc., etc., come from if these 90% spend their lives smoking dope, playing video games and being fed and housed by their lazy doting parents and grandparents, gradually descending into bankruptcy from all the support costs? And how about the ones in the 85-90 percentile who are working in minimum wage retail jobs? And the pretty smart 1% of those we allow to buy deadly high tech weapons while they descend into dark hatred of how the system screwed them?

What this nation needs to do is figure out just what life is going to be and then educate new members of our society TO LIVE THAT LIFE whatever we decide is what it will be. Allowing our society to live one pattern while educating children for a different pattern is the bad fantasy we continue to entertain, to our ultimate downfall.

Ed Weldon

you have really struck a chord with me Ed. There is some room for interpretation in what you said, but I think I capture your idea... and agree with it. ga.

Chris

Thanks, Chris -------- You and I don't make much of a voting bloc..... Actually you folks seem to have far more common sense than those of us down here in the southern colonies. I admire all of you. ..........Ed

Ed,

I agree we should not coddle the kids or try to make them "feel good" about themselves as a substitute for self esteem.

You state "What this nation needs to do is figure out just what life is going to be and then educate new members of our society TO LIVE THAT LIFE whatever we decide is what it will be"

I don't think we have a snowballs chance in hell of being able to figure out what life is going to be. The future will be what it is, the best way to arm the future generations is not to try to prepare them for what we think the future will hold (for we may be completely wrong), but to prepare them to use their brains, then they can figure out how best to handle the future they find themselves in.

How do we do that?

• educate children to know facts (language, math in early years),
• exposure to a broad array of topics (history, more math, more language, science, economics, etc. in later years)
• provide opportunities to learn and apply critical thinking.

This list is just what comes to mind at the moment. Certainly more could be added with value.

GA

Selecting over-achievers at the 5th grade(age10),then at the 8th grade,again at10th grade etc is the best idea.It is like a process of refining. Only the best should go to the university.But now those who have money get private tutors and get high grades in exams.At each level underachievers to be send to other kinds of professional training like manual labour(pushing lawn mowers),vocational(technicians),clerical(office workers) etc. This will reduce congestion in universities.I think in Malaysia they are doing it.The elite won't like their children to be trained to do manual jobs.They will pay high fees and even send their children to foreign or other universities where money plays.In india one has to pay high fees to get a seat in private medical college.The world has become money oriented not talent oriented.Intelligence is god-given but money can buy knowledge.

Hello pnaban, I do think that kids that put in the work and get the grades should be able to go on to college, regardless of their socio-economic background. That said, I also will never think of people that do manual labor as underachievers. All of this work needs to be done by someone, some people enjoy it and thrive on it. I know people that that build houses or started landscaping companies, etc. that are very well off financially, they are not stupid either, by any means. Their field of expertise just lies outside of what traditional colleges teach.

There are many people with college degrees that have chosen to go into the manual trades like carpentry; even cooking because they can make more money at it and enjoy it.

i am afraid not in India as a rule(there are exceptions of course). My plumber charges me $1 for an hour's work. My carpenter charged me ~$50 for making something that took him a week. Cost of wood extra. Both guys are smart enough to have gone to school and college if their parents had the wherewithal to send them. They would then have been in white collar jobs earning > 10 times what they do now. That is the bane of overpopulation and consequent poverty.

Jobs should be chosen on the basis of skills possessed by a person.The skill required to be a scientist will be different from that required by a cook or a plumber.All of them need not study together in the high school or college.If they are segregated at a earlier stage each can specialise in his selected area of work and become a specialist instead of wasting time studying subjects or skills required to other jobs.

I always believed that to be really good at anything a person requires a "well rounded" knowledge base. Specialization at an early age will not allow this. Specialization is sort of like putting blinders on. How many "AHA" moments have come when someone has linked two apparently unrelated bits of information from two apparently unrelated fields to solve a problem?

Apothicus - I agree about the well rounding idea up to a point. And that point is when the student simply can't handle any more rounding in a particular subject area.

Case example: Trying to cram algebra into the brain of an intelligent right brained dyslectic student. In desperation trying not to mess up her high GPA she memorized the answers to 200 algebra homework problems, passed the final exam and got a B in the course. And I will tell you the day after she finished the course she couldn't have solved a real world problem with the simplest algebra if her life depended on it. BTW she graduated with a BA, a GPA of 3.7 and a major in physical anthropology.

The other point to make is that like it or not we are not all created equal especially in the area of scholastic aptitude. There are plenty of good reasons to break out the stronger learners from the weaker ones fairly early. Many years ago there were serious injustices allowed in this process; but I think educators are much wiser in such matters in today's world. (Uhhhh....at least where we live..) That doesn't mean such a grouping system will be perfect. Public educational resources sources simply won't allow that. No practical educational system other than home schooling or perhaps the highest priced private schools can afford to create and follow a specialized curriculum to fit each and every student.

BTW, home schooling, IMHO, works well with the right parents. But it's a tough gig, especially if they live in an area where the cost of the roof over the young family's heads chews up most of one income. And that issue is like a termite infestation that bores right into the foundations of the American family's very existence. If we could only confront that issue intelligently.

Ed Weldon

I agree, to a point. I believe that everyone should possess basic skills in math, science, grammar, history etc. These should be covered in high school and the earlier grades. Once in college, it's time to specialize in ones chosen field. If they don't possess the basic skills, they don't belong in college.

Kramarat -

Not much wrong with the education system you describe. I grew up that way too and believe it worked well for most of us. It even worked for the "D" students who soon enough learned that they might not be able to fathom algebra but could do just fine repeating the same manual task a thousand times a day.

But education is a deep reflection of the value system of immediately previous generations. And for our society the value systems have changed greatly in the last 50 years. Short of experiencing some catastrophe (of either rapid or slow onset) that takes us a few steps down on the hierarchy of human needs we'll be very slow in changing the present value system.

JBTardis in another previous reply disagrees with my suggestion in the comment: "I don't think we have a snowballs chance in hell of being able to figure out what life is going to be."

I say that is not the case. History is full of the accomplishments of people who successfully planned and executed courses into the future, even one with uncharted rocks and shoals. There is no reason why we should not expect to do the same; albeit in terms of probabilities rather than hard and fast predictions.

Make an objective assessment of facts on the ground: growing population, a global economy, climate change, depletion of natural resources, communication and information technology, changing demographics, an increasing understanding of human behavior to name a few. A logical course can then be plotted. And I think most of us agree it will diverge from the current one.

We have to be realistic about what kind of educations the broad spectrum of our students will need. The idea that all students should be educated to fill a relatively small number of available white collar, professional and "super technician" jobs is a sad absurdity. Even these jobs are subject to being filled by people from other nations either through immigration or sophisticated communication technologies. What are we going to do with the "B" and "C" students, let alone the "D's" and "F's"? Does anybody know what they will do with all that math and algebra they had to learn in order to qualify for the university acceptance that never came?

Then we must objectively determine the quantity and sources of resources to match these needs and where they will come from. That will very likely mean a greater contributions of material (read money) and personal time from the parents. Likely this will be at the expense of discretionary components of their standard of living.

We also need to go back to taking account of differences in scholastic aptitude early in the education process and tailor the course work accordingly. We cannot afford to squander education resources on course work whose cost is far out of proportion to the value delivered.

And most importantly we need to straighten out the currently badly unbalanced process of maturing our kids into responsible adults. This can and must take place in the K-8 grades where a strong focus of teacher guidance and parental support is needed. It's quite ironic and sad that one side of our kids matures rapidly both physically and through exposure to mass media and popular culture while we allow the other side to shirk adult responsibilities and stay a child far longer than is good for anyone.

That's why I strongly believe that the biggest move away from traditional schooling will come when we realize that education will have to consist of first teaching children how to conduct themselves in a productive society and take responsibility for their own subsistence and self improvement. This should happen in K-8. In secondary schooling and college substantial economies of scale can come via numerous educational opportunities available largely through inexpensive current technology. But the motivation for the student to educate him/herself via things like web based courses will only work for one who has a reasonable level of maturity and a well learned set of basic life skills. That's why the emphasis on resources to support K-8 education will have to be much greater even at the expense of secondary education.

Ed Weldon

Ed,

Please don't get me wrong, I am in sync with what you say for the most part...in the previous post and in this last one. It's not that I disagree with your suggestions, but that I don't think it has much to do with what we think the future will be. Much of what you suggests can be implemented without a prediction of the future.

For instance....a large segment of the world believes in global warming. If we think that's going to be the future and educate our children with that in mind, then they may be ill prepared for their future should the globe not warm any further...or significantly cool.

I am in no way advocating for maintaining the status quo of the current education system either.

The simple answer to all of this is: If parents don't take an active role in their kids education, the "system", regardless of how good it is, will never be able to fill this vacuum. The proof of this, is the fact that home schooled kids are getting their educations in what boils down to, a one room school house, and yet regularly outperform their publicly educated piers across the board on standardized testing. And you can bet, they are being labeled, they are being labeled as "smart" kids, who, armed with knowledge and a good education, can achieve anything they put their minds to. Amen

Hi Kramarat,

I disagree with having some kids labelled as 'above average' or 'genius'. My oldest brother was identified as a 'genius'... in KINDERGARDEN. I'm almost 50 now, and for the last 43 years, I have wondered what the hell that meant.. this is the same brother that would tell me (me = age 5) "I have a note in my bum.. read it" and then as I approached the lethal distance, he would fart loudly... no genius required. (he was 7 years older than me.)

Success is when preparation and opportunity meet. Labelling kids as anything other than 'pass' is not really productive. I think it is very important for all kids to be encouraged and praised for the successes that they do have. I think competition is healthy, but doesn't and shouldn't have all the labels and bs that goes with some of them. (parents acting badly) There should only be gold, silver, bronze. and try again next time. done.

Like Fire; comprised of fuel, heat, and oxygen, parents and members of education/society need to create the environmental factors that produce success. We need to provide all the learning tools, information, encouragement, and opportunity. Kids will teach themselves, and follow examples. (good or bad) (see here for proof)

I agree with Ed that, in defining the future of education, we can see a reasonable distance into the future... I've been reading Sci-Fi for decades, and think that a lot of great stuff has sprung from those pages, with more to come. some is just common sense, whether we know how to do it or not. (ie, food, shelter, clothing, transportation, comunication, etc.. Ed mentioned the/a Hierarchy of Needs. It is very relevant)

Chris

How's it going chris? There is nothing in my post that suggest that parent/educators label kids, they will do that on their own i.e. fatso, retard, geek, dumb jock, nerd, stoner, etc. the list goes on......"Labeling kids as anything other than pass is not really productive" This is is where you and I part ways, (in our thinking), Big Time! I suppose that "not pass", would be considered cruel and unusual punishment. Only gold, silver and bronze are equally ridiculous. If I've worked to get an A and I get a B, I want to know exactly where I screwed up, I don't want to be told, "don't worry you got a gold" move on. We can agree to disagree, IMHO, this "feel good, everyone is the same and equal", way of thinking has been very damaging, and has only helped with "feelings". Whether these kids like it or not, they are going to be entering extremely competitive workplaces and are going to be competing with global competition, I'd rather see them prepared for the real world than entering the workforce expecting imaginary medals. The reality is, once they enter the real world, it's do or die. P.S. I'm sorry your brother scarred you like that, if I was there I would give you a hug. Then again, it sounds like he pulled it off more than once. Maybe he was a genius.;-)

Maybe he was a genius.;-)

ya well... it was still rude.. and he was very persuasive...

God forbid the alternative......you may have been a little slow. I'll never buy that! I forgot to mention that a sense of humor is essential. After all, I was one of those big brothers and I can attest to the fact, that I have never resembled, nor ever will resemble, a genius. I've got witnesses.

hug accepted bro.

And then there is this theory.

http://www.unschooling.com/

an eye opener!

Yes, kinda scary. The only personal exposure I had to these "unschooled" kids was a couple I met online, playing Warcraft at all hours of the day or night.

Yikes!! I guess these could also be called "feral" children, what fun!