How about (un)schooling?

Discussion in 'Science & Society' started by Aladdin, Jun 21, 2011.

  1. The Esotericist Getting the message to Garcia Valued Senior Member

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    This process is usually known as indoctrination, or more subtly as, schooling. In so far as it inhibits the fostering of natural curiosity, the flowering of intelligence, the process of education and neutral instruction, yes, I agree, I believe it is the most powerful argument against schooling.
     
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  3. Me-Ki-Gal Banned Banned

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    I foster a deep desire to learn in my children ( Parent responsibility )
    I open there minds to possibilities and use buzzwords I know they will learn about in the next year or two. So when the teacher opens there mouth there is a familiarity to the subject . See I know this instinctively creates excitement in a child and drives then to strive further . I call it the tip off . Like in basketball , but applied to thought games of intrigue. The other thing is to create interest. Not the things your interested in but the things the child is interested in . If they realize that collateral knowledge is useful for the things they find interesting they will move mountains to get at the information just to further there own agenda . A parent can be quite deceptive at connection subjects this way when there young . Like my youngest child ( The savior of your asses in the future ) I would tell him as soon as you can read we can play a serious game of monopoly . Well he just had to play monopoly . He was driven . I didn't have to play but 2 games of monopoly with him cause from his reading skills at such a young age other things were a lot more interesting to him . You get the idea and what I consider the responsibility of the parent to create desire to learn in the child and not depend on teachers to create the desire. Parents got to spend time with there child while they are under 5 to instill this in the child . It is what is called the formative years . It sets the tone of a child's life
     
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  5. Me-Ki-Gal Banned Banned

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    The bribing and the flattery is to help procure pigeon holing in a positive way . See teachers hold children s lives in balance . A test was done . Maybe you can find it on the internet . I think it was conducted in Madison Wisconsin( Madison in Wisconsin ?) Might be wrong ? Here is the premise. Files are doctored . They take the problem children and doctor the records to make them look like sweethearts and they take the smart kids and doctor them to look like problem children . Can you guess the results ? It lead Me to bribe and flirt with teachers and after seeing my own results I believe the study was right
     
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  7. Nasor Valued Senior Member

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    Don't forget replacing evolution with the teaching that life was created by magic, and replacing useful sex education with nothing.
     
  8. Nasor Valued Senior Member

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    Total bullshit. Private schools "do better" because they accept better students in the first place, and on average their students have parents who are more involved in their children's education. In fact, once economic and family backgrounds are controlled for, private schools are worse on average at educating students than public schools.

    Source: http://www.projectappleseed.org/public-private.html

    I guess the "masculine" way is to express strong opinions on a subject even though you don't know what they hell you're talking about, while simultaneously being too lazy to spend five seconds googling for information to check the accuracy of your uninformed opinions? Let me guess, fact-checking is all part of the feminine conspiracy...
     
    Last edited: Jun 22, 2011
  9. Kennyc Registered Senior Member

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    I'm pretty much against it in that I believe learning and advancing society need frameworks to fit into and the common schooling gives that in the most efficient manner. Not to say it doesn't need major overhauls to improve, primarily in society itself respecting education, teachers, knowledge more that friggin' basketball, football, etc.

    And also not to say there aren't outliers whom would do better in a different system.
     
  10. Me-Ki-Gal Banned Banned

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    I agree with him except for extra curricular activity . You got your basic education and then you have the exploratory learning by desire beyond the normal class room setting . Something the child is excited about . The parent helps create the desire. I would venture to guess that most children drawn to athletics in school is because of play time with the parents and what is considered fun in the family . To say we make an impression on our children what fun is. If you are a football playing family chances are your child will excel more in school football than the other children . The same could hold true at learning games . It does cause my children prove it to be true . People are always saying " You don't know " and your children can fall victim to the promiscuity of the world in the teen years. I say no they won't . There personalities are set in stone already and that is not part of there personality . They don't think on that wave length. It would be like a nun going to war and killing poor people . It just don't happen . There extreme reading of ideas from the past and there understanding of lititure ancient and modern made them aware of consequences . Not by Me harpen but by there own discovery. Rule number 1 If the child makes the discovery and perceives it as so the take ownership
     
  11. Kennyc Registered Senior Member

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    Oh, yes extracurricular activities can definitely be a great part of creating healthy intelligent adults.
     
  12. psikeyhackr Live Long and Suffer Valued Senior Member

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    Looking back on it I started unschooling myself in grade school though I didn't know that is what I was doing.

    GOOD science fiction books contain a lot of ideas and information that can be encountered long before they are formally introduced by the so called educational system.

    In A Fall of Moondust by Arthur C. Clarke he talks about Plato's Allegory of the Cave. How many people don't encounter that until college? I read it in grade school.

    Another thing is building plastic models.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4k0lXbTQGfs

    I built that during my grade school years too. The nuns did not even tell us what an electron was. So I think kids can be unschooled and sent to school also. I think too many parents help teach kids to be subservient to the authority of the school system though. One kid cried in class because he got a B in math one grading period.

    Do you want kids that can think for themselves or that think what they are told by AUTHORITY because that is the "intelligent" thing to do? Because AUTHORITY said so.

    psik
     
  13. Kennyc Registered Senior Member

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    Reading broadly and deeply can be the best education I think.
     
  14. MacGyver1968 Fixin' Shit that Ain't Broke Valued Senior Member

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    "broadly and deeply"...I think I saw that porn movie

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  15. SomethingClever Registered Senior Member

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    the public school system, for the most part, is a disaster.
    but I have mixed feelings about home schooling.

    On one hand, the system is designed to produce average people capable of average work. Creative minds get thrown to the wolves.
    but imagine all the friendships and experiences a child is deprived of by home-schooling. it's pick your poison.

    In my experience (and the experience of my peers), elementary school is golden, but middle school/ high school are essentially a madhouse, controlled by a warden they call "Principal." Material is so dull and homework so excessive that the majority lose their minds. only the truly robotic retain their full selves, those who are eager to please or motivated enough to look past all the rubbish.

    I attend a private university, and thankfully it isn't at all like high school.
    but looking back, I don't know how I didn't end up in the psych ward. It's a crazy world in there.

    Sure, there are a few teachers who see the light and have a tremendous positive influence on the kids. but mostly, just like the kids, they do what they are told, which slowly but surely leads students to dismiss learning and reading altogether.

    Many do what it takes to reach college, but it's torture. I don't think anyone can deny that. Sure, strong work ethic gets instilled, but is it worth the cost of happiness?

    Originality and creativity are frowned upon, and mindless conformism and robotic cramming get rewarded in the sad world of American secondary school.
    It's a true American tragedy.
     
  16. Aladdin Registered Senior Member

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    I don't see a lot of efficiency in the way public schools are run today -- they burn a lot of money only to produce appalling results. I guess their major contribution in terms of efficiency is that both parents are "freed" for hired work (and yes, there are quite a few families that cannot afford one parent to stay at home with the kids).
     
  17. chimpkin C'mon, get happy! Registered Senior Member

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    That would be my experience, with the added fun of being verbally bullied every day by anyone handy.

    What's the dropout rate? 8% http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=16

    I think that's artificially low.
    I know in Texas it's more like 1 in 4 unofficially, but they have ways of twinking the numbers. They don't count people who dropped out from in-school-suspension.

    I don't know about the schools burning a lot of money-not in this state... but they're not producing a well-educated kid.

    Then again, neither are the parents, or the culture. It's a complex problem.
     
    Last edited: Jun 23, 2011
  18. Aladdin Registered Senior Member

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    I don't see how that could possibly work, unless the option of going to school belongs to the student himself (not his parents) -- perhaps a way for him to learn what public schooling is all about? And while there may well be some unschoolers who choose to go to school for a while (think I've read a blog post somewhere about such a case) I very much doubt they'll last too long there, mostly because of the coercionary nature of the schooling system.


    Are you asking me or is just a rhetoric question?
     
  19. Aladdin Registered Senior Member

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    Guess daily classroom attendance and excessive homework only helps by reducing the amount of time one can dedicate to his own reading...
     
  20. Aladdin Registered Senior Member

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    And why would a home schooled kid be deprived of friendships? Being home schooled doesn't mean being locked at home, you know. There's life outside school, too.

    Depending on the kid's personality and the environment where he lives it may well be that a home schooled kid fosters more friendships than a schooled kid. There would be nobody to keep him quiet when he wants to carry a conversation with another person, and the age range will also be virtually unrestricted.

    As for "school experiences" if by that you mean all sorts of mischief and rebellion against the school system, then yeah, I'll agree -- a home schooled kid will probably miss that part.

    Otherwise, I can see that quite a bit of your school experience wasn't exactly something that you'll wish to your good friends

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  21. Aladdin Registered Senior Member

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    Just saw Waiting for Superman this evening, and I believe the amount mentioned there was something like a bit over nine thousand dollars/child/year. Well, just imagine how many books, museum passes, concert tickets, trips to wherever you can buy with that kind of money and what would you have gotten out of those as compared to attending the school.
     
  22. wellwisher Banned Banned

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    Let me give an example of the problems that are created in public education when maximizing feelings is the prime directive This example is based on the feeling template that lies at the heart of the problem. There is a push to prevent childhood obesity, by totally altering the school menus. This is good for long term health.

    If you look at this problem logically, instead of emotionally, not every child is overweight. Some children, because of genetics, exercise, or a healthy attitude toward eating are slim. As such, the retooling the entire cafateria idea for all, does not apply to them, yet they will be forced to participate. Although their slim body should be treated like a badge of honor, under the circumstances of national overweight, they will be treated like they are overweight, and forced into one size fits all standards; forced into mediocrity.

    The motivation for this irrationality, we don't want to hurt anybody's feelings, by singling out just the overweight kids. But if you think about it, the same people don't mind hurting the feelings of the kids with optimized weight by treating them like are compulsive eaters.

    This illogical equation may have to do with how the emotional math adds up. We assume the fat kids already feel bad, so we don't want to add more emotional baggage by segregrating them. The slim kids must be happy they are slim, therefore if we treat them like they are fat their emotional high is zeroed out. But all and all, we get a net emotional gain for all.

    In the more masculine spirit of education, emotions are not the main variable in the educational equation. In this case, the slim kids would not have to participate in any remediation project, since they have shown themselves to be accomplished at eating. These accomplished children will be used as examples for the overweight kids; goal. Only the fat kids will be given the remediation diet. Once overweight kids skinny down, the open caferteria option, of the slim will open up to them. This opening up of the caferteria options can be done in steps, so they have easier targets and faster rewards.

    From a resource POV, targetting only the fat kids, uses only a fraction of resources ,compared to remediation for all. If waste is the goal then the emotional way is better. Instead of an imaginary ideal for all the children based on a poster child, in the masculine way, the children will have real life peer examples to see and to try emulate; how do you do that? We also give them food incentive, to become like one of the goal kids.

    The feminine feeling approach is optimized for the short term, since it will indeed maximize feelings, second to second. The masculine approach will be painful for some at the beginning of the bootcamp process and will therefore not maximize feelings. This process is about long term optimization that helps the children overcome adversity in life. Life is not a warm fuzzy place, like in feminine school.

    Let us leave the school and enter the real world. Liberal social policies have used a lot of resources enforcing preferred social manners so the educational feeling template of feminine education can apear to extrapolate into real life. If we can warm fuzzy culture, it might work. But you can not control everyone this way, although that is the goal; even if you don't need it you will get it; feminine template.

    Life is easier to optimze if you know about cause and effect. It requires less resources moving with the punches then trying to control the world so one can coast with warm fuzzy feelings.

    Relative to the liberal food police, I would set up both the feminine and the masculine approach, so we can compare results. One approach is one size fits all into mediocrity. The other is segregation into optimized and the need for remediation. After one year compare cost and benefit. A clear winner will appear, and then we use that to help remediate the other things that were ruined.
     
  23. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    We aren't treating our children like they are in boot camp or some baby Spartan warriors. Feelings do matter, and feminine qualities are just as valuable as masculine ones. We want our society to be a warm fuzzy place, not full of hate and fear as it was during the segregated and highly conformist 50s and early 60s.

    Updating the cafeteria to serve healthier food options has benefits for everyone, not just the fat kids. Kids who learn healthy eating habits will avoid the pitfalls of high cholesterol, diabetes, and heart disease. Better nutrition will help their brains to develop.

    Wellwisher and many theists embody masculine values because that is what Christianity teaches. It treats women as second class, the source of original sin, people who should be submissive to their men. Society would do well to copy the feminine values of egalitarian cultures.
     

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