Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community - View Single Post - How would you change the education system?

spindles · 04-05-2009, 05:19 PM

We are quite lucky in some respects - my wife is a 'stay at home' mum. With reading and writing, we are taking the approach that we should encourage our children to enjoy books - reading books to them should be fun, with learning their letters and how to read a secondary issue. My eldest (who is 4.5) can recognise all the letters and has a pretty good idea what the all sound like, can count really well (a number of the books we have at home include some amount of "how many X's on this page" and he enjoys finding things in pictures. If you can get your kids to appreciate books, it is a huge benefit, but I don't think we are equipped (or most parents are) with the skills to teach him to read and write (except as a addition to what he is learning at pre-school and what he will learn when he reaches infants school next year) - just because someone can read doesn't automatically make me a good reading teacher.

I know in Oz, there already is a focus on skills training late in high school, so if the children are interested in (for example) plumbing or nursing, then some of their school time is spent on more skills based training (outside of the school - at technical colleges etc. and work experience) in an effort to
a) keep them in school longer (in the past some of these students could stop high school at 16 year of age and) so they get a broader education
b) still help to kick start their careers earlier

I'm all for a gap year between high school and university. Whether that is spent working or travelling is for the individual, but think this would provide more balanced university students.

04-05-2009, 05:19 PM	#4 (permalink)
spindles Mine is an evil laugh Location: Sydney, Australia	We are quite lucky in some respects - my wife is a 'stay at home' mum. With reading and writing, we are taking the approach that we should encourage our children to enjoy books - reading books to them should be fun, with learning their letters and how to read a secondary issue. My eldest (who is 4.5) can recognise all the letters and has a pretty good idea what the all sound like, can count really well (a number of the books we have at home include some amount of "how many X's on this page" and he enjoys finding things in pictures. If you can get your kids to appreciate books, it is a huge benefit, but I don't think we are equipped (or most parents are) with the skills to teach him to read and write (except as a addition to what he is learning at pre-school and what he will learn when he reaches infants school next year) - just because someone can read doesn't automatically make me a good reading teacher. I know in Oz, there already is a focus on skills training late in high school, so if the children are interested in (for example) plumbing or nursing, then some of their school time is spent on more skills based training (outside of the school - at technical colleges etc. and work experience) in an effort to a) keep them in school longer (in the past some of these students could stop high school at 16 year of age and) so they get a broader education b) still help to kick start their careers earlier I'm all for a gap year between high school and university. Whether that is spent working or travelling is for the individual, but think this would provide more balanced university students. __________________ who hid my keyboard's PANIC button?