pai mei

Here is a video about the US education system, it was made in 1993, it is the speech of a teacher from Pennsylvania

http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...+down+children

First time I saw it I was even more shocked than when I saw 9/11 related videos.
It's about the way kids are educated, and the purpose is not to create "the man of tommorow" but "the working man of tommorow", a worker-consumer useful to the corporations

Rockefeller Education Board—which funded the creation of numerous public schools—issued a statement which read in part:

"In our dreams...people yield themselves with perfect docility to our molding hands. The present educational conventions [intellectual and character education] fade from our minds, and unhampered by tradition we work our own good will upon a grateful and responsive folk. We shall not try to make these people or any of their children into philosophers or men of learning or men of science. We have not to raise up from among them authors, educators, poets or men of letters. We shall not search for embryo great artists, painters, musicians, nor lawyers, doctors, preachers, politicians, statesmen, of whom we have ample supply. The task we set before ourselves is very simple...we will organize children...and teach them to do in a perfect way the things their fathers and mothers are doing in an imperfect way."

JustDisGuy

As a product of the public education system, I can attest to the fact that it is designed solely for the purpose of programming the next generation of drones. It was the main reason I hated school so much near the end. University was no better. Anyone who's gone to school should be able to readily identify this fact.

ASU2003

That is something I thought about when I was in school. It wasn't really that bad where I was, we had good teachers who made us question everything and not to trust that the information we learn is always the truth. That there might be a oil company with money behind the oil spill cleanup video for instance. College was more of training session to learn how to think like a engineer. You had to have the facts and pay attention to every detail. But there wasn't any discussions about "We can build this, but should we build this?"

I doubt it would be possible, but I would like to see colleges become more specialized. One college for engineers, one for medical, one just does business, another does liberal arts. Maybe this is a better idea if it was a fall semester thing in High School. Where kids from all over would come together and get specilized training ahead of college to see if what they are interested in is what they want to study.

Having said that, what else would the school system do but produce workers? The large majority of them will work at a job, regardless of what you change.

The other problem is money. There isn't much money in it to be an artist, musicians (marching band?), poets, philosophers or authors. To be a politician you need to have some standing in your community which you get by working and having a message. And any kid in the public school system can work hard and be a doctor or lawyer.

The problem comes where we need fast food workers, cashiers, maids, factory workers, etc. It isn't an easy job, but someone needs to do it, and get paid enough to survive.

edit:I need to use firefox with a spellchecker.

shesus

I've been teaching for 7 years now. Just in that short amount of time I have seen many problems with the education system. I started teaching in a rural school where we had no set curriculum. It was basically, teach what you want. Then I went to a mid-sized city and taught. That district was so focused on testing, it took the joy out of teaching and learning. Those poor kids were tested almost once a month for the district, state, and country. It was so bad that one fourth grade student wrote on his test, "These are wasting my time. Why can't my teacher use this time to teach me?"

Now, I teach in Chicago. It is such a large district no one knows what is going on really. We have to prep for the tests and that is the main goal. That is how the school gets money and it also decides if the teachers and/or administration keep their job. The problem with that is that the kids are the main factors and it is not guaranteed that the children want to learn.

Standardized testing is one huge problem in dumbing our kids down. We aren't necessarily teaching students to think, but to spit out information and perform a sequence of steps to solve problems. Of course, it doesn't matter because it seems like kids today generally are lazy. They don't want to think. Of course, I teach in a low-income area so that skews my generalization I'm sure. For example, I'm teaching them how to make outlines in Social Studies. They can use those on the tests. However, I don't ask cognitive questions on the test. I ask synthesis and application questions so they have to take the information that they have to draw conclusions. They hate this and claim that we didn't go over it. Also, in math they refuse to show their work and if it's a problem with more than one step, they will only complete the first step and think they are finished. Lazy kids I tell you. I'm not sure if it's TV, video games, or what, but it's frustrating. I'm hoping that after awhile I'll teach them some thinking skills.

Money as mentioned above is also a huge issue. Not only is the art program almost non-existant, but teaching materials are slim. We aren't given money to buy things to do fun, research projects and center activities. Our hands are almost tied. At one school, I was given a ream of paper a month. That was all we were allowed to use. I had 20 kids. The paper didn't go very far. So I couldn't do a lot of practice with the topics. We couldn't do projects because art supplies weren't provided. Teachers don't get paid enough to buy all the materials for the kids.

Another issue with the schools are the students homelife. Parents seem to not put importance on respect and education. This is instilled at a young age. If the child doesn't value education and isn't interested in learning, they aren't going to.

I will say that I believe the student learned more in the rural setting. I was free to develop my own curriculum guided by state standards, develop student-focused units that the kids loved, and I wasn't hounded by administrators to raise the test scores. And you know what, the kids always did well. It's because we had the supplies and support and freedom to teach using our best strategies and make learning fun and interesting.

I could go on and on about possible solutions, but they're fairly radical and would never come to pass. All I can say, is that if you have a kid...teach them at home in conjunction with public schooling. Teachers have a lot on their plate and with increasing class sizes in conjunction with lack of support and supplies...it's a tough job and many kids are getting lost in the cracks.

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pai mei

The teacher should be respected, he is a teacher, a person who teaches other people, it's the most important job on the planet, he is not just someone who talks to others like a machine and then tests them to see if they remember. Ancient teachers were respected, they created schools and had followers.

jbw97361

The state of the Public Education system in the United states is pathetic. Reaching back to my high school years (1998-2002) I can recall that more time was spent in classes dealing with self esteem and feelings than with actually learning anything of value. I am not saying education needs to be endless hours of drill work, but the idea that open ended learning is the way to go is totally pointless. Youths are expected to completely rediscover everything that they ever learn? It took us 20,000 years to get where we are now.

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X3N0

At 17m26s listen for the break in audio, I noticed a very dramatic increase in pitch of voice, and beforehand the picture was targeted to the audience.

42:07-Cut immediately after religion is mentioned

Thoughts :
1) This video has been edited to show a great deal of information but not the key points.
2) Videos such as this and the 9/11 video are being allowed to broadcast on Google because the events that these are based upon are long past, and relating emotionally to the past, which would cause motivation to change are less likely.
3) These videos are not only a mockery of our human will, but a message saying that we are losing the war of free thought.

To ASU2003:
You mentioned that the problem was money. This is not the problem. The actual dilemma for youth's is captured in today's media. The world's idols are our pop stars, and along with fame comes fortune. If one were to think that the reasons for the Education system is to work so much on self-esteem, and we are social beings, who gain satisfaction from the admiration of others, and being shown to others in a positive light; this is a great method for establishing a high value of self-esteem and showing them where to get it.

The jobs such as poets, philosophers and musicians are few and far between. This is because they are quite possibly some of the hardest branches of thought to not only be well studied, understood, and competent in, but you must also be creative.

(A suggestion for a very symbolic representation of this message can be seen in the movie Pi. The scene where he stands in a railway station prodding brain matter with a pencil. If anyone wishes to discuss this further, and have a more well understood view then do not hesitate to e-mail me.)

Since the education system is focusing less and less on actually teaching the kids, they are not learning how to teach themselves. Which is a dedicated, self-doubting, daunting, indeterminate task. Unfortunately, the education system doesn't like to deal with open-ended answers which are not based upon the reasoning, but of the outcome. This is a world of possibilities. That is why we have scientific reasoning that is called theory. It is deemed with this name, because there is always the possibility that somehow two could equal three, or that gravity could stop having a constant value dependent upon the amount of mass something has. This kind of thinking has very little involvement in the education system.

My Experience throughout public education.

As far as I can remember throughout the education system, I despised it.. every last moment of it.. I walked into the classrooms and looked at the teacher with a steady eye, watching their next move in shifting the view of the classroom. Over time, I would gain enough information about the teacher to start question their ways.

There were two possible outcomes for this:
1) Using vocabulary that I had not heard of, and then upon questioning the meaning of the word. I was asked to research within my own spare time. It was class time, and I was to follow the class.
2) Telling me, these were not conversations for the classroom.

There were two other outcomes that were most likely to occur to me after going through research, and approaching them after class.

1) They didn't have enough time.
2) I was told that I wouldn't understand.

Once though, something happened which a teacher did fear. Her name was Mrs. McCullah and she retired the next year.

She told me that it didn't matter how much I questioned what was going on in the classroom, and why she was teaching a certain way. Replying with the thought on why it didn't matter, I asked why ? Her response was that I had already passed to far through the system and I had already began to show what was required.

At that moment, I told her with the most serious tone of voice that what this school and whatever school had to teach me from now on would only be considered as a desert. Where I am asked to tell which piece of sand is next to the other piece of sand. This desert though will be something that I will walk over, and only let my feet touch upon because I will have my views set to the horizon and the skies above. This school's meaning had no value.

This is where it gets good.

She tells me that if I hold no value in anything, then I won't understand it and I'll never pass. Replying in a calm tone I asked her if she could memorize the alphabet in a random pattern and then repeat it, and she said yes. I told her that I could do the same, all of your lessons are memorization, and even the understanding is so basic that I can memorize that. Regurgitating random information on a piece of paper will grant me passing grades. This then continued on to her questioning of how I will fit into society and function well.
Here is where she and the system are trapped.

The child silently sitting in the classroom, only questioning the questions after understanding the answers, will be able to understand his environment and change it.

She I couldn't take on the whole world though, but I knew that we all live in separate worlds where we are only connected through senses. Our thoughts can remain hidden. That is the true world we live in, because it is the conscious recognition of the world. If I end up dying in an alley because I am rejected, but I believe the reasons I am here are well thought out, then passing on with a smile on my face will be something no one can stop.

After this entire discussion, I went to the principal with bursting pride and joy of how I had understood how to seperate myself from the system. This was the person to go to, because he had the most influence around here, and maybe he deserved it because he had showed a mastery of their system. After explaining where I stood, and where I got my reasoning from, he left the office to talk to my teacher.

This is what lead to the retirement of that teacher. Who, tried her best never to speak to me again.

What does this say about the education system ? An adolescent is able to scratch the surface deep enough to have a teacher admit vague facts about my actual education, and then a student devises a way to counter and seperate himself from. This leads to her announcing her retirement.

Does this not seem like a system that has a zero tolerance system for their students understanding the real methods of and meanings of their actions; punishable by being removed from the system?

Please, criticize, judge, question, humiliate, agree, expand, laugh at, dismiss and ignore.
It is all material which can create new thought, and I eagerly await it all.

Thankyou TFP for a place to rant.

I know every thought may not be directly connected to each other, but it is because I have problems in taking the time to say everything when I think faster than I type.

P.S. I started writing at the end of that break. No other influences. Just to show there was an unbiased opinion up to that point.

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