Wounded by School: Are outdated school policies hurting our children? »
Posted By jwag57 4 months, 4 weeks ago in FamilyI just read the new book by Kirsten Olson, "Wounded by School: Recapturing the joy in learning and standing up to old school culture" and if you are a student, parent or teacher, you should too. Today's schooling, with its focus on achievement tests and accountability is taking away the joy of learning from our students.
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TheMagnificentOne4 months, 4 weeks ago
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This argument presents a chilling truth about our eductation system as a whole. Isnt education supposed to be about fostering a love of learning and not just making sure that students make the grade so that a school's funding is not in danger of being cut. Standardized testing, while it should play some role in the education system, should not be the scale of which we base the performance of our schools. Any teacher's grade book will show one that a majority of the failing students are not failing because they do not understand the material being presented. In many cases the number of missing assignments, and poor attendance will show a large lack of interest in the material being presented. We cant simply tell teenagers who usually dont even believe that math is even useful in their lives that education is important and expect that to motivate them. We have to find creative ways to relate schoolwork to real life and not just blandly give out worksheets assign homework and take tests. Which leads to another point. Maybe instead of just judging schools off of test scores and graduation rates, which only encourages school systems to make sure students meet the bare minimum requirements to graduate so that the graduation rate meets the requirements in order to receive proper funding, schools should also be judged on the number of graduates that attend college or vocational school.
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david_nwpa4 months, 4 weeks ago
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Public schools are required to track how well our special education students perform for up to five years after they leave high school. Much of the problem with our education system falls before students reach high school. Far too many elementary schools suffer from a gross lack of funding for adequate, up-to-date texts, poor technology, lack of supplies, and an overburdened faculty. Anyone who thinks that second and third grade teachers can thrive with more than 20 students per classroom has not spent enough time in an elementary classroom.
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Using standardized tests to determine the students' skills should serve as one of many factors that determine the effectiveness of the education provided. That said, rather than punishing teachers or schools, why are our government officials not spending more time concerned with the fact that students are pulled in multiple directions at the end of the school day. Too many students in divorced families are shuffling to a variety of practices and after-school activities, only to be shuttled to the other spouse on weekends. Our schools and teachers are not the primary problem, yet these standardized tests are used to root them out as if they were.
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david_nwpa4 months, 4 weeks ago
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Although I agree that our educational system is broken and in desperate need of repair, I think we need to do more than push more standardized testing on our students. Accountability should not be sole focus of our education laws. The "one size fits all" tests that students are forced to take come from governments rather than educators in the classroom.
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Our students have a total disconnect from thinking. Many cannot solve problems without having multiple answers from which they can select one. They need to have more open-ended problems which have multiple potential answers. They need to theorize and evaluate situations and provide more in-depth answers than those on a multiple choice quiz.
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