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A few changes I would do: I'd drop a lot of the homework, possibly only introducing it at a high school level. I'd drop grades for young students - up to middl

A few changes I would do: I'd drop a lot of the homework, possibly only introducing it at a high school level. I'd drop grades for young students - up to middle school - and adjust the grades for the upper levels so that an average mark - a C in the states - actually reflects the average levels. See, I think when your average or goal is an A - perfect - it doesn't leave room for those that go above and beyond what is expected. It also makes it so that the struggling students are really, really far behind. I mean, think about it. A C student struggling and earning a D would get help, yet in the current system, they still get help at the D or F level, yet their peers are generally making A's or B's - so the difference is greater. I think we could make use of standardized testing better as well, with fewer and shorter tests. I'd also do much more cross-learning. Want to teach kids to work in fractions? Teach them to cook, teach them to read music. Actually apply maths, including algebra and geometry, to real-life scenarios. History can be taught with literature - and science, and math. After all, many scientists were really given a hard time because of the politics of the day. Above all, I think general skills should be the focus. Everyone should know how the justice system works in practice (not just theory). Folks should know how to get credit and keep it, how to file taxes, what taxes are used for, and so on. We could also do Much better teaching about health. I had many classes going over basic anatomy and sex education, where they mostly told us that it could make a baby and we could get horrible diseases. Unfortunately, learning how to take care of your own body, what to do when you are sick and when to go to the doctor or ER aren't included. The same goes for learning about healthy relationships, signs of abuse (for both sexes!), and learning about the needs of children are absent and I generally think this sort of thing is a shame.

cesarbs 10y ago
> Actually apply maths, including algebra and geometry, to real-life scenarios. I very much agree with this. Back when I was in high school we had some overlapping topics in Math and Physics. But in the Physics class we'd actually see things applied to the real world (e.g. a quadratic equation representing the trajectory of a cannon ball), and that made the stuff learned in Math a lot more interesting to me. > Unfortunately, learning how to take care of your own body, This should be fixed in PE. I only got interested in being active after I was already an adult (and a very sedentary one). For years I hated the thought of doing physical activity because I associated it with PE class and all the bullshit I had to endure (bullying and having no option but to play sports I didn't really like). Would be nice if we were taught at school about body composition, nutrition, different results you can get from exercise (strength, hypertrophy, endurance, that kind of thing). PE is often instead a bunch of random stuff with no explanation of what results can be expected.
- Broken_Hippo 10y ago
  Oh, I completely agree with you. I'd also extend PE so kids have it all through school - in high school, I only had 2 semesters over the years. 6 weeks of that was Ping Pong. Yes. Ping pong. Valid physical activity, sure, but I really don't need to know the rules. It would be more helpful to know how to build up a running habit and how to do resistence and flexibility training safely. It'd be helpful to know how to stay active without equipment - and in addition, how to use the equipment safely. I generally seperate the nutrition into a health and life skills class, but they could be combined easily.

cesarbs 10y ago

> Actually apply maths, including algebra and geometry, to real-life scenarios. I very much agree with this. Back when I was in high school we had some overlapping topics in Math and Physics. But in the Physics class we'd actually see things applied to the real world (e.g. a quadratic equation representing the trajectory of a cannon ball), and that made the stuff learned in Math a lot more interesting to me. > Unfortunately, learning how to take care of your own body, This should be fixed in PE. I only got interested in being active after I was already an adult (and a very sedentary one). For years I hated the thought of doing physical activity because I associated it with PE class and all the bullshit I had to endure (bullying and having no option but to play sports I didn't really like). Would be nice if we were taught at school about body composition, nutrition, different results you can get from exercise (strength, hypertrophy, endurance, that kind of thing). PE is often instead a bunch of random stuff with no explanation of what results can be expected.

Broken_Hippo 10y ago
Oh, I completely agree with you. I'd also extend PE so kids have it all through school - in high school, I only had 2 semesters over the years. 6 weeks of that was Ping Pong. Yes. Ping pong. Valid physical activity, sure, but I really don't need to know the rules. It would be more helpful to know how to build up a running habit and how to do resistence and flexibility training safely. It'd be helpful to know how to stay active without equipment - and in addition, how to use the equipment safely. I generally seperate the nutrition into a health and life skills class, but they could be combined easily.