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The huge elephant in the room is the our education system isn't built or designed to be in the best interest of children. School does a few things very well - i

The huge elephant in the room is the our education system isn't built or designed to be in the best interest of children. School does a few things very well - it frees parents from needing to be available for their children during working hours, it conditions students to accept obedience-based hierarchies, and it makes it much easier for bureaucracies to interact with the public as a whole. None of these are central needs of children. If holding your children back for one year is good, how about twelve?

tmsldd 10y ago
Totally agree... there is a misunderstanding about the problem. In fact, the education system is not flexible enough to adapt to the children's mental age. And, therefore the education system as it is designed is causing damage to a group of students. A solution might be delay 1 year to enroll the children. Another solution is to subdivide the admission to 2 or 4 times per year or ideally grouping students by maturity level and personalized education.. but I guess the cost might be prohibitive.
- ThrustVectoring 10y ago
  Why are we age segregating in the first place? Most of what that does is make it easier to administer a classroom, manage the teacher responsible for it, and develop a standard syllabus for it.
  - tmsldd 10y ago
    Indeed, a better solution ;)
UweSchmidt 10y ago
Most people are in no position to teach their kids appropriately. If you have a highly motivated, well educated stay-at-home parent it can work great of course. Otherwise, yes, there is incredible untapped human potential wasted in today's schools, unfortunately.
- ThrustVectoring 10y ago
  You're kind of assuming the conclusion - that children must be educated. If someone needs to learn something in order to meet their needs or fulfill their desires, there's hardly a force in the world that can stop them from picking stuff up. If it doesn't meet their needs or fulfill their desires, then why are you trying to make them learn it anyways? Setting up an environment that allows children to learn is ridiculously easy. Food, shelter, freedom to explore and experiment, other children and adults to interact with and discover things, more detailed resources if they end up needing math or something to solve a problem, and so forth. Primary schooling costs something like $200k total per student, and this expense could buy a lot of child-focused structure.
  - pfarnsworth 10y ago
    200k sounds wrong. I have my children in private school and it costs about $25k each per year. Assuming that the private school is profitable, to get to $200k would need a lot of explanation. Sure, amortization of the mortgage for school grounds, etc, but that won't make up the difference.
    - ThrustVectoring 10y ago
      $200k over twelve years, or ballpark of $16k/yr. Quick Google research says that this is on the higher end of public school expenditure levels, but not unheard of.
      - npunt 10y ago
        Typically schools get between $4-8k/pupil/yr. Rich neighborhoods get more, owing to the greater property taxes collected and the ratio of local/state/federal (approx 50/43/7 in CA). Rich ones have a lot of other resource advantages but that's a discussion for another place. Critically, there's an big economies of scale advantage in schools relative to homeschooling. Resource specialization has advantages. Just spitballing, I'd imagine the curve would show it's at least 2-3x cheaper to provide an equivalent education to a student at a mid-sized school relative to a student in a 5-student homeschool environment, and probably 5x+ for single student - obviously depends on the parent's earning capacity and skill as a teacher. The argument for homeschooling is almost never about cost though, due in part to this enormous disadvantage.
rustynails77 10y ago
Your comment really resonates with me. I've been very involved with a few schools and many teachers. I've presented classes to students. I've become friends with teachers. Sadly, the more I see, the less I like. You are absolutely right when you say that the classrooms aren't there for the students' best interests. One of the links below says "It’s a betrayal of our children and of our country’s future.". To quote one particularly honest teacher, "your child is a slow processor and extremely gifted. He's F*. The education system doesn't cater for children like yours". She (like me) has an autistic child. I wasn't cross with her at all. In fact, I deeply respected her honesty. My other child is very active. If you've done any reading, you will know that many modern teachers do not like active children. These kids are energetic, they ask too many questions, they are disruptive, won't sit down for long periods and no matter how much they're punished, they just won't shut up. My child has been marginalised by three teachers. I confronted the worst offender who broke down and cried when I told her how my child had responded to her bullying. She admitted it and in her own words "grossly mismanaged the situation". Yet, I respect her honesty (she's one of the few who would admit to it). My active child undulates between an A grade student a C grade student depending on the compatibility with the teacher. However, my child has said that he's getting tired of the sexism from the teachers and I expect it to start impacting the effort he puts in. The education system has become more sexist than it ever was in my lifetime. World University Rankings show that girls, only in recent years, are 30% more likely to graduate than boys, and that's expected to grow much larger. Nobody is asking WHY the drastic change! How many times have you heard someone like the New York Times say flippant comments like "boys suddenly think education is girly" or "boys suddenly are thick as two planks" as an attempt to explain a radical shift in performance by gender? We also hear manipulative terms like "girls _outclass_ the boys". If it were the other way around, it would be called "discrimination", "marginalisation", or a "sausage club" (to quote an Australian Education rep in the Daily Telegraph - below). https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/ucas-figures-gender-gap-university-applications-hits-record-level https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/ucas-figures-gende... I have included a link to one of the few excellent articles on Australia's prejudiced education system. They interviewed a representative from Australia’s school curriculum - a top science professor, Michelle Simmons, who condemned the Australian education system for totally failing students, http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/rendezview/feminising-education-is-setting-us-up-to-fail/ http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/rendezview/feminising-educa... Australia has ramped up its gender bias in education significantly in recent years. The result, according to the article is... "In less than 20 years, Australia has fallen from the fourth in the world for reading to 13th, according to an OECD report. We were once sixth for maths, but now we’re 19th." You will see almost the same downward trend in the UK and the US (who we copied for their gendered education policies). Compound this with denials from quite a few media publications that there's anything wrong, http://ideas.time.com/2013/03/21/the-boy-crisis-is-it-fictional/ http://ideas.time.com/2013/03/21/the-boy-crisis-is-it-fictio... http://womensenews.org/2006/03/boy-crisis-in-education-nothing-hype/ http://womensenews.org/2006/03/boy-crisis-in-education-nothi... https://www.jstor.org/stable/40535485?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents https://www.jstor.org/stable/40535485?seq=1#page_scan_tab_co... And a host of others. I can't tell you how many times i've seen extreme sexism in classrooms (eg. comparing leaders. Female: Sheryl Sandberg and Hillary Clinton; Male: Adolph Hitler and Donald Trump. I wish I was joking). The education system is letting our kids down badly. The significant swing away from boys attending university would strongly imply that it's not just inadequate study areas, but also sexism. I've all but lost faith in the education system, yet, I still contribute at my school as much as I can afford to.
2bitencryption 10y ago
hacker news, ladies and gentlemen

tmsldd 10y ago

Totally agree... there is a misunderstanding about the problem. In fact, the education system is not flexible enough to adapt to the children's mental age. And, therefore the education system as it is designed is causing damage to a group of students. A solution might be delay 1 year to enroll the children. Another solution is to subdivide the admission to 2 or 4 times per year or ideally grouping students by maturity level and personalized education.. but I guess the cost might be prohibitive.

ThrustVectoring 10y ago
Why are we age segregating in the first place? Most of what that does is make it easier to administer a classroom, manage the teacher responsible for it, and develop a standard syllabus for it.
- tmsldd 10y ago
  Indeed, a better solution ;)

UweSchmidt 10y ago

Most people are in no position to teach their kids appropriately. If you have a highly motivated, well educated stay-at-home parent it can work great of course. Otherwise, yes, there is incredible untapped human potential wasted in today's schools, unfortunately.

ThrustVectoring 10y ago
You're kind of assuming the conclusion - that children must be educated. If someone needs to learn something in order to meet their needs or fulfill their desires, there's hardly a force in the world that can stop them from picking stuff up. If it doesn't meet their needs or fulfill their desires, then why are you trying to make them learn it anyways? Setting up an environment that allows children to learn is ridiculously easy. Food, shelter, freedom to explore and experiment, other children and adults to interact with and discover things, more detailed resources if they end up needing math or something to solve a problem, and so forth. Primary schooling costs something like $200k total per student, and this expense could buy a lot of child-focused structure.
- pfarnsworth 10y ago
  200k sounds wrong. I have my children in private school and it costs about $25k each per year. Assuming that the private school is profitable, to get to $200k would need a lot of explanation. Sure, amortization of the mortgage for school grounds, etc, but that won't make up the difference.
  - ThrustVectoring 10y ago
    $200k over twelve years, or ballpark of $16k/yr. Quick Google research says that this is on the higher end of public school expenditure levels, but not unheard of.
    - npunt 10y ago
      Typically schools get between $4-8k/pupil/yr. Rich neighborhoods get more, owing to the greater property taxes collected and the ratio of local/state/federal (approx 50/43/7 in CA). Rich ones have a lot of other resource advantages but that's a discussion for another place. Critically, there's an big economies of scale advantage in schools relative to homeschooling. Resource specialization has advantages. Just spitballing, I'd imagine the curve would show it's at least 2-3x cheaper to provide an equivalent education to a student at a mid-sized school relative to a student in a 5-student homeschool environment, and probably 5x+ for single student - obviously depends on the parent's earning capacity and skill as a teacher. The argument for homeschooling is almost never about cost though, due in part to this enormous disadvantage.

rustynails77 10y ago

Your comment really resonates with me. I've been very involved with a few schools and many teachers. I've presented classes to students. I've become friends with teachers. Sadly, the more I see, the less I like. You are absolutely right when you say that the classrooms aren't there for the students' best interests. One of the links below says "It’s a betrayal of our children and of our country’s future.". To quote one particularly honest teacher, "your child is a slow processor and extremely gifted. He's F*. The education system doesn't cater for children like yours". She (like me) has an autistic child. I wasn't cross with her at all. In fact, I deeply respected her honesty. My other child is very active. If you've done any reading, you will know that many modern teachers do not like active children. These kids are energetic, they ask too many questions, they are disruptive, won't sit down for long periods and no matter how much they're punished, they just won't shut up. My child has been marginalised by three teachers. I confronted the worst offender who broke down and cried when I told her how my child had responded to her bullying. She admitted it and in her own words "grossly mismanaged the situation". Yet, I respect her honesty (she's one of the few who would admit to it). My active child undulates between an A grade student a C grade student depending on the compatibility with the teacher. However, my child has said that he's getting tired of the sexism from the teachers and I expect it to start impacting the effort he puts in. The education system has become more sexist than it ever was in my lifetime. World University Rankings show that girls, only in recent years, are 30% more likely to graduate than boys, and that's expected to grow much larger. Nobody is asking WHY the drastic change! How many times have you heard someone like the New York Times say flippant comments like "boys suddenly think education is girly" or "boys suddenly are thick as two planks" as an attempt to explain a radical shift in performance by gender? We also hear manipulative terms like "girls _outclass_ the boys". If it were the other way around, it would be called "discrimination", "marginalisation", or a "sausage club" (to quote an Australian Education rep in the Daily Telegraph - below). https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/ucas-figures-gender-gap-university-applications-hits-record-level https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/ucas-figures-gende... I have included a link to one of the few excellent articles on Australia's prejudiced education system. They interviewed a representative from Australia’s school curriculum - a top science professor, Michelle Simmons, who condemned the Australian education system for totally failing students, http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/rendezview/feminising-education-is-setting-us-up-to-fail/ http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/rendezview/feminising-educa... Australia has ramped up its gender bias in education significantly in recent years. The result, according to the article is... "In less than 20 years, Australia has fallen from the fourth in the world for reading to 13th, according to an OECD report. We were once sixth for maths, but now we’re 19th." You will see almost the same downward trend in the UK and the US (who we copied for their gendered education policies). Compound this with denials from quite a few media publications that there's anything wrong, http://ideas.time.com/2013/03/21/the-boy-crisis-is-it-fictional/ http://ideas.time.com/2013/03/21/the-boy-crisis-is-it-fictio... http://womensenews.org/2006/03/boy-crisis-in-education-nothing-hype/ http://womensenews.org/2006/03/boy-crisis-in-education-nothi... https://www.jstor.org/stable/40535485?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents https://www.jstor.org/stable/40535485?seq=1#page_scan_tab_co... And a host of others. I can't tell you how many times i've seen extreme sexism in classrooms (eg. comparing leaders. Female: Sheryl Sandberg and Hillary Clinton; Male: Adolph Hitler and Donald Trump. I wish I was joking). The education system is letting our kids down badly. The significant swing away from boys attending university would strongly imply that it's not just inadequate study areas, but also sexism. I've all but lost faith in the education system, yet, I still contribute at my school as much as I can afford to.

2bitencryption 10y ago

hacker news, ladies and gentlemen