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> ) and speculation (everyone is better without heavily structured schooling). https://www.theguardian.com/education/2016/sep/20/grammar-schools-play-europe-to

> ) and speculation (everyone is better without heavily structured schooling). https://www.theguardian.com/education/2016/sep/20/grammar-schools-play-europe-top-education-system-finland-daycare https://www.theguardian.com/education/2016/sep/20/grammar-sc... https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/why-are-finlands-schools-successful-49859555/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/why-are-finlands-s... This isn't speculation. Some of the best performing primary schools in the world are in Scandinavian countries, and they have a heavily unstructured "structure" if you want to call it that, day consisting of mostly playtime and activities, no standardized tests (even when there are testing, the results aren't publicized). A far-cry from some of the rigor and structure our kids face here in the US, where the primary objective seems to have been to raise obedient subservient factory workers rather than inspire dreams, aspirations, and creativity and teaching children how to truly learn, rather than simply perform a task.

gameswithgo 7y ago
ditches need digging too. every us school i or my kids have been a part of has a gifted and talented program. two tier approach seems a reasonable compromise
- wayoutthere 7y ago
  As one of the kids who went through a “gifted and talented” program, it was largely a way to segregate social classes. The “regular” classes were actually harder to do well in, but they weren’t full of blonde white kids.
jacobush 7y ago
Even here, there's a method to the madness. It may appear unstructured compared to the US.
topkai22 7y ago
Picking Finland as a model is problematic. Compared to the US, it's a small, socially homogenous country that speaks a language isolate. A much better comparison is Canada, which demographically and socially is much closer to the United States but ranks even higher than Finland in education scores. AFAIK from my contacts in Canada, their schooling system is very similar to the US, but had much better results.
- tyri_kai_psomi 7y ago
  I am not just picking Finland however. I am picking Scandanavia as a region, which consists of 21 million, or a little over half of Canada's population. The sample size is large enough, in my opinion. It passes the smell test as well: teaching children how to learn versus teaching children how to perform a task or pass a test Obviously the former is going to be better. Not forcing children to sit in classrooms for the majority of the day is obviously going to be better. Not being obsessed with standardize testing losing sight of the overall goal of preparing your children for life sounds obviously better. Starting at 7 years old sounds obviously better - I can specifically attest to this as a parent, where Americans seem obsessed to have their glorified daycare service aka "preschool and kindergarten" so that they can work more of their already overworked life away) Irrespective of the above points: I get it (the point about population size, different countries, economic systems, political systems, etc). This fact is brought up every time a desired attribute about a smaller country is mentioned. The things I am talking about are irrespective of population size. It requires a perspective change and getting rid of politicians that still somehow think the turn of the century, industrial-age, overtly standardized school system we have built here in America that more resembles a prison than a place of learning is working and just needs more: more money, more teachers, more books, more standardization (now we need to account for all different metrics and biases! more money to the test generators) etc, so we can keep on chugging along with this failed system when the elephant in the room is the system itself is what is a overall failure and needs a complete rebuild -- which is exactly what Finland did in the 60s when it had similar challenges from the Soviet-era education system.

gameswithgo 7y ago

ditches need digging too. every us school i or my kids have been a part of has a gifted and talented program. two tier approach seems a reasonable compromise

wayoutthere 7y ago
As one of the kids who went through a “gifted and talented” program, it was largely a way to segregate social classes. The “regular” classes were actually harder to do well in, but they weren’t full of blonde white kids.

jacobush 7y ago

Even here, there's a method to the madness. It may appear unstructured compared to the US.

topkai22 7y ago

Picking Finland as a model is problematic. Compared to the US, it's a small, socially homogenous country that speaks a language isolate. A much better comparison is Canada, which demographically and socially is much closer to the United States but ranks even higher than Finland in education scores. AFAIK from my contacts in Canada, their schooling system is very similar to the US, but had much better results.

tyri_kai_psomi 7y ago
I am not just picking Finland however. I am picking Scandanavia as a region, which consists of 21 million, or a little over half of Canada's population. The sample size is large enough, in my opinion. It passes the smell test as well: teaching children how to learn versus teaching children how to perform a task or pass a test Obviously the former is going to be better. Not forcing children to sit in classrooms for the majority of the day is obviously going to be better. Not being obsessed with standardize testing losing sight of the overall goal of preparing your children for life sounds obviously better. Starting at 7 years old sounds obviously better - I can specifically attest to this as a parent, where Americans seem obsessed to have their glorified daycare service aka "preschool and kindergarten" so that they can work more of their already overworked life away) Irrespective of the above points: I get it (the point about population size, different countries, economic systems, political systems, etc). This fact is brought up every time a desired attribute about a smaller country is mentioned. The things I am talking about are irrespective of population size. It requires a perspective change and getting rid of politicians that still somehow think the turn of the century, industrial-age, overtly standardized school system we have built here in America that more resembles a prison than a place of learning is working and just needs more: more money, more teachers, more books, more standardization (now we need to account for all different metrics and biases! more money to the test generators) etc, so we can keep on chugging along with this failed system when the elephant in the room is the system itself is what is a overall failure and needs a complete rebuild -- which is exactly what Finland did in the 60s when it had similar challenges from the Soviet-era education system.