7 ms·

Personally, I don't think the situation is nearly as gloomy in the US as a lot of my fellows seem to. It's a characteristic of nation citizens to be over hard o

by ellyagg 15y ago

Personally, I don't think the situation is nearly as gloomy in the US as a lot of my fellows seem to. It's a characteristic of nation citizens to be over hard on certain aspects of their community. As a matter of fact, if the US school system is partly or significantly responsible for the productivity and creativity of adult residents, I'm pretty satisfied with it on the whole. I'm not sure studying to tests produces the best outcomes. I'm more interested in novel problem solving, invention, and innovation, and typical international standardized tests don't suss that out especially well, do they? Moreover, it's hard to know what to infer when comparing a giant, multicultural country with a small, much more homogeneous one such as Singapore. It makes sense that some small countries might outperform the US at testing in the same way that you expect some small countries to have a higher per capita gdp. Unless I miss my guess, we could cherry pick some communities in the US that do better on either than Singapore. This article about US test scores, after adjusting for demographics, was discussed on HN before, although I can't find the link just now: http://super-economy.blogspot.com/2010/12/amazing-truth-about-pisa-scores-usa.html http://super-economy.blogspot.com/2010/12/amazing-truth-abou... It's extremely interesting, and I haven't seen anything that impeaches it. That's not to say that I think the US school system does not have huge room for improvement. That's clear, and I'm hopeful that continued technological development and research will provide amazing breakthroughs. Moreover, we're not even using some of the best methods that are already available; research suggests the Montessorri method is advantageous, and indeed my own son was trained at one, and we were much happier with the result in comparison to his time at a public elementary school. But it's not necessary to down talk where we're at to motivate improvement. What I don't want to see is throwing the baby out with the bathwater. US schools get some things right. Students come out believing they can do anything. They're not afraid to try new approaches. I'd rather not end up with test taking automatons who are mainly expert at memorization and thoughtless skills drills.

thaumaturgy 15y ago
Just a couple of quibbles: > But it's not necessary to down talk where we're at to motivate improvement. It is necessary if the general perception of where we're at is much better than where we're actually at. I think the U.S. still has a very strong cultural air of superiority which perhaps is no longer justified (if it ever was). The first step to solving a problem is to realize that it exists, and the U.S. educational system is only recently coming under scrutiny because of repeated criticisms of it. > Students come out believing they can do anything. I'm uncertain about this -- both whether it's true, and whether it's beneficial if true. > They're not afraid to try new approaches. Actually, there's a growing murmur of dissent that, at least in the special case of "gifted" children, the constant praise of their intelligence leads to a fear of failure which, in turn, leads to a fear of trying things which others might try without hesitation.
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
- lsc 15y ago
  >Actually, there's a growing murmur of dissent that, at least in the special case of "gifted" children, the constant praise of their intelligence leads to a fear of failure which, in turn, leads to a fear of trying things which others might try without hesitation. Citation needed. Speaking as a giftie myself, and someone who has many friends who went through various gifted programs, this is not my impression.
  - lupatus 15y ago
    Back in the day, I was also in my school's gifted programs and I had a fear of failure. But, it was because my family was poor. I knew that I was solely responsible for my attendance at college and that academic scholarships were my "golden ticket" for that. Similarly, some of my friends feared sports injuries because athletic prowess was their ticket to college.
  - tokenadult 15y ago
    Citation needed. Citation given: http://www.stanfordalumni.org/news/magazine/2007/marapr/features/dweck.html http://www.stanfordalumni.org/news/magazine/2007/marapr/feat... I am also very familiar with the gifted education community and numerous families of people who have been identified as gifted learners, and the research finding reported in the article submitted to open this thread rings true, based on my experience.
  - thaumaturgy 15y ago
    http://nymag.com/news/features/27840/ http://nymag.com/news/features/27840/ Googling for "praise effort not intelligence" will turn up a bunch more references, but most of them (at a glance) are referencing the same work by the same individual(s) (Dweck, et al). I didn't have this saved in my pinboard, so I had to go find it again. I have to snark a little about a giftie not investigating this for themselves. (snark snark snark) :-)
    - 15y ago
zwieback 15y ago
Agree, I have two kids in public elementary school and have no complaints about what and how they learn math. I think the problem in the US is the huge difference between schools. I happen to live close to a very good school but not everyone is as privileged. From what I've heard the difference in school quality goes up in the higher grades, which I can easily believe.
pixcavator 15y ago
>it's hard to know what to infer when comparing a giant, multicultural country with a small, much more homogeneous one such as Singapore. That's nothing. I remember a few years ago at this forum someone put forward a report that compared the US with a list of contries with the Vatican at the top.
- eru 15y ago
  And the US was found lacking in the Pope per Capita ranking?
tokenadult 15y ago
I wrote: (the language of schooling in Singapore has long been English, but the home languages of most Singaporeans are south Chinese languages like my wife's native Hokkien or Malay or Indian languages like Tamil) And then you replied: it's hard to know what to infer when comparing a giant, multicultural country with a small, much more homogeneous one such as Singapore. I especially noted the language diversity of Singapore to respond to something I have read over and over and over throughout the years when Singapore is mentioned in discussions of educational comparisons, namely the false idea that Singapore is "homogeneous" in any meaningful sense for the provision of primary education. It is not. Singapore is, as far as I know, the only country in the world with four different official languages (Modern Standard Chinese, Bahasa Malay, Tamil, and English) from different language families (Sino-Tibetan, Austronesian, Dravidian, and Indo-European) and surely one of the very few countries during my lifetime in which the typical person grew up in a home in which NONE of the official languages were spoken at home. Since before independence, the primary language of school instruction in Singapore has been the official language, English, that was at the beginning LEAST likely to be spoken by any school pupil at home. School officials in the United States whine about a minority of pupils who speak Spanish at home, even though they surely also speak English in the broader community (as my neighbors from Spanish-speaking households do). Try to imagine the United States and its level of educational achievement if most school pupils had first of all, when entering school, to learn a new language that they don't speak at home to their parents and rarely speak to classmates when outside of school. That is the amazing achievement of Singapore. (Something similar and only a bit less amazing happened in Taiwan over a just slightly longer time span, when a majority population that spoke Taiwanese or Hakka watched a younger generation grow up as Mandarin-speakers.) That's not to say that I think the US school system does not have huge room for improvement. That's clear, and I'm hopeful that continued technological development and research will provide amazing breakthroughs. Moreover, we're not even using some of the best methods that are already available We largely agree on these statements of yours. On my part, I think "research" (on educational methods that already work in other places) are like to have more impact on primary education than "technological development," but I'll take improvements however they come. I see I omitted to mention in my first post here, an omission I will now correct, a link to a study of PISA results http://www.hks.harvard.edu/pepg/PDF/Papers/PEPG10-19_HanushekPetersonWoessmann.pdf http://www.hks.harvard.edu/pepg/PDF/Papers/PEPG10-19_Hanushe... showing that advantaged pupils with highly educated parents in the United States fare particularly poorly in comparison with pupils enjoying similar advantages in other countries. What's really shocking about international educational comparisons is how badly the top-end students in the United States do, as was also shown in the data graphs linked to in my first post, http://pirls.bc.edu/timss2007/PDF/T07_M_IR_Chapter1.pdf http://pirls.bc.edu/timss2007/PDF/T07_M_IR_Chapter1.pdf which provide an excellent example of correct use of what are sometimes called "box and whisker" plots.

by ellyagg 15y ago

thaumaturgy 15y ago

Just a couple of quibbles: > But it's not necessary to down talk where we're at to motivate improvement. It is necessary if the general perception of where we're at is much better than where we're actually at. I think the U.S. still has a very strong cultural air of superiority which perhaps is no longer justified (if it ever was). The first step to solving a problem is to realize that it exists, and the U.S. educational system is only recently coming under scrutiny because of repeated criticisms of it. > Students come out believing they can do anything. I'm uncertain about this -- both whether it's true, and whether it's beneficial if true. > They're not afraid to try new approaches. Actually, there's a growing murmur of dissent that, at least in the special case of "gifted" children, the constant praise of their intelligence leads to a fear of failure which, in turn, leads to a fear of trying things which others might try without hesitation.

deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
lsc 15y ago
>Actually, there's a growing murmur of dissent that, at least in the special case of "gifted" children, the constant praise of their intelligence leads to a fear of failure which, in turn, leads to a fear of trying things which others might try without hesitation. Citation needed. Speaking as a giftie myself, and someone who has many friends who went through various gifted programs, this is not my impression.
- lupatus 15y ago
  Back in the day, I was also in my school's gifted programs and I had a fear of failure. But, it was because my family was poor. I knew that I was solely responsible for my attendance at college and that academic scholarships were my "golden ticket" for that. Similarly, some of my friends feared sports injuries because athletic prowess was their ticket to college.
- tokenadult 15y ago
  Citation needed. Citation given: http://www.stanfordalumni.org/news/magazine/2007/marapr/features/dweck.html http://www.stanfordalumni.org/news/magazine/2007/marapr/feat... I am also very familiar with the gifted education community and numerous families of people who have been identified as gifted learners, and the research finding reported in the article submitted to open this thread rings true, based on my experience.
- thaumaturgy 15y ago
  http://nymag.com/news/features/27840/ http://nymag.com/news/features/27840/ Googling for "praise effort not intelligence" will turn up a bunch more references, but most of them (at a glance) are referencing the same work by the same individual(s) (Dweck, et al). I didn't have this saved in my pinboard, so I had to go find it again. I have to snark a little about a giftie not investigating this for themselves. (snark snark snark) :-)
  - 15y ago

zwieback 15y ago

Agree, I have two kids in public elementary school and have no complaints about what and how they learn math. I think the problem in the US is the huge difference between schools. I happen to live close to a very good school but not everyone is as privileged. From what I've heard the difference in school quality goes up in the higher grades, which I can easily believe.

pixcavator 15y ago

>it's hard to know what to infer when comparing a giant, multicultural country with a small, much more homogeneous one such as Singapore. That's nothing. I remember a few years ago at this forum someone put forward a report that compared the US with a list of contries with the Vatican at the top.

eru 15y ago
And the US was found lacking in the Pope per Capita ranking?

tokenadult 15y ago

I wrote: (the language of schooling in Singapore has long been English, but the home languages of most Singaporeans are south Chinese languages like my wife's native Hokkien or Malay or Indian languages like Tamil) And then you replied: it's hard to know what to infer when comparing a giant, multicultural country with a small, much more homogeneous one such as Singapore. I especially noted the language diversity of Singapore to respond to something I have read over and over and over throughout the years when Singapore is mentioned in discussions of educational comparisons, namely the false idea that Singapore is "homogeneous" in any meaningful sense for the provision of primary education. It is not. Singapore is, as far as I know, the only country in the world with four different official languages (Modern Standard Chinese, Bahasa Malay, Tamil, and English) from different language families (Sino-Tibetan, Austronesian, Dravidian, and Indo-European) and surely one of the very few countries during my lifetime in which the typical person grew up in a home in which NONE of the official languages were spoken at home. Since before independence, the primary language of school instruction in Singapore has been the official language, English, that was at the beginning LEAST likely to be spoken by any school pupil at home. School officials in the United States whine about a minority of pupils who speak Spanish at home, even though they surely also speak English in the broader community (as my neighbors from Spanish-speaking households do). Try to imagine the United States and its level of educational achievement if most school pupils had first of all, when entering school, to learn a new language that they don't speak at home to their parents and rarely speak to classmates when outside of school. That is the amazing achievement of Singapore. (Something similar and only a bit less amazing happened in Taiwan over a just slightly longer time span, when a majority population that spoke Taiwanese or Hakka watched a younger generation grow up as Mandarin-speakers.) That's not to say that I think the US school system does not have huge room for improvement. That's clear, and I'm hopeful that continued technological development and research will provide amazing breakthroughs. Moreover, we're not even using some of the best methods that are already available We largely agree on these statements of yours. On my part, I think "research" (on educational methods that already work in other places) are like to have more impact on primary education than "technological development," but I'll take improvements however they come. I see I omitted to mention in my first post here, an omission I will now correct, a link to a study of PISA results http://www.hks.harvard.edu/pepg/PDF/Papers/PEPG10-19_HanushekPetersonWoessmann.pdf http://www.hks.harvard.edu/pepg/PDF/Papers/PEPG10-19_Hanushe... showing that advantaged pupils with highly educated parents in the United States fare particularly poorly in comparison with pupils enjoying similar advantages in other countries. What's really shocking about international educational comparisons is how badly the top-end students in the United States do, as was also shown in the data graphs linked to in my first post, http://pirls.bc.edu/timss2007/PDF/T07_M_IR_Chapter1.pdf http://pirls.bc.edu/timss2007/PDF/T07_M_IR_Chapter1.pdf which provide an excellent example of correct use of what are sometimes called "box and whisker" plots.