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I think a huge part of the problem with the American education system is exemplified right here with belittling the role of teachers.

xondono 5y ago
To be fair, the average teacher in most countries is quite bad. Like it or not, schooling was originally designed as a daycare that teaches conformity and compliance. The idea that we can change that by improving things at the margins is IMO ludicrous.
- xkbarkar 5y ago
  Not at all. Mass schooling eas originally designed to teach the low-skilled to work on complicated machines in large factories. Modern society demands both parents working, a single parent can no longer cover even the cost of housing for an entire family. As is has become so expensive. Let alone medical expenses, hobbies, tutition etc. tldr; Schools turned into daycare facilites when housing became so expesive that both parents must work full time. That is maybe 40 years ago.
  - LocalH 5y ago
    This is the natural result when society is designed in some way to extract everything possible from every individual. Basic survival is monetized, promises are broken, in a race to the bottom. Modern society itself is the problem.
- watwut 5y ago
  At the time when schooling started, 6 years old kids were not considered to need babysitting or daycare. They were to large extend able to move around the world independently. If they were not in school, they either did useful work for parents, in shops or played with other kids (or did mess on the streets). The origin of kindergarten is daycare - for 4 years old playing in streets with literally zero adult supervision.
wobblybubble 5y ago
A lot of what teachers do is exactly just that—basically talking at the pupils, as if they were vessels who are supposed to have their heads filled up with knowledge. Proper learning is supposed to be more active and pupil-directed. Look at the Deweyite schools in America. If you find that to be a belittling description then I’m sorry, but that’s largely what teachers do. And it’s been critiqued for a long time by thoughtful people who care about pedagogy, so you can’t simply dismiss it as some kind of “woe be the state of education” phenomenom.
- another_story 5y ago
  “Proper education” is student, culture and even teacher dependent. There is no singular best practice. So many of the sit down, shut up models of education in other countries produce students which routinely trounce US students in math and science. At the same time, so does Finland. My point above is that the belittling is a major part of the problem. You want to denigrate an entire profession, sure, but it has consequences, something we're seeing as experienced teachers leave the profession.
  - wobblybubble 5y ago
    > “Proper education” is student, culture and even teacher dependent. There is no singular best practice. In my experience it is not productive to have this kind of conversation with teachers since they will go back and forth between (1) general, vague praise for mass education, and then (2) vacuous, relativistic statements that says nothing about education other than “it’s relative” once they are confronted with concrete problems. They seem to identify too strongly with their teacher identity to be up for that discussion.
dukeofdoom 5y ago
No. It's about empowering the students with access to the mute button. It's a beautiful thing!

xondono 5y ago

To be fair, the average teacher in most countries is quite bad. Like it or not, schooling was originally designed as a daycare that teaches conformity and compliance. The idea that we can change that by improving things at the margins is IMO ludicrous.

xkbarkar 5y ago
Not at all. Mass schooling eas originally designed to teach the low-skilled to work on complicated machines in large factories. Modern society demands both parents working, a single parent can no longer cover even the cost of housing for an entire family. As is has become so expensive. Let alone medical expenses, hobbies, tutition etc. tldr; Schools turned into daycare facilites when housing became so expesive that both parents must work full time. That is maybe 40 years ago.
- LocalH 5y ago
  This is the natural result when society is designed in some way to extract everything possible from every individual. Basic survival is monetized, promises are broken, in a race to the bottom. Modern society itself is the problem.
watwut 5y ago
At the time when schooling started, 6 years old kids were not considered to need babysitting or daycare. They were to large extend able to move around the world independently. If they were not in school, they either did useful work for parents, in shops or played with other kids (or did mess on the streets). The origin of kindergarten is daycare - for 4 years old playing in streets with literally zero adult supervision.

wobblybubble 5y ago

A lot of what teachers do is exactly just that—basically talking at the pupils, as if they were vessels who are supposed to have their heads filled up with knowledge. Proper learning is supposed to be more active and pupil-directed. Look at the Deweyite schools in America. If you find that to be a belittling description then I’m sorry, but that’s largely what teachers do. And it’s been critiqued for a long time by thoughtful people who care about pedagogy, so you can’t simply dismiss it as some kind of “woe be the state of education” phenomenom.

another_story 5y ago
“Proper education” is student, culture and even teacher dependent. There is no singular best practice. So many of the sit down, shut up models of education in other countries produce students which routinely trounce US students in math and science. At the same time, so does Finland. My point above is that the belittling is a major part of the problem. You want to denigrate an entire profession, sure, but it has consequences, something we're seeing as experienced teachers leave the profession.
- wobblybubble 5y ago
  > “Proper education” is student, culture and even teacher dependent. There is no singular best practice. In my experience it is not productive to have this kind of conversation with teachers since they will go back and forth between (1) general, vague praise for mass education, and then (2) vacuous, relativistic statements that says nothing about education other than “it’s relative” once they are confronted with concrete problems. They seem to identify too strongly with their teacher identity to be up for that discussion.

dukeofdoom 5y ago

No. It's about empowering the students with access to the mute button. It's a beautiful thing!