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If the goal of school is to develop children into young adults with good reasoning and analytical skills, a basic wholesome world and social model and some prac

If the goal of school is to develop children into young adults with good reasoning and analytical skills, a basic wholesome world and social model and some practical skills and basic physique, smartphones seem to contribute little and distract a lot from those aims.

constantcrying 2y ago
Is that the aim of schools? It certainly did not appear to me that way, here in Germany. There was a lot of time spend sitting in a room and "learning", yet I basically learned nothing. For the other things you described I do not think they were ever considered. All around school was a giant waste of time.
- bnegreve 2y ago
  Surely reading/writing are useful skills that most people did not have before school was mandatory.
  - constantcrying 2y ago
    I did not take me twelve years to learn to read and write. What an awful excuse. What made me good at reading was reading books outside of school. In a single semester of university I learned more than in 12 years of school.
    - moooo99 2y ago
      > In a single semester of university I learned more than in 12 years of school. I learned more in a single year on the job than I did in 3 years of university. That doesn’t make university useless
    - rad_gruchalski 2y ago
      No, I don’t think that’s true. The 12 years of the pre-uni education set you up for being a member of society. You don’t see it because it became a part of you. You also learned to read, write, all basic math, geography, … The uni taught you more real-world expected skills but I‘m certain you learned more before uni.
      - constantcrying 2y ago
        Why couldn't I have learned university courses and these other skills at the same time?
        kube-system 2y ago
        > Why couldn't I have learned university courses and these other skills at the same time? Was that not offered at your school? It was at mine. University level courses do presume you have some basic skills. But in many places, schools do offer university level courses for those who are prepared.
        constantcrying 2y ago
        >Was that not offered at your school? I think it would have been theoretically possible, but obviously logistically difficult as I would have had to skip multiple classes in other fields to attend. It's also not like I was particularly interested in mathematics at that point in my life. I essentially chose my field of study based on what I had the best grades in. Only during my studies, when the material actually became difficult, I started to be interested and engaged in the subject.
        kube-system 2y ago
        For the schools that offer students the ability to take university-level courses, students aren't "skipping" other classes. > Only during my studies, when the material actually became difficult, I started to be interested and engaged in the subject. Many schools solve this by having different difficulty-levels of courses. My school, in the US, had three.
        constantcrying 2y ago
        Germany has different levels of schools. I was in the one for highest education, targeting a university degree.
    - andrepd 2y ago
      > In a single semester of university I learned more than in 12 years of school. You keep saying this but I have a hard time believing this is true; in fact I'm not even sure what "more" means (objectively) in this context. Let's see, in the 12 years of schooling you've learned at the very least: how to read and write, how to interpret texts, how to read literature, how to compose an essay, how to speak, read, and write a second language, a ton of mathematics from basic arithmetic to I guess something like calculus and trigonometry and algebra and some discrete maths, several topics of physics and chemistry, biology, geology, and other natural sciences (in more or less detail), several years of history, and mandatory physical exercise to top it off. What magical university did you go to that in a single semester you learned more than that :D Unless I'm missing something.
      - constantcrying 2y ago
        In school I spend 8 hours listening to some teacher or playing silly learning games and did some busywork as homework. I never learned for any test or found any of the material particularly interesting. In university I actually had to study, take notes, research the subject, study for many hours, etc. >a ton of mathematics from basic arithmetic to I guess something like calculus and trigonometry and algebra and some discrete maths Hilarious to say this. As it turned out, my first semester of university mathematics was spent on learning everything I did not learn in school. And it made it extremely clear to me how badly school had prepared me. You would think that school would put me in a position where university mathematics were just a continuation. Nothing further could be from the truth, nearly everything taught in school was taught in a way which made it useless for actual mathematics. In school we learned nothing about: Sets, logic, deductions, Axioms or Proofs (which turn out to be really important!), we did however spend years solving integrals, which turned out extremely unhelpful for actual mathematics.
        RandomLensman 2y ago
        Seems experiences vary: For me, the first year of university mathematics was to a large extent a continuation or even what was covered in school (sets, axioms, proofs etc were covered in school). That said, that wasn't the case for everyone as far as I could tell.
    - kube-system 2y ago
      > I did not take me twelve years to learn to read and write. It takes people twelve years to learn to read and write at a 12th grade level. You could study it for another 4 or more years at university if you wanted to develop your skills further. > What made me good at reading was reading books outside of school. This is your personal experience. I learned to read and write quite well at school and was well-prepared for university.
      - DocTomoe 2y ago
        > It takes people twelve years to learn to read and write at a 12th grade level. Nah. You are mixing up the skill 'writing glyphs on a piece of paper and retrieving that information via optical means' with 'being well-grounded in a wide array of subjects so you can express an idea in a way that is mentally stimulating to a potential reader'. Neither takes 12 years to learn. The first, we teach within a year, at most. The second we do not teach at all, and the best 'writers' often are those who were challenged outside of school, by parents who gave them a rich, intellectually interesting environment, not within it.
        deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
        const_cast 2y ago
        We most definitely teach number 2. That's what English class is - you read books, plays, maybe documents, and then you write essays on them. You need to be concise, persuasive, have a unique voice. Just because you, and other's, did not pay attention or were not good writers, does not mean we don't teach that. We do, for years.
      - bluGill 2y ago
        There is no such thing as a 12th grade level. 6th grade is all the farther English is taught. There are sometimes things called levels above that, but they are not levels in English they are levels in some specific specialization and have more to do with that specialization than reading. (doctors would not be expected to understand deep computer science writing even though doctors have very advanced reading skills in a medical domain). I understand Spanish only goes up to a 5th grade level while Japanese to 9th. This is a reflection on how complex the writing systems are, and not the kids, intelligence, or school systems. The years after you have your basic reading down are used to learn other skills that are of general use in life for everyone.
    - tremon 2y ago
      You should have taken that semester when you were 4 years old then, you could have skipped fifteen years of education!
  - Ekaros 2y ago
    They did. Well at least officially. Being able to read was needed if you wanted to get married.
  - bluGill 2y ago
    > Surely reading/writing are useful skills that most people did not have before school was mandatory. Citation needed. I've heard it repeated a lot, but never by someone with actual historical credentials. It varied from society to society (and many societies were sexist so boys and girls would have different results). Likely most is correct, but also misleading as it appears many societies were very literate even among poor people. From what I understand (recognize I'm not a historian!), Jewish boys have long had a right of passage of reading the bible in the local synagogue. Most languages are not that hard to learn the basic phonics of and thus read and write. You wouldn't be good, but you could do it. Historians have told me that most of their references for is literate were from time/places where literate meant Latin. The common person know much Latin (despite going to mass in Latin), and couldn't read/write it. However they would have had more education in their local language which was never counted.
- sofixa 2y ago
  > There was a lot of time spend sitting in a room and "learning", yet I basically learned nothing Do you think that was because their methods were bad, you didn't bother and they couldn't force you, or that their methods were not adapted to the way you learn? Also, I'd find it surprising if you really learned nothing. From what I know of German schooling from people who went through it, you certainly learned at least a bit about the depths to which humans can go to and how to prevent them (Holocaust and wider Nazi atrocities). Also, you probably learned social skills, basic project management and collaboration, and some knowledge which is probably useless other than maybe as a basis of understanding the world and various things you might encounter. I don't recall much from my biology or chemistry classes, but I recall vague outlines, which is enough.
  - constantcrying 2y ago
    >Do you think that was because their methods were bad, you didn't bother and they couldn't force you, or that their methods were not adapted to the way you learn? It was because they had nothing to teach. I still remember trying to learn fractions from a teacher who clearly did not understand fractions either. Just to be clear, I did very well in school. Given their standards I would be considered a "successful student" and I went on to get a university degree. >Also, you probably learned social skills, basic project management and collaboration, and some knowledge which is probably useless other than maybe as a basis of understanding the world None of that I learned while sitting in class. I learned it despite the school activities I had to do.
    - sofixa 2y ago
      > None of that I learned while sitting in class School is about more than the part where you sit in class. The social skills, time and project management navigation etc. is all stuff you learn and do because of school but outside of class.
      - constantcrying 2y ago
        But if that is the goal of schools then we would drastically reduce the time students sit in class.
- roenxi 2y ago
  You have put your finger on something - the actual purpose of school is to socialise children (it isn't very efficient as a teaching system - tutoring is better and what the people who really care about educational attainment use). But a side effect is teaching them a lot of useful things. And telling if time spent learning is wasted is actually quite hard - if you know something and everyone else knows something it often fades into the background and nobody notices. But it still makes a difference.
  - constantcrying 2y ago
    >the actual purpose of school is to socialise children I agree that this is probably the most important thing for children to learn. My point is that sitting in a room for 8 hours does very little to accomplish that. >And telling if time spent learning is wasted is actually quite hard - if you know something and everyone else knows something it often fades into the background and nobody notices. But it still makes a difference. I had the direct comparison when I went to university. It became very clear that I was learning much more and faster. To talk about schooling we first have to make clear what the goal is. Sure everybody needs to learn how to read, write and do basic arithmetic, but that is not a 12 year endeavor. Even including basic general knowledge is not a 12 year endeavor. And we should not be wasting children's time on things, just because we can't be bothered to have them do something actually meaningful.
    - myrmidon 2y ago
      > I had the direct comparison when I went to university. It became very clear that I was learning much more and faster. Sure, but this should be expected. If you filtered out all children with low interest/performance/support in preschool and just threw them onto a playground, learning rate could also be much faster in school for the rest. But if you want a solid baseline of reading/writing/math/general education for everyone in society, those twelve years are already barely enough. I'm very confident that early discrimination/segregation ("gifted" and "idiot" tracks in school) is a net negative for society and encourages unethical outcomes on top. Optional programs for faster/more targetted learning are much better and can be very positive IMO, but even there you need to be careful with how you set things up to avoid problems.
- 2muchcoffeeman 2y ago
  I know several teachers. So these sorts of comments are always funny. I know math teachers who lack support but continuously attempt to present topics from different POV because some students don’t get it. So some self proclaimed smart person “learned nothing”, and therefore school is a waste of time. At the same time, ignoring that maybe a school or system is indeed not prepared to handle some individuals (which is not good), or that maybe some teachers are bad, or maybe the system does not support their staff enough. But that can’t be the case because they learned nothing. Whole school system must be a scam.
  - constantcrying 2y ago
    As I wrote below. My most memorable math class was a teacher failing to explain fractions to me, what later became obvious to me was that the teacher did not understand fractions either. I am sure you want to blame me for this, but somehow I went to university and got a degree in (applied) mathematics. So I doubt it was some fundamental problem with me. Everybody is upset when someone tells them they fail at their jobs and teachers are an entire industry of total failure. In a single semester of university I learned so much more than in 12 years of school. If teachers aren't at fault, who is? By any metric I was a successful student.
    - 2muchcoffeeman 2y ago
      I’m not blaming you. But as intelligent as you may be, you have discounted all the possibilities for the failure of you school or your particular teachers. Because you had a bad time, then the whole system is malicious right? I know a high school teacher with a PhD and has tutored and lectured at the university level. But they are a teacher now. Guess I’ll paint them with the same brush as all teachers.
      - constantcrying 2y ago
        >then the whole system is malicious right? Where did I say that the intentions were bad? >Because you had a bad time, then the whole system is malicious right? No. In university the expectations were drastically higher. If the goal of the school was to prepare me for university, then it failed at that for everyone. The mismatch can not be attributed to me. >But they are a teacher now. Guess I’ll paint them with the same brush as all teachers. We had one of these as well. Average teacher, learned basically nothing in her class.
- closewith 2y ago
  And yet consistently the happiest, healthiest, and most developed societies are those with the highest levels of primary and secondary education attainment. Not necessarily causative, but we'd want to be very sure the educational fence isn't contributory before we tear it down.
- watwut 2y ago
  Quite a lot of Germans learn quite a lot. German schools expect quite a lot from students that do actually want to go to better schools. But yes, it is possible to slack through it all if you want to slack.
  - constantcrying 2y ago
    >German schools expect quite a lot from students that do actually want to go to better schools. Not my experience. >But yes, it is possible to slack through it all if you want to slack. I was a good student though and did really well. I never learned for anything though and was bored in basically every subject. There never were any expectations on me which I didn't trivially meet.
    - watwut 2y ago
      Hey, you are the genius who knew it all before learning and got highest possible grades with no effort. Congrats. Overwhelming majority of people is not like that, they do not get highest grades, they do not get into gymnasium without effort, don't pass tests without effort.
      - constantcrying 2y ago
        Haha, are you serious?
        bmn__ 2y ago
        He is. Today is the day you realise that thanks to your innate intelligence you had a time of privilege in school.
        constantcrying 2y ago
        I felt much more privileged when I was at university and there were students far more intelligent than me, who helped me with the material.
        2y ago
- barbazoo 2y ago
  “I basically learned nothing at school” is such a silly obviously wrong thing to say. Really doesn’t help you make a point.
  - constantcrying 2y ago
    I spent 12 years there. Give the time investment the education results were extremely underwhelming.
    - barbazoo 2y ago
      Same here, full 12 years in the German school system and I can't say I would complain given where I'm at right now.
brainzap 2y ago
the goal of school and what it is used for are different thing. School is childcare
- constantcrying 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - fmbb 2y ago
    Have you met a 16-year old?
    - lupusreal 2y ago
      Their fingers are too big to fit in electrical sockets, they should be fine.
      - rad_gruchalski 2y ago
        No worries. A tongue will always fit. Especially after some alcohol.
    - constantcrying 2y ago
      They are old enough to drive certain vehicles and old enough to buy alcohol. If we trust them with that surely we can let them do things during the day without constant adult supervision.
      - graemep 2y ago
        > They are old enough to drive certain vehicles and old enough to buy alcohol Hopefully not at the same time.
        Meneth 2y ago
        They would drive to and from the store. Drinking what they bought is a different matter.
GuB-42 2y ago
The thing is: smartphones exist. The young adults these children will become will live in a world where smartphones are an essential part of their life. Using a smartphone is a practical skill. That's why I don't think banning smartphones is the best idea. It is probably better than unrestricted access, but I feel that school should teach how to use them well instead. It is a bit like with calculators, there are classes with calculators, classes without, and classes that teach how to work with them, their strengths and shortcomings. I don't know how to do it in practice though. Airplane mode and offline educative apps may be a start.
- cheschire 2y ago
  Cars exist and are foundational to modern living yet we do not push kids to learn to drive until their later teenage years. Some countries wait until they are 18 and others choosing a couple years sooner.
  - makeitdouble 2y ago
    Kids still get to walk with cars around, ride bikes, drive motorcycles usually a few years before majority, they also ride cars and are usually familiar with how they work way before driving. I'm actually of the option we should have a smartphone category/setup at the same positioning as bikes are to cars, it would even benefit adults the same way not everyone wants a car.
    - lolinder 2y ago
      We do, they're called regular cellphones. They can be used to make phone calls and even to send text messages, but they can't be used to access social media hellscapes.
      - makeitdouble 2y ago
        Phone calls are for emergencies at this point. If it's not it's spam. Then Apple ruined SMS ( except for the US apparently?), nobody wants to gamble whether a message will reach a phone or the iPad sitting in a drawer still associated with the phone number. So social things, like communicating with people, happens on social apps. Kids also would be better with map apps, GPS, electronic payments and auto-charging bus/train pass if you expect them to have any independence. All in all, kids should be the last ones IMHO to get real dumb phones. We might as well give them pagers if that's what we're going for.
RHSeeger 2y ago
My daughter brings her phone to school with her - If he bus doesn't show up, she can call and ask us to come drive her to school - If she wants to go somewhere after school, she can call us and let us know she won't be home at her normal time - If she forgot something at home, she can call and ask us to bring it - etc, etc, etc There's a ton of reasons for her to have her phone on her. Enough so that, when she gets punished with phone removal, we generally still let her bring it to school. The fact that the phone doesn't contribute to the schooling itself (although it does when she forgets something she needs for school) doesn't mean that it doesn't contribute to QOL overall by being with her at school.
- ecshafer 2y ago
  All of those reasons can be solved with her using a public phone. My school growing up had a phone in the hallway by the main office for those reasons.
  - ethbr1 2y ago
    As part of the last generation to grow up without phones in (early) school, this. The endless rationalizing of why kids need to have phones at every moment rings hollow... Because grade school kids actually did just fine without them. Things functioned, people got where they needed to get, emergencies were handled, etc. Especially with pre- and post-school access, we're balancing a minimum of in-school utility against a massive danger to learning and development. We should just accept we built addiction boxes and therefore restrict them appropriately.
    - meowface 2y ago
      I also grew up without phones in schools but in my opinion the problem is phones (and laptops, frankly) in class. If a student isn't in class, I don't see why they can't use their phone to talk to people or browse websites or whatever. If they're in class, then 99% chance it's distracting them from learning. If they're not, I think personal autonomy is a good rule.
ysavir 2y ago
I agree with your take on the purpose of schools and that smartphones contribute little. But my concern is that actions like these teach students an additional lesson: That it's okay to coerce people into specific actions or forfeitures if it serves your purposes. Children and teens absorb a lot, and while they don't always absorb the contents of their lectures, they do typically absorb how they're treated and how that implies they can treat others. The ultimate problem with education (at least in the US, can't speak for other countries) is that students are given very little motivation to participate in the educational process. Their participation is demanded and their disengagement is punished. There's little about the system that actually motivates and rewards their participation. If we really want students to spend less time on smartphones at schools, we should be looking at how we can restructure our approach to education so that students would actually feel encouraged to participate and ignore their smartphones.
- unethical_ban 2y ago
  >That it's okay to coerce people into specific actions or forfeitures if it serves your purposes It is acceptable for public schools, whose mandate is education of the youth, to enaxt restrictions on behavior to that end. And smartphones are an addictive item. I want school to be fun and engaging. That doesn't mean every kid who's been raised on an iPad since age 0.5 will put down their phones if the teacher has rizz.
- kspacewalk2 2y ago
  >But my concern is that actions like these teach students an additional lesson: That it's okay to coerce people into specific actions or forfeitures if it serves your purposes. Well, of course it is. Organized society largely rests upon this principle. In the oppressive ones coercion is exercised arbitrarily or by a select few, and in societies based on rule of law it is exercised, well, using law. >The ultimate problem with education (at least in the US, can't speak for other countries) is that students are given very little motivation to participate in the educational process. Their participation is demanded and their disengagement is punished. There's little about the system that actually motivates and rewards their participation. If we really want students to spend less time on smartphones at schools, we should be looking at how we can restructure our approach to education so that students would actually feel encouraged to participate and ignore their smartphones. Maybe. Or maybe the pesky slot machines and gossip aggregators are impossible to compete with, if you leave the adolescent attention economy in the hands of the almighty free market. Either way, banning cell phones certainly won't hurt efforts to engage students, if any.
pixxel 1y ago
[dead]

constantcrying 2y ago

Is that the aim of schools? It certainly did not appear to me that way, here in Germany. There was a lot of time spend sitting in a room and "learning", yet I basically learned nothing. For the other things you described I do not think they were ever considered. All around school was a giant waste of time.

bnegreve 2y ago
Surely reading/writing are useful skills that most people did not have before school was mandatory.
- constantcrying 2y ago
  I did not take me twelve years to learn to read and write. What an awful excuse. What made me good at reading was reading books outside of school. In a single semester of university I learned more than in 12 years of school.
  - moooo99 2y ago
    > In a single semester of university I learned more than in 12 years of school. I learned more in a single year on the job than I did in 3 years of university. That doesn’t make university useless
  - rad_gruchalski 2y ago
    No, I don’t think that’s true. The 12 years of the pre-uni education set you up for being a member of society. You don’t see it because it became a part of you. You also learned to read, write, all basic math, geography, … The uni taught you more real-world expected skills but I‘m certain you learned more before uni.
    - constantcrying 2y ago
      Why couldn't I have learned university courses and these other skills at the same time?
      - kube-system 2y ago
        > Why couldn't I have learned university courses and these other skills at the same time? Was that not offered at your school? It was at mine. University level courses do presume you have some basic skills. But in many places, schools do offer university level courses for those who are prepared.
        constantcrying 2y ago
        >Was that not offered at your school? I think it would have been theoretically possible, but obviously logistically difficult as I would have had to skip multiple classes in other fields to attend. It's also not like I was particularly interested in mathematics at that point in my life. I essentially chose my field of study based on what I had the best grades in. Only during my studies, when the material actually became difficult, I started to be interested and engaged in the subject.
        kube-system 2y ago
        For the schools that offer students the ability to take university-level courses, students aren't "skipping" other classes. > Only during my studies, when the material actually became difficult, I started to be interested and engaged in the subject. Many schools solve this by having different difficulty-levels of courses. My school, in the US, had three.
        constantcrying 2y ago
        Germany has different levels of schools. I was in the one for highest education, targeting a university degree.
  - andrepd 2y ago
    > In a single semester of university I learned more than in 12 years of school. You keep saying this but I have a hard time believing this is true; in fact I'm not even sure what "more" means (objectively) in this context. Let's see, in the 12 years of schooling you've learned at the very least: how to read and write, how to interpret texts, how to read literature, how to compose an essay, how to speak, read, and write a second language, a ton of mathematics from basic arithmetic to I guess something like calculus and trigonometry and algebra and some discrete maths, several topics of physics and chemistry, biology, geology, and other natural sciences (in more or less detail), several years of history, and mandatory physical exercise to top it off. What magical university did you go to that in a single semester you learned more than that :D Unless I'm missing something.
    - constantcrying 2y ago
      In school I spend 8 hours listening to some teacher or playing silly learning games and did some busywork as homework. I never learned for any test or found any of the material particularly interesting. In university I actually had to study, take notes, research the subject, study for many hours, etc. >a ton of mathematics from basic arithmetic to I guess something like calculus and trigonometry and algebra and some discrete maths Hilarious to say this. As it turned out, my first semester of university mathematics was spent on learning everything I did not learn in school. And it made it extremely clear to me how badly school had prepared me. You would think that school would put me in a position where university mathematics were just a continuation. Nothing further could be from the truth, nearly everything taught in school was taught in a way which made it useless for actual mathematics. In school we learned nothing about: Sets, logic, deductions, Axioms or Proofs (which turn out to be really important!), we did however spend years solving integrals, which turned out extremely unhelpful for actual mathematics.
      - RandomLensman 2y ago
        Seems experiences vary: For me, the first year of university mathematics was to a large extent a continuation or even what was covered in school (sets, axioms, proofs etc were covered in school). That said, that wasn't the case for everyone as far as I could tell.
  - kube-system 2y ago
    > I did not take me twelve years to learn to read and write. It takes people twelve years to learn to read and write at a 12th grade level. You could study it for another 4 or more years at university if you wanted to develop your skills further. > What made me good at reading was reading books outside of school. This is your personal experience. I learned to read and write quite well at school and was well-prepared for university.
    - DocTomoe 2y ago
      > It takes people twelve years to learn to read and write at a 12th grade level. Nah. You are mixing up the skill 'writing glyphs on a piece of paper and retrieving that information via optical means' with 'being well-grounded in a wide array of subjects so you can express an idea in a way that is mentally stimulating to a potential reader'. Neither takes 12 years to learn. The first, we teach within a year, at most. The second we do not teach at all, and the best 'writers' often are those who were challenged outside of school, by parents who gave them a rich, intellectually interesting environment, not within it.
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
      - const_cast 2y ago
        We most definitely teach number 2. That's what English class is - you read books, plays, maybe documents, and then you write essays on them. You need to be concise, persuasive, have a unique voice. Just because you, and other's, did not pay attention or were not good writers, does not mean we don't teach that. We do, for years.
    - bluGill 2y ago
      There is no such thing as a 12th grade level. 6th grade is all the farther English is taught. There are sometimes things called levels above that, but they are not levels in English they are levels in some specific specialization and have more to do with that specialization than reading. (doctors would not be expected to understand deep computer science writing even though doctors have very advanced reading skills in a medical domain). I understand Spanish only goes up to a 5th grade level while Japanese to 9th. This is a reflection on how complex the writing systems are, and not the kids, intelligence, or school systems. The years after you have your basic reading down are used to learn other skills that are of general use in life for everyone.
  - tremon 2y ago
    You should have taken that semester when you were 4 years old then, you could have skipped fifteen years of education!
- Ekaros 2y ago
  They did. Well at least officially. Being able to read was needed if you wanted to get married.
- bluGill 2y ago
  > Surely reading/writing are useful skills that most people did not have before school was mandatory. Citation needed. I've heard it repeated a lot, but never by someone with actual historical credentials. It varied from society to society (and many societies were sexist so boys and girls would have different results). Likely most is correct, but also misleading as it appears many societies were very literate even among poor people. From what I understand (recognize I'm not a historian!), Jewish boys have long had a right of passage of reading the bible in the local synagogue. Most languages are not that hard to learn the basic phonics of and thus read and write. You wouldn't be good, but you could do it. Historians have told me that most of their references for is literate were from time/places where literate meant Latin. The common person know much Latin (despite going to mass in Latin), and couldn't read/write it. However they would have had more education in their local language which was never counted.
sofixa 2y ago
> There was a lot of time spend sitting in a room and "learning", yet I basically learned nothing Do you think that was because their methods were bad, you didn't bother and they couldn't force you, or that their methods were not adapted to the way you learn? Also, I'd find it surprising if you really learned nothing. From what I know of German schooling from people who went through it, you certainly learned at least a bit about the depths to which humans can go to and how to prevent them (Holocaust and wider Nazi atrocities). Also, you probably learned social skills, basic project management and collaboration, and some knowledge which is probably useless other than maybe as a basis of understanding the world and various things you might encounter. I don't recall much from my biology or chemistry classes, but I recall vague outlines, which is enough.
- constantcrying 2y ago
  >Do you think that was because their methods were bad, you didn't bother and they couldn't force you, or that their methods were not adapted to the way you learn? It was because they had nothing to teach. I still remember trying to learn fractions from a teacher who clearly did not understand fractions either. Just to be clear, I did very well in school. Given their standards I would be considered a "successful student" and I went on to get a university degree. >Also, you probably learned social skills, basic project management and collaboration, and some knowledge which is probably useless other than maybe as a basis of understanding the world None of that I learned while sitting in class. I learned it despite the school activities I had to do.
  - sofixa 2y ago
    > None of that I learned while sitting in class School is about more than the part where you sit in class. The social skills, time and project management navigation etc. is all stuff you learn and do because of school but outside of class.
    - constantcrying 2y ago
      But if that is the goal of schools then we would drastically reduce the time students sit in class.
roenxi 2y ago
You have put your finger on something - the actual purpose of school is to socialise children (it isn't very efficient as a teaching system - tutoring is better and what the people who really care about educational attainment use). But a side effect is teaching them a lot of useful things. And telling if time spent learning is wasted is actually quite hard - if you know something and everyone else knows something it often fades into the background and nobody notices. But it still makes a difference.
- constantcrying 2y ago
  >the actual purpose of school is to socialise children I agree that this is probably the most important thing for children to learn. My point is that sitting in a room for 8 hours does very little to accomplish that. >And telling if time spent learning is wasted is actually quite hard - if you know something and everyone else knows something it often fades into the background and nobody notices. But it still makes a difference. I had the direct comparison when I went to university. It became very clear that I was learning much more and faster. To talk about schooling we first have to make clear what the goal is. Sure everybody needs to learn how to read, write and do basic arithmetic, but that is not a 12 year endeavor. Even including basic general knowledge is not a 12 year endeavor. And we should not be wasting children's time on things, just because we can't be bothered to have them do something actually meaningful.
  - myrmidon 2y ago
    > I had the direct comparison when I went to university. It became very clear that I was learning much more and faster. Sure, but this should be expected. If you filtered out all children with low interest/performance/support in preschool and just threw them onto a playground, learning rate could also be much faster in school for the rest. But if you want a solid baseline of reading/writing/math/general education for everyone in society, those twelve years are already barely enough. I'm very confident that early discrimination/segregation ("gifted" and "idiot" tracks in school) is a net negative for society and encourages unethical outcomes on top. Optional programs for faster/more targetted learning are much better and can be very positive IMO, but even there you need to be careful with how you set things up to avoid problems.
2muchcoffeeman 2y ago
I know several teachers. So these sorts of comments are always funny. I know math teachers who lack support but continuously attempt to present topics from different POV because some students don’t get it. So some self proclaimed smart person “learned nothing”, and therefore school is a waste of time. At the same time, ignoring that maybe a school or system is indeed not prepared to handle some individuals (which is not good), or that maybe some teachers are bad, or maybe the system does not support their staff enough. But that can’t be the case because they learned nothing. Whole school system must be a scam.
- constantcrying 2y ago
  As I wrote below. My most memorable math class was a teacher failing to explain fractions to me, what later became obvious to me was that the teacher did not understand fractions either. I am sure you want to blame me for this, but somehow I went to university and got a degree in (applied) mathematics. So I doubt it was some fundamental problem with me. Everybody is upset when someone tells them they fail at their jobs and teachers are an entire industry of total failure. In a single semester of university I learned so much more than in 12 years of school. If teachers aren't at fault, who is? By any metric I was a successful student.
  - 2muchcoffeeman 2y ago
    I’m not blaming you. But as intelligent as you may be, you have discounted all the possibilities for the failure of you school or your particular teachers. Because you had a bad time, then the whole system is malicious right? I know a high school teacher with a PhD and has tutored and lectured at the university level. But they are a teacher now. Guess I’ll paint them with the same brush as all teachers.
    - constantcrying 2y ago
      >then the whole system is malicious right? Where did I say that the intentions were bad? >Because you had a bad time, then the whole system is malicious right? No. In university the expectations were drastically higher. If the goal of the school was to prepare me for university, then it failed at that for everyone. The mismatch can not be attributed to me. >But they are a teacher now. Guess I’ll paint them with the same brush as all teachers. We had one of these as well. Average teacher, learned basically nothing in her class.
closewith 2y ago
And yet consistently the happiest, healthiest, and most developed societies are those with the highest levels of primary and secondary education attainment. Not necessarily causative, but we'd want to be very sure the educational fence isn't contributory before we tear it down.
watwut 2y ago
Quite a lot of Germans learn quite a lot. German schools expect quite a lot from students that do actually want to go to better schools. But yes, it is possible to slack through it all if you want to slack.
- constantcrying 2y ago
  >German schools expect quite a lot from students that do actually want to go to better schools. Not my experience. >But yes, it is possible to slack through it all if you want to slack. I was a good student though and did really well. I never learned for anything though and was bored in basically every subject. There never were any expectations on me which I didn't trivially meet.
  - watwut 2y ago
    Hey, you are the genius who knew it all before learning and got highest possible grades with no effort. Congrats. Overwhelming majority of people is not like that, they do not get highest grades, they do not get into gymnasium without effort, don't pass tests without effort.
    - constantcrying 2y ago
      Haha, are you serious?
      - bmn__ 2y ago
        He is. Today is the day you realise that thanks to your innate intelligence you had a time of privilege in school.
        constantcrying 2y ago
        I felt much more privileged when I was at university and there were students far more intelligent than me, who helped me with the material.
      - 2y ago
barbazoo 2y ago
“I basically learned nothing at school” is such a silly obviously wrong thing to say. Really doesn’t help you make a point.
- constantcrying 2y ago
  I spent 12 years there. Give the time investment the education results were extremely underwhelming.
  - barbazoo 2y ago
    Same here, full 12 years in the German school system and I can't say I would complain given where I'm at right now.

brainzap 2y ago

the goal of school and what it is used for are different thing. School is childcare

constantcrying 2y ago
[flagged]
- fmbb 2y ago
  Have you met a 16-year old?
  - lupusreal 2y ago
    Their fingers are too big to fit in electrical sockets, they should be fine.
    - rad_gruchalski 2y ago
      No worries. A tongue will always fit. Especially after some alcohol.
  - constantcrying 2y ago
    They are old enough to drive certain vehicles and old enough to buy alcohol. If we trust them with that surely we can let them do things during the day without constant adult supervision.
    - graemep 2y ago
      > They are old enough to drive certain vehicles and old enough to buy alcohol Hopefully not at the same time.
      - Meneth 2y ago
        They would drive to and from the store. Drinking what they bought is a different matter.

GuB-42 2y ago

The thing is: smartphones exist. The young adults these children will become will live in a world where smartphones are an essential part of their life. Using a smartphone is a practical skill. That's why I don't think banning smartphones is the best idea. It is probably better than unrestricted access, but I feel that school should teach how to use them well instead. It is a bit like with calculators, there are classes with calculators, classes without, and classes that teach how to work with them, their strengths and shortcomings. I don't know how to do it in practice though. Airplane mode and offline educative apps may be a start.

cheschire 2y ago
Cars exist and are foundational to modern living yet we do not push kids to learn to drive until their later teenage years. Some countries wait until they are 18 and others choosing a couple years sooner.
- makeitdouble 2y ago
  Kids still get to walk with cars around, ride bikes, drive motorcycles usually a few years before majority, they also ride cars and are usually familiar with how they work way before driving. I'm actually of the option we should have a smartphone category/setup at the same positioning as bikes are to cars, it would even benefit adults the same way not everyone wants a car.
  - lolinder 2y ago
    We do, they're called regular cellphones. They can be used to make phone calls and even to send text messages, but they can't be used to access social media hellscapes.
    - makeitdouble 2y ago
      Phone calls are for emergencies at this point. If it's not it's spam. Then Apple ruined SMS ( except for the US apparently?), nobody wants to gamble whether a message will reach a phone or the iPad sitting in a drawer still associated with the phone number. So social things, like communicating with people, happens on social apps. Kids also would be better with map apps, GPS, electronic payments and auto-charging bus/train pass if you expect them to have any independence. All in all, kids should be the last ones IMHO to get real dumb phones. We might as well give them pagers if that's what we're going for.

RHSeeger 2y ago

My daughter brings her phone to school with her - If he bus doesn't show up, she can call and ask us to come drive her to school - If she wants to go somewhere after school, she can call us and let us know she won't be home at her normal time - If she forgot something at home, she can call and ask us to bring it - etc, etc, etc There's a ton of reasons for her to have her phone on her. Enough so that, when she gets punished with phone removal, we generally still let her bring it to school. The fact that the phone doesn't contribute to the schooling itself (although it does when she forgets something she needs for school) doesn't mean that it doesn't contribute to QOL overall by being with her at school.

ecshafer 2y ago
All of those reasons can be solved with her using a public phone. My school growing up had a phone in the hallway by the main office for those reasons.
- ethbr1 2y ago
  As part of the last generation to grow up without phones in (early) school, this. The endless rationalizing of why kids need to have phones at every moment rings hollow... Because grade school kids actually did just fine without them. Things functioned, people got where they needed to get, emergencies were handled, etc. Especially with pre- and post-school access, we're balancing a minimum of in-school utility against a massive danger to learning and development. We should just accept we built addiction boxes and therefore restrict them appropriately.
  - meowface 2y ago
    I also grew up without phones in schools but in my opinion the problem is phones (and laptops, frankly) in class. If a student isn't in class, I don't see why they can't use their phone to talk to people or browse websites or whatever. If they're in class, then 99% chance it's distracting them from learning. If they're not, I think personal autonomy is a good rule.

ysavir 2y ago

I agree with your take on the purpose of schools and that smartphones contribute little. But my concern is that actions like these teach students an additional lesson: That it's okay to coerce people into specific actions or forfeitures if it serves your purposes. Children and teens absorb a lot, and while they don't always absorb the contents of their lectures, they do typically absorb how they're treated and how that implies they can treat others. The ultimate problem with education (at least in the US, can't speak for other countries) is that students are given very little motivation to participate in the educational process. Their participation is demanded and their disengagement is punished. There's little about the system that actually motivates and rewards their participation. If we really want students to spend less time on smartphones at schools, we should be looking at how we can restructure our approach to education so that students would actually feel encouraged to participate and ignore their smartphones.

unethical_ban 2y ago
>That it's okay to coerce people into specific actions or forfeitures if it serves your purposes It is acceptable for public schools, whose mandate is education of the youth, to enaxt restrictions on behavior to that end. And smartphones are an addictive item. I want school to be fun and engaging. That doesn't mean every kid who's been raised on an iPad since age 0.5 will put down their phones if the teacher has rizz.
kspacewalk2 2y ago
>But my concern is that actions like these teach students an additional lesson: That it's okay to coerce people into specific actions or forfeitures if it serves your purposes. Well, of course it is. Organized society largely rests upon this principle. In the oppressive ones coercion is exercised arbitrarily or by a select few, and in societies based on rule of law it is exercised, well, using law. >The ultimate problem with education (at least in the US, can't speak for other countries) is that students are given very little motivation to participate in the educational process. Their participation is demanded and their disengagement is punished. There's little about the system that actually motivates and rewards their participation. If we really want students to spend less time on smartphones at schools, we should be looking at how we can restructure our approach to education so that students would actually feel encouraged to participate and ignore their smartphones. Maybe. Or maybe the pesky slot machines and gossip aggregators are impossible to compete with, if you leave the adolescent attention economy in the hands of the almighty free market. Either way, banning cell phones certainly won't hurt efforts to engage students, if any.

pixxel 1y ago

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