`Western education - headed downhill?'

AND

`The search for Wisdom'

Is western education headed downhill?

Next generation - dumbo voters?

War recruits - easy meat?

From: Ray D
Subject: teaching to the test
Date: Wed, 17 May 2006 23:34:32 +0100

education.guardian.co.uk/schools/story/0,,1776201,00.html
Maths teaching failing secondary pupils, report finds

> "A narrow focus on meeting examination requirements by 'teaching
> to the test', so that although students are able to pass the
> examinations they are not able to apply their knowledge
> independently to new contexts and are not well prepared for
> further study;"

Full report
image.guardian.co.uk/sys-files/Education/documents/2006/05/16/Ofstedreport.pdf

Could be seen as `disease of our time' - men-in-suits with lots of pseudo-academic qualifications but _no_ knowledge of basis principles.

cheers
Ray D

risking accusations of `told-u-so' - check << math ed4.html >> in Google.com

From: Chris K***
Date: Wed, 17 May 2006 16:35:07 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: Re: teaching to the test

Exact same problem in the US. I teach high-school and that's what they force us to do as well.

Chris

Date: Thu, 18 May 2006 10:04:34 +0100
Subject: Re: teaching to the test

You've got my sympathy Chris,
It's a soul-less bureaucratic regime, robs teaching of interest or creativity and prevents effective learning.

Mitigated it a bit at one place by turning "confirm" stage - [for non-teachers, three elements i) impart ii) consolidate iii) confirm (not necessarily equal time)] - into `make-your-own-saga' session, for a mnemonic line, or whole verse.

That `allowed' the class to use a simple image for a scene or short story, to which they could then attach the key-words - or initial letters - which summed up the lesson (or module). That also added more `consolidation', since they had to understand the lesson's essentials to do it.

Turkish and Arab students took to it (some cultural imaginative link maybe?) and would quickly have a chant or mantra giving them great recall (for next exam) of some ferocious math or physics / electronics theory.

Added benefit was it cheered up final period when students would've otherwise been drowsy.
[student day was 07:30 to 13:00 in Arabia and in summertime Med
- teachers work longer.]

cheers
Ray D

as you might guess, work on the principle - "if a student isn't trying to talk, he's trying to sleep".

That's why favorite session method is fast Q & A (their questions and answers - invisibly guided by `teach', like in `pick a card' but lots quicker).

Can get fast and furious, but hopefully ends with the class feeling "We did that hard thing - easily" - while exhausted teacher gets no credit (as per usual).
RD

From: Peter D*** ***@***.au
Date: Thu, 18 May 2006 22:12:44 +1000
Subject: Re: teaching to the test

and at the risk of shocking everyone on the list I'm pretty much in agreeance with Ray on this one. When funding is linked to test results, then everything is about getting those test results

peter

Sent: Thursday, May 18, 2006 1:12 PM
Subject: Re: teaching to the test

Will have to agree with that Peter.

And if the teaching and learning is forced to be `by rote' because the exam marking is also `by rote' - then mediocrity [and mis-information] rules.

Think a German politician recently said he was disgusted with the sub-standard level of German education, so we're joining them.

Do our men-in-suits rulers have a sudden need to impose stupidity or dullness on everyone? Are they feeling lonely?

cheers
Ray D

From: "Steve B***
Date: Fri, 19 May 2006 11:34:29 +0100
Subject: Re: Re: teaching to the test

There's a further effect in the UK caused by competition between different exam boards.

Say Board A and Board B both set an exam.

80% of students pass Board A's exam, but only 60% of students pass Board B's.

Next year, lots of schools decide to switch exam boards to board A, to improve their results. Board B loses its customers, so brings out a new exam, which 85% of students pass.

After a few years of this, we have the insane result that 90% of students get A grades, and they still can't write or add up...

"Can we truly expect that those who aim to exploit us can be trusted to educate us?"
- Eric Schaub

and you can add - "or to make our laws?"

`The search for Wisdom'

Sun, 16 Jul 2006 23:15:33 -0400 (EDT)
From: "T. Peter Park"

Subject: `Cultural Elites'

<snip>
> More generally, attacks on so-called "cultural elites" often
> puzzle and bemuse me a bit. After all, as I sometimes tell
> people, upward social mobility--"bettering yourself," rising
> "from rags to riches" or "from log cabin to White House"--
> has always been part of the traditional "American Dream"!
> So, I then ask, what in the world is *WRONG* with getting
> an education and in the process perhaps broadening some of
> one's own attitudes and perspectives,
<snip>

Date: Mon, 17 Jul 2006 12:38:32 +0100
Subject: Magi - was `Cultural Elites'

Hi T Peter,

Am pretty sure that discussion will be clouded by mis-perceptions of "culture" and even of "elites" - contradictory usages are thick on the ground.

True, there's a deep-seated respect - almost `instinctive' in most societies - for the `wise man / woman'. And, logically, this needs some form of civilization, permitting the gathering of data, leading to knowledge, leading (hopefully) to wisdom.

In the West, probably since the ancient Greeks' recovery from their Dark Age, this desire for data / knowledge / wisdom, although often conflated with mere asset-gathering, comes from the Ionians down to say, Roger Bacon and present `science'.

They later swapped info with a parallel Middle-Eastern tradition of respect for - and search for - data / knowledge / wisdom, which was inherited from the Sumerian / Babylonian / Arabic hand-overs of records. That trail resurfaced in Zoroasterism's colleges of magi, then led more or less directly to Baghdad's `House of Wisdom' - founded by Khalif al-Mamun (son of Harun al-Raschid of `Arabian Nights' fame).
[check Magi - early Eastern philosophers in Google]

Curiously, much of the most efficient methodology of the mid-east mysteriously `appeared' in ancient times, then was unfortunately obliterated by the imposition of primitive Greek then Roman lettering and numbering - almost paralyzing mathematics for centuries.
[Maybe check "The oldest mathematical textbook is Egyptian" in Google w/quotes]

What we can see, from repeated cycles in _all_ cultures, is that the institutionalizing of the search for data / knowledge / wisdom leads to some fakers opting for pretence, superstition and abuse - merely to keep power and wealth. This habit of falling-back on `talltales' to cling to privilege is probably where most suspicions of `cultural elites' come from - and they're well-founded suspicions.
[check Buckle's talltales in Google]

[Don't think modern science is immune to creating `priesthoods' - try "BadSci" in Google]

However, in cultures which retain traces maybe lasting for millennia, there's a purer tradition, perhaps best illustrated in this extract from a later Buddhist text -

On their last visit outside the palace, the prince and Channa rode their horses out through the West Gate. They passed by a holy man in ragged robes. Seeing how quiet and peaceful he was, the prince asked, "Who is that?" Channa explained to him, "He is a wandering holy man. He has left his home and left behind fame and riches. He leads a simple life and is at peace with himself. He hopes to find the truth and overcome the suffering that troubles the world." - Siddhartha smiled. "I shall become like him."
English_Buddha_life.pdf

So, the search for data / knowledge / wisdom is hard - as is everything worthwhile?

cheers
Ray D