Wiki says 6500 spoken languages in the world today. "There are roughly 6,500 spoken languages in the world today. However, about 2,000 of those languages have fewer than 1,000 speakers."
It drives me nuts, everyone is not the same, trying to make everyone "equal", and it being dictated by the state is national socialism. There's no way around it, Common Core is the same thing, it's not education it's ideology. "It's the biggest inequality to make unequal things equal." - I've since forgotten where I got that quote. What is funny is, we accept evolution, evolution is change. Some humans evolve the capacity to do certain things differntly and better, but those are not conforming to the education standards and processes so they are a "problem". For me the biggest issue with education for younger kids is it is not made interesting cos we know making a subject interesting returns far better results but making it interesting requires flexibility and a wider scope of subject, something the schools are not doing, it is almost robotic.. you must learn this and exactly this and know this to pass your test. No deviation, limited scope and little logic to it. Critical thinking is drilled out of kids in the younger years of school, you must conform.
Best not to read newspaper headlines Schools are committed to improving spoken English, particularly for children with English as an additional language. In primary education, children will receive an hour of modern foreign languages and they rarely have anything to do with what a child's native tongue is unless by coincidence. These languages are usually French or Spanish.
There are a lot of misconceptions on here tbh. This is gradually turning into a school bashing thread. Schools and teachers do an amazing job under difficult circumstances. They work hard to develop the WHOLE child and deserve more credit than society gives them these days. The government sets the agenda, and with each new government the agenda changes. Teachers are continuously having to change their practises, often unnecessarily and for no real purpose other thsn just for the sake of it. Add to that, the lack of any public respect for teachers as society sees them as nothing more than glorified child minders. It would be nice if every now and again people looked at the difference a good teacher made to their lives or that of their children and comment about that publicly. Bcos that happens every day in every school with the vast majority of children. But it's a poor indictment of the regard we have for one of the most vital professions in society that we dont hear about that. Education in this country is continuously evolving and schools have become a lot more innovative and exciting places of learning. At primary level this is tempered sadly by the emphasis placed on SATs examinations. Ultimately schools are judged on this. As a result schools are slaves to Maths and English and exam results at age 7 and 11. That's the real problem with primary education I'm afraid, but finding the balance between measuring achievement and providing a holistic experience for our children is a difficult one. If you dont believe me, try it. Bcos teachers really do work tirelessly to deliver just that and do a remarkable job doing so. Anyway that's my tuppence worth as an insider.
Except all you could be bothered with, was nothing to do with what I actually posted EDIT: And you were wrong to say not one person had criticised any teachers. If you actually read what ppl write you'll see they have, but that wasnt the point of my post - it was about education/schools/teaching in this country in general
Teachers are a mixed bag. The actual system of education is another matter. Don#t get me wrong, reading writing maths ect are important, but.. kids for example don't start school here till 7, they can already read and write before they start school proper. You have to be a ****ing forest gump parent to not be able to teach your own kid the alphabet, writing and reading, spelling and the basic maths up to algebra. Schools do not need to provide that kind of education level, with a few exceptions albeit like special needs or illiteracy of parents or some such things.
Teachers do what they are told to do. Some are better than others but most work hard in my experience. I wouldn't want to swap paces with them either.
It falls under humanities. Like geography and history. You don't teach religion as a "this is what you should believe" and you don't place too much focus on one religion. It should be treated academically. Religion isn't important in most of western and northern Europe but for the vast majority of people in the world it's still a huuuge thing. Kids are going to be dealing with international businesses and even people of different faiths at home. I think it is very relevant to know what the people you'll be dealing with on a global scale believe. At least knowing the basics. Hymns, prayers, etc... No that's not for school. Knowing religions of the world in the ever shrinking planet is very important. Actually I think instead of R.E. it should be "cultural studies" of which RE should be a big chapter. I'm not at all religious myself but I think it's important to be aware of.
A lot of parents ARE "Forrest Gump" parents. Not fair on a kid to not receive a quality education if his parent is a slacked or a dunce. That's one thing that annoys me about US schools. They give out so much homework for the kids starting at age 5/6 for kids to take home and parents to teach them. Not even stuff they've covered in school. My wife and I are capable of teaching them but for the lazy parents, the stupid parents, or the parents who work two jobs to make ends meet and barely see their kids as a result... How are those kids supposed to learn?
This. ...and to help integrate communities. If we understand each other a little better it helps prevent misunderstandings and ignorance about differences that often lead to segragation and animosity.
Where are you? All valid points I do question the need to start children at age 4 here. BUT I want to add that Early Years here is much more about developing the whole child. So it's much more about learning things like the world around you, social interaction, motor neurone skills, play activities (as well as the basics in phonics, storytelling, speaking and listening, numeracy). It really is productive if it's done properly. I agree though, I look at other countries and then look at us,and wonder WTF when it comes to the pressure we put on kids before they even reach 7.
The forest gump parents, (I don't mean actually challenged in any way) are the exception I mention but they are also a product of the same education system, food for thought. But I agree totally with the parents who are just not arsed. Therein lies the problem for society overall not just education. You are right kids shouldn't miss out because of lazy parents. I think some flexibility and choice for those who want to invest time and effort in their kids future would be good though.
Finland is 3rd in the world with student performance. behind China and Sweden I think. Taking kids at 4 is "getting them while they are young" because they are so impressionable. It is at this stage that you teach kids to conform and subordinate unquestioningly to authority, this is carried through life. I can think of two different experiments that have been done that relate to this. There was the Blue Eye Brown Eye experiment. Kids with Brown eyes were told they were inferior to people with Blue eyes. The kids knew it was a sort of demonstration. The teacher would always favour the blue eye'd kids. They got to drink first from hte water fountain ect, praised and so on. Eventually the Brown eyed kids started to complain. The teacher then lied to the kids and said blue eyed people were actually superior in ways, which many people think is cruel and I can see why, but the result was that brown eyed kids started to do worse in their exams tests, and had worse rebellious behaviour. The blue eyed kids did better in pretty much all ways but notably, they started to believe their own superiority. Here was a teacher that was able to create racism with her class in no time based solely on eye colour. These were older than 4 years old too. They just submitted and believed everything. That's my point. They were literally turned "eyeist" The other was the Milgram experiment, one person in a rooom with a button, they ask questions into a mic, they think there is another person next door. If the 2nd person answers wrong, the first person administers a shock and the volts are incremented with each wrong answer. Because a guy in a white coat told them, he was no scientist just an actor with no authority, the people kept sending shocks even after they suspected they had killed the other person (who was just an actor in the next room screaming and moaning). That's grown adults doing what they are told and were prepared to kill someone because they are predisposed to subordination and authority, most likely from education at a young age
Some parents are not educated enough themselves tbf. What I've found is very few parents are lazy. Most want the best for their kids. But think about the practicality for some families who often work shifts, or do two jobs, or have medium/large families. Often it's about finding the time or the resources. I'll be honest with you, if all that a parent does is spend 20 mins reading with their child that is more than enough. The impact that has on their progress in English reading and writing is unreal Here's something else to ponder. Very few teachers have the will (or time) to spend even an hour teaching their own kids after spending 10+ hours at school.
I'm familiar with both Sisu. It's often the theory used to support how perfectly rational ppl are made to carry out extreme acts of attrocity they normally never would - often Nazism being the prime example. I take it you've seen "The Experiment" based upon all this? Not sure it's bcos of children being made to conform from an early age though.
plenty of research into automatic responses to figures of authority, what is possibly more interesting is the example you gave ie Nazism, why did you choose that and not maybe the pilots that dropped the bombs on hiroshima/nagasaki? weird...... what happened to me quoting the post from treble?
