A broken style of education

[a completely inoffensive name]

I agree with this video for the most part, yet I always have to ask when I listen to the arguments of radically reforming education as to how exactly we implement this change. I would like all of your opinions, on the video:

http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinso...paradigms.html

EDIT: Actual youtube video here:

[Fragony]

It's really not that difficult, here we don't put the brighter with the slower learners. You got to make a test at age 11 or twelve, and that determines the level you will start. If you get high marks you can move up it isn't a verdict. VMBO is easiest, and more practically orientated, Gymnasium is the toughest and is more academic. HAVO and Atheneum sit inbetween (although Gymnasium isn't harder than Atheneum, same exams). Works fine. You don't more teachers if you plan things right.

[HoreTore]

He neatly symmed up my thoughts on the matter. And I do believe that you missed his point Frags, his point was in essence that the current system of education destroys our creative capability.

As to ACINs question of how to implement it: it honestly shouldn't be that hard. We judt need to realize that those with knowøedge should be running to show, not those without knowledge. You don't put s civil servsnt in charge of the Army, you let the generals run the show there. Why would you put a politician in charge of the education sector, instead of a professor of education?

Everyone educated in this field thinks along these lines. We should put them in charge and fire the useless people who don't have any updated knowledge in this field.

This is one of the reason why I'm very happy with my current government, our minister of education is handing over her power to those who know what they're talking about, and she follows their advice.

[Fragony]

But it's boredom that kills creativity, I watched it halfway mind you, bit too many assumptions for my liking (and it's rather long ). I attended a great primary school runned by a band of old hippies, we never got any homework, you had to figure it out by yourself what to do and when. Sometimes we could lay down our work and teacher would read us from a book, which he was really good at. There was no structure at all complete laissez faire, only rule was to never exclude anyone. Really had to get used to the structure I had to endure in secondary, to being treated as a kid again, which you are when you are twelve but still

[The Stranger]

But it's boredom that kills creativity, I watched it halfway mind you, bit too many assumptions for my liking (and it's rather long ). I attended a great primary school runned by a band of old hippies, we never got any homework, you had to figure it out by yourself what to do and when. Sometimes we could lay down our work and teacher would read us from a book, which he was really good at. There was no structure at all complete laissez faire, only rule was to never exclude anyone. Really had to get used to the structure I had to endure in secondary, to being treated as a kid again, which you are when you are twelve but still

how did you end up right wing? is it because you aged?

[The Stranger]

It's really not that difficult, here we don't put the brighter with the slower learners. You got to make a test at age 11 or twelve, and that determines the level you will start. If you get high marks you can move up it isn't a verdict. VMBO is easiest, and more practically orientated, Gymnasium is the toughest and is more academic. HAVO and Atheneum sit inbetween (although Gymnasium isn't harder than Atheneum, same exams). Works fine. You don't more teachers if you plan things right.

horetore has a point though, because even though the dutch system makes a difference between "intelligence" it is only "intelligence" measured in a certain way and for a certain system. if you are good at memorising things and a good work ethos but have very little creativity and general knowledge you have a better chance of becoming a top student than someone who is a bit lazy and a bit of a dreamer but with much imagination, creativity etc. and i think that this also what the movie is about, as horetore pointed out.

i've done gymnasium and trust me ive seen some of the dumbest people in my classroom. and i dont mean immature or i dont agree with what you say dumb, but really stupid i dont have a clue what is going on this world mommy will pay for my college anyway dumb. and ive had some of the most intelligent discussions with people who had little to no education.

another thing that should change though is the attitude of politics towards education and the teachers, they should be treated respectful and it should be a well payed job (not like im the chairman of exxon well, but decent i dont have to worry about my bills well) that will ensure that the teacher can give a full 100% because imo they have one of the most important jobs in the world.

[Fragony]

how did you end up right wing? is it because you aged?

I'm not rightwing, I don't even vote PVV, I vote on the pirates. But I am certainly anti leftist bull so I like Geertje. Would have prefered Fortuyn

[Sasaki Kojiro]

I have serious doubts about that adhd map. It's easy to set "over 8%" as solid color and "under 6%" as white or whatever the numbers are and get a wacky map. Then he talks about how he isn't qualified and then makes a bunch of claims he shouldn't if he isn't qualified. And it isn't surprising that some areas of the country have higher prescription rates--or whatever it is being measured, which I doubt is really "prevalence of adhd". Probably prevalence of diagnosis of adhd. And the definition of epidemic has to do with infectious diseases so that's an easy claim to argue against.

"A system of education that's modeled on the interests of industrialism"? Like, people want to get a job after they graduate?

"SCHOOLS ARE FACTORIES!!!!" --> everything I can compare to a factory is horrible

"They teach spanish in one class and calculus in another, awful!" /pseudo quote

In 1968, George Land distributed among 1,600 5-year-olds a creativity test used by NASA to select innovative engineers and scientists. He re-tested the same children at 10 years of age, and again at 15 years of age.

Test results amongst 5 year olds: 98%
Test results amongst 10 year olds: 30%
Test results amongst 15 year olds: 12%
Same test given to 280,000 adults: 2%

I'm very skeptical...hell, measuring intelligence is hard enough, and how do you measure creativity exactly? How are the scores for this lone 1968 test that was developed for a different purpose than it is being used for calculated? What's the justification for saying they are at genius level?

I don't think there is any known good way to test for creativity.

"inside schools that's called cheating...outside it's called collaboration" (on copying answers from back of book)--> no, outside school it's called slacking and letting other people do the work for you because you don't know how.

******

Well the video is pathetic and disgustingly bad. Crappy thesis, cheap propaganda level rhetoric, bandwagoning of the perpetual discontent with education.

I have serious doubts about his opinion that schools kill creativity. As more people have gone through the school system, has creativity decreased? That would seem like an obvious question. Have they done comparison on home schooled vs montessori vs standard? Well I doubt it since creativity is hard to measure. But intuitively, I think the useful kind of creativity in say, space shuttle design, comes from expertise. Who cares if you can come up with 1500 rocket designs if they all are laughably ignorant about the laws of physics? I mean seriously. Describing knowledge of what's physically impossible as a limitation on creativity is ridiculous. And knowing that information requires intense study.

[Tellos Athenaios]

But the trouble with changing education paradigms is:
(1) The methodology needs to ensure some kind of result. Even those who are not inclined to learn things by themselves should be educated to some degree.
(2) The methodology needs to ensure that within class people get a fair opportunity to develop themselves if only they put in the effort. So you can't have a few students monopolizing the teacher's attention, for instance.
(3) The methodology needs to ensure that certain essential skills or subjects are taught at all.

So far the only methodology which has proven capable of doing this somewhat reliably on the scale required and with the resource constraints imposed has been the “academic” one.

[HoreTore]

So far the only methodology which has proven capable of doing this somewhat reliably on the scale required and with the resource constraints imposed has been the “academic” one.

Spoken like someone who doesn't know what he's talking about. Sorry if that was a bit rought, but it's the truth....

There are a lot of experimentation going on all over the world. The reason we have stuck with the current method is because the politicians in charge fear change, not because we don't already have other fully mapped and working methods of education, which we do.

Also Frags, another thing to point out in your first post: you talk about a test at some age which determines where you go... Such a test is unneccessary. First of all because it will be impossible to make a test that is satisfactory, secondly because an empowered 11-year old is more than capable of knowing where his level is and where he should be. Why make decision for people, when those people are fully capable of making those decisions themselves?

[Tellos Athenaios]

I have serious doubts about that adhd map. It's easy to set "over 8%" as solid color and "under 6%" as white or whatever the numbers are and get a wacky map. Then he talks about how he isn't qualified and then makes a bunch of claims he shouldn't if he isn't qualified. And it isn't surprising that some areas of the country have higher prescription rates--or whatever it is being measured, which I doubt is really "prevalence of adhd". Probably prevalence of diagnosis of adhd. And the definition of epidemic has to do with infectious diseases so that's an easy claim to argue against.

The ADHD “epidemic” is a bit old, really. Every other few years there's a new thing for anxious parents to fret about.

"A system of education that's modeled on the interests of industrialism"? Like, people want to get a job after they graduate?

I do not think his arguments have anything to do with getting jobs. At any rate jobs & educational qualifications are something of a mixed bag. Helping people set up some piece of software does not require a college degree in technical studies. More useful to have an almost infinite capacity to smile patiently and find new ways to say exactly the same without the customer noticing.

I don't think there is any known good way to test for creativity.

Well that is actually not the most difficult issue here. Puzzles are often used for this sort of thing. The paperclip example wasn't too bad, considering. It's not exactly a secret either that schools “kill creativity” in the sense that the more people are taught to think in a certain way, the more likely they are to apply it to a new problem (has worked in the past, remember?). What it doesn't show however is whether or not those people who eventually do poorly at “1001 different ways to bend a paperclip” would fail to come up with creative solutions once they face a genuine problem they must overcome.

[Tellos Athenaios]

Spoken like someone who doesn't know what he's talking about. Sorry if that was a bit rought, but it's the truth....

There are a lot of experimentation going on all over the world. The reason we have stuck with the current method is because the politicians in charge fear change, not because we don't already have other fully mapped and working methods of education, which we do.

I know there are other methodologies out there which “work”, sometimes producing objectively better results than anything anyone could've hoped for. They were out there in the 19th century already, primarily in primary education. But where is the fully mapped quality assurance, and where is the fully mapped budget and where is the fully mapped education for the teachers?

Even with the relatively popular montessori idea, those issues couldn't be solved satisfactorily: for one thing funds are even more of an issue, and it proved difficult to train sufficient teachers to work with it. The reason why we have the current “standard” is not that is the “best” methodology measured against how much the students benefit from it (a well know, and well observed frustration which leads to such alternative experiments in the first place); it is that the methodology itself allows for straightforward and efficient implementation which is still able to offer a decent education. Consider: over here its earliest form was worked out and signed into law in the span of a mere 10 years in a somewhat politically volatile climate. (1796 - 1806)

[Louis VI the Fat]

It's easy to set "over 8%" as solid color and "under 6%" as white

Dear oh dear we haven't even left page one and already the Americans have turned this into a race thingy.

WHATS WRONG WITH YOU YANKS YOU SEE RACE IN EVERYTHING

[a completely inoffensive name]

I have serious doubts about that adhd map. It's easy to set "over 8%" as solid color and "under 6%" as white or whatever the numbers are and get a wacky map. Then he talks about how he isn't qualified and then makes a bunch of claims he shouldn't if he isn't qualified. And it isn't surprising that some areas of the country have higher prescription rates--or whatever it is being measured, which I doubt is really "prevalence of adhd". Probably prevalence of diagnosis of adhd. And the definition of epidemic has to do with infectious diseases so that's an easy claim to argue against.

I don't think this guy is out to manipulate the data to try and get "his" way. Regarding him saying he isn't qualified, i think that just means to take what he says with a grain of salt, but his hypothesis might have some good insight in it for us to consider. Regarding epidemic...hmm you are technically correct, but nowadays people always use it in the context of how he used it. "Obesity is now an epidemic among Americans!!!"

"A system of education that's modeled on the interests of industrialism"? Like, people want to get a job after they graduate?

Capitalism and industry needs more then just workers with the bare minimum of knowledge to become functional workers. Let those naturally not as creative or intelligent to take up the lower roles and promote those more naturally gifted to become the new leaders of industry and innovators. The current system treats everyone as a worker and expects those naturally talented to rise from the muck with the expectation that they will get the "good" life if they do. But as he said in the video, a degree is not a guarantee of a "good" life, so this incentive is gone and the system no longer functions the way it is supposed to.

For some reason it reminds me of that part of that Coolidge quote:
"Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan "press on" has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race."

"SCHOOLS ARE FACTORIES!!!!" --> everything I can compare to a factory is horrible

Tbh, besides the uniformity of the curriculum being taught I don't see how modeling schools after factories is good. Perhaps you have put more thought into this and have figured out why such a statement is to be dismissed instead of agreed with.

"They teach spanish in one class and calculus in another, awful!" /pseudo quote

A bit of an exaggeration, but yeah he was vague about it. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he meant that we should be integrating the subjects when it enhances the learning. I am about to start a class on the history of mathematics. That kind of thing is never even talked about in high school at least for me. There was history and there was math. In math you learned about math, even though you might argue that learning the origins of it could give you a greater perspective on the subject matter.

EDIT: hell, my calculus professor last quarter at least took 4-5 minutes each lecture just to briefly go over the people whose names are attributed to certain theorems and laws. I liked that a lot.

I'm very skeptical...hell, measuring intelligence is hard enough, and how do you measure creativity exactly? How are the scores for this lone 1968 test that was developed for a different purpose than it is being used for calculated? What's the justification for saying they are at genius level?

Creativity is the ability to arrive at your destination in a way that is not readily apparent to the person being tasked or to third party outsiders watching from the outside. That's the best definition I can come up with, and I think you could conceive a test to measure this in varying degrees although it would take some...creativity to design it.

I don't think there is any known good way to test for creativity.

I agree but I don't think we should be stumbling in the dark. We need some sort of measurement or test to go off on, no matter how weak, otherwise we are just going off what we "feel" might be the right direction.

"inside schools that's called cheating...outside it's called collaboration" (on copying answers from back of book)--> no, outside school it's called slacking and letting other people do the work for you because you don't know how.

Depends on your perspective. Obviously in the 9 to 5 office, "collaboration" will take on a different meaning then in academic or scientific groups.

Well the video is pathetic and disgustingly bad. Crappy thesis, cheap propaganda level rhetoric, bandwagoning of the perpetual discontent with education.

I think you might be too harsh here. I think the point of an 11 minute presentation video isn't to be an explanation of an entire thesis but just to raise some concerns to provoke some thought on the fundamental structure of education. In my opinion, people spend too much focusing on whether or not teachers and the teacher union is being payed too much and if it is undermining the government from being able to help the students. That discussion obviously isn't the end all for the education problem but people need a scapegoat and the Teach. Union serves as a convenient one to distract people from the real problems.

I have serious doubts about his opinion that schools kill creativity. As more people have gone through the school system, has creativity decreased? That would seem like an obvious question. Have they done comparison on home schooled vs montessori vs standard? Well I doubt it since creativity is hard to measure. But intuitively, I think the useful kind of creativity in say, space shuttle design, comes from expertise. Who cares if you can come up with 1500 rocket designs if they all are laughably ignorant about the laws of physics? I mean seriously. Describing knowledge of what's physically impossible as a limitation on creativity is ridiculous. And knowing that information requires intense study.

Creativity all depends on the subject and the teacher to a large degree. A physics class can be the most creative class you can take in high school or it can be the most insanely boring and difficult class based around memorizing equations and laws. The teacher really makes it or breaks it at some point.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

I think you might be too harsh here. I think the point of an 11 minute presentation video isn't to be an explanation of an entire thesis but just to raise some concerns to provoke some thought on the fundamental structure of education. In my opinion, people spend too much focusing on whether or not teachers and the teacher union is being payed too much and if it is undermining the government from being able to help the students. That discussion obviously isn't the end all for the education problem but people need a scapegoat and the Teach. Union serves as a convenient one to distract people from the real problems.

I object to his intellectual dishonesty and glossy style. I do think most people focus too much on the teachers, it seems plausible to me that kids whose parents make them do their work do well in school regardless. Well enough to get to college and take charge of things themselves.

I don't think this guy is out to manipulate the data to try and get "his" way.

He did.



This is an actual map of prevalence of diagnosis.



This is his map. It is actually labeled "map of prescriptions", but he fooled me on that by the way he talked about it. He talks about "instances of adhd earlier" and says that "adhd increases as you travel east across the country".

I'm not even sure what his argument based on the manipulated version is. Do those states have more standardized testing? Huh? Maybe he should show a map of africa and say that there are no instances of adhd there, thus adhd is fictitious (if he's qualified to say that of course).

Kids with adhd can have trouble finishing sentences, let alone assignments.

Regarding him saying he isn't qualified, i think that just means to take what he says with a grain of salt, but his hypothesis might have some good insight in it for us to consider. Regarding epidemic...hmm you are technically correct, but nowadays people always use it in the context of how he used it. "Obesity is now an epidemic among Americans!!!"

He said he isn't qualified to say "there's no such thing as adhd". Psychologists "think there is such a thing...though it's still a matter of debate". He "knows for a fact that it's not an epidemic". And then that "they are being medicated on a whimsical basis--medical fashion".

See? There's obviously such a thing as adhd, but he isn't qualified to say that. He is qualified to make a fluff statement about it not being an epidemic, and apparently to dismiss it as medical fashion.

Capitalism and industry needs more then just workers with the bare minimum of knowledge to become functional workers. Let those naturally not as creative or intelligent to take up the lower roles and promote those more naturally gifted to become the new leaders of industry and innovators. The current system treats everyone as a worker and expects those naturally talented to rise from the muck with the expectation that they will get the "good" life if they do. But as he said in the video, a degree is not a guarantee of a "good" life, so this incentive is gone and the system no longer functions the way it is supposed to.

Tbh, besides the uniformity of the curriculum being taught I don't see how modeling schools after factories is good. Perhaps you have put more thought into this and have figured out why such a statement is to be dismissed instead of agreed with.

Having seen a bunch of TED videos, I'm confidant in saying that any comparison to factories and capitalism is very persuasive to his audience. So much so that he doesn't do anything more than that. It's like if someone from the religious right started off by saying to their congregation that the schools were areligious and thus like an "atheist church" due to separation of church and state.

I think montessori makes plenty of sense (went to one) for many kids (not all). But comparing the bell to end class with the bells in a factory is a flimsy rhetorical criticism.

A bit of an exaggeration, but yeah he was vague about it. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he meant that we should be integrating the subjects when it enhances the learning. I am about to start a class on the history of mathematics. That kind of thing is never even talked about in high school at least for me. There was history and there was math. In math you learned about math, even though you might argue that learning the origins of it could give you a greater perspective on the subject matter.

EDIT: hell, my calculus professor last quarter at least took 4-5 minutes each lecture just to briefly go over the people whose names are attributed to certain theorems and laws. I liked that a lot.

We had our history and english classes link up a couple of years. But that just meant we had to read Johnny Tremain. Anyway, "integrating the different fields" is something that people love to say vaguely and earnestly.

Creativity is the ability to arrive at your destination in a way that is not readily apparent to the person being tasked or to third party outsiders watching from the outside. That's the best definition I can come up with, and I think you could conceive a test to measure this in varying degrees although it would take some...creativity to design it.

I mean, the proof is in the pudding I suppose. People who make great designs are creative. But that isn't a test like the IQ test is. In any case, I doubt the NASA test measures it in any significant way.

I agree but I don't think we should be stumbling in the dark. We need some sort of measurement or test to go off on, no matter how weak, otherwise we are just going off what we "feel" might be the right direction.

No. Ignore tests unless we have some reason to think they are useful. They can be worse than useless. Remember all those tests the financial institutions had before the crash?

We can barely test intelligence and academic ability adequately. Now imagine we had no reason to think the SAT test was good, but you wanted college admissions to be based on it.

Creativity all depends on the subject and the teacher to a large degree. A physics class can be the most creative class you can take in high school or it can be the most insanely boring and difficult class based around memorizing equations and laws. The teacher really makes it or breaks it at some point.

Yes, they do.

Depends on your perspective. Obviously in the 9 to 5 office, "collaboration" will take on a different meaning then in academic or scientific groups.

It never means getting all the answers from someone else, not doing any work, and not understanding what you're doing. That was a particularly ridiculous remark by him, considering every class and it's mother has group work.

And what the hell is he suggesting? He ends with something about how we don't learn when we're alone (!?) and how we need to change the habits etc of the schools. But all he did was describe them and imply they were bad and use some crappy data about adhd and some nasa test. It's always possible that a flawed system is better than any conceivable alternative.

I would be interested in an argument for making the majority of gradeschools montessori. I've read interesting arguments about how colleges should be reformed. This guy gives me nothing but smarmy dishonesty.

[a completely inoffensive name]

Yeah, I have to agree with pretty much everything you said there after thinking about it a bit. Guess I gave the guy the benefit of the doubt since it was just an 11 minute video lecture and not an entire essay with footnotes and sources.

However, I have to disagree with you on one point. The SAT isn't really all that good. I took both the SAT and the ACT and I much preferred the ACT and I view it as a better judge of students than the SAT.

[Fragony]

@Horetore, test works fine we call it the cito-toets, all kids have to make it. First year on secondary midrange (havo) and highest (vwo/atheneum)are in the same class (Gymnasiums are seperate schools only for the brightest) after that another selection. Also, parents tend to overestimate their offspring. Everybody naturally want gymnesium for their kids, but the gap between midrange and highest is huge. On havo I had 9.8 on avarage so I moved up, but I really had to struggle

[HoreTore]

I know there are other methodologies out there which “work”, sometimes producing objectively better results than anything anyone could've hoped for. They were out there in the 19th century already, primarily in primary education. But where is the fully mapped quality assurance, and where is the fully mapped budget and where is the fully mapped education for the teachers?

Even with the relatively popular montessori idea, those issues couldn't be solved satisfactorily: for one thing funds are even more of an issue, and it proved difficult to train sufficient teachers to work with it. The reason why we have the current “standard” is not that is the “best” methodology measured against how much the students benefit from it (a well know, and well observed frustration which leads to such alternative experiments in the first place); it is that the methodology itself allows for straightforward and efficient implementation which is still able to offer a decent education. Consider: over here its earliest form was worked out and signed into law in the span of a mere 10 years in a somewhat politically volatile climate. (1796 - 1806)

Teachers are already fully capable of a wide range of alternate ways of teaching. Our education takes 4 years, what do you think we spend those four years on? The main problem we teachers face, however, is that we spend those four 4 years getting all creative and full of ideas - and then we are sent chrashing to the ground by having to work within the confines of the system. We constantly try to change things for the better, but we are restricted from doing what we would like. Funding is neither a problem, since it won't cost any more, and quality assurance? There has to be a gazillion papers and a ton of books written on alternative ways to educate people. What would a professor of education spend his time doing, if not researching new ways to teach?

All it would take to change our system of education completely would be for the politician in charge to say to every principal: "I have faith that your decades of training and experience has given you insight into how a child should/could be educated. You now have complete freedom to run you school however you please."


But no. Unlike any other field in society, all the requirements you need to have an opinion on education is simply having grown up(children who attend school don't seem to have any opinion though). Nobody would let a 50-year old carpenter who has barely ever seen a computer tell an electronics engineer what developing tools he should use - but he is thought to be fully qualified to comment on how to run our schools.

@Horetore, test works fine we call it the cito-toets

But why make a decision an 11-year old can do himself?

[Fragony]

He/she wouldn't be making it but their parents, and everybody wants to put them on the gymnasium, academic parents will hate it if they don't go there but it isn't their choice, it's selection at the gate. You can cry all you want but if you have low scores they won't accept you, they want to be sure you are university material. You can become that but it takes a year in mixed midrange/high class, when it isn't really sure what you are you go there, it's just efficient. And certainly not set in stone you can move up and back it's quite flexible, you can do the year again or move down. Fail in your 'career' twice and you have to, unless there are special circumstances. May seem a bit harsh but a lower education is still better than none at all.

[The Stranger]

But why make a decision an 11-year old can do himself?

I'm not so sure about that... there are more complaints of people that they belief they had to chose to early than that they had to chose too late.

in vmbo (the lowest) the student (at age of 12) gets to chose the direction he wants to continue his education (like sports, healthcare etc) in the higher levels of education the choise is given at age of 14 (because the basic knowledge needed is larger i assume). so i think the dutch system already comes pretty close to what you want.

besides that if you get high test results you can always chose a lower level of education, just not the other way around.

[Fragony]

Would call it a profile rather than direction, each profile has many directions.

[Strike For The South]

I showed up drunk for the SAT and got a perfect score on the reading

Srsly I pissed away 4 years of high school and got in to college because I destroyed the SAT and AP tests I took

My mother hit me so hard, like with her hand, so pissed I didn't get money for scholies

[HoreTore]

I too took all my high school exams either with a hangover or to sneak away from army work... Didn't study a minute for any of them, and of course I wasn't any smarter after I did them. But I still had to put my education on hold because I had to pass a couple of irrelevant exams...