Subject:
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Re: Cheap American shot (Was: NEW Mindstorms set shown (with picture!))
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Tue, 1 Feb 2000 21:06:17 GMT
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Viewed:
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402 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Jonathan Little writes:
> I would like to applaud Kyle for writing a very mature post without any
> naming calling. I was beginning to think that it wasn't possible.
>
> What I feel some of us are failing to realize is that every country is
> essentially the same. There are some differences, i.e. government, culture,
> etc, but for all intents and purposes, people are people and they are who
> make up these countries. There are intelligent people in the United States.
> There are intelligent people in Canada. There are intelligent people in
> Germany, England, Brazil, Puerto Rico, and China. There are also less
> intelligent people in each of these countries. That doesn't change. I
Yes. But the single area where the US is ludicrously falling behind -
that is to say, falling behind more and more as time goes by -
is pre-university education. A major reason is the basic one-school-
fits-all system which succeeds at pushing every student towards
mediocrity. Even in Germany, a similar system is being pushed
rather a bit, with pretty bad results.
Someone mentioned that a second language is mandatory in US high
schools. However, while such standards are subject to significant
local differences (which doesn't help), this compares to (in Germany,
knowledge about which is all I have to compare to US systems)
English starting in 5th grade for all three levels of schooling
(which splite beginning wth the 5th grade, BTW);
-the 10-year "blue-collar" track may offer optional French
or Spanish from the 7th grade
-the 10-year "white collar" track does the same (may be mandatory,
not sure)
-the 13-(somethimes 12-)year "college-prep" track adds French
or Latin (the latter being completed being required for a number of
college majors, and actually required for high school graduation
in some states) from 7th grade, and optionally whichever of
Fr. or Lat. isn't yet taken, or Spanish (sometimes Russian),
from 9th grade. Some schools start with latin in 5th grade
and start English in 7th grade.
-While the 2nd and 3rd
languages tend to be considered completed after 4-6/2-3 years,
English, with a choice of taking it as a "major" the last
two years (of the college-bound track), continues to the end of
high school.
As impressive as the number of foreign languages may sound, I consider
basic math and first-language teaching more important.
This is where large numbers of US college students find
themselves woefully unprepared when entering college.
(And, as I had to tell my daughter, for all the "rah! rah! leadership!
excellence!" BS she is surrounded by now, none of these teachers
and curriculum makers will be available for comment or taking
any responsibility when, after acing her way through K-12, she
finds herself rather unprepared when starting college.)
I sometimes feel my memory must be clouded, but she is being
taught math in mid-5th grade that I learned in early 4th grade,
and it's only getting worse.
For a laugh: her grade has all-A and A/B honor rolls. Which, between
them, list 70% of all students. (all of which are obviously "above
average" :) - with apologies to Garrison Keillor)
So, why is the US doing so well? Grrreat universities.
(When the Construction Site says "Why are Germans such great
Engineers?" in Fischertechnik, well, sorry, particularly these
days, they mean "craftsmanship", not engineers educated at slow,
ponderous, underfunded (tuition-free) overrun German universities.)
Oddly (not really) you have a lot of student educated at foreign
high schools flooding (and unproportionally dominating,
achievement-wise) high-tech/science majors at US universities.
Yes, a lot of well-educated graduates are produced, but at
far too high a cost in long study times due to failure
and/or remedial math and english (!) courses.
(In the meantime, the children go through a long phase that
creates the "uneducated US teenager" stereotype in Europe.)
What I don't understand is 1. German schools, which were doing
really well, are introducing more and more "fun" stuff to
waste time with, too, and emphasis on learning is decreasing
notably, such that final-years (10th grade-plus) teachers
encounter students with study habits worsening year after year.
2. US schools spend a lot of time with experimental curriculums,
e.g. "New Math" is followed by even newer math, with emphasis on
overly complicated methods (for a "greater understanding");
my daughter's school had some prize statements in a recent
new-curriculum description that quite clearly stated that while
all that evil rote memorization (of basic multiplication tables
and the like!) will no longer be done at all....the students
will certainly be expected to have all that knowledge -
but I guess that those changes will add only a little to the time
we spend every day patching up the classroom desasters.
> suppose there are some Americans (1) that can't find a specific state on a
> map (though the statement that there are people from the United States who
> can't find the US on a map is absurd). Likewise, I would wager that there
> are Canadians who can not find a particular province in Canada and English
> who do not know where Wales is and Europeans who can not point out a
> specific country in Europe ( a feat that I feel is comparable to an American
> locating a particular state, given the similarities in size between the US
> and Europe and the individual states and countries within each). What this
Of course. But you see, that's all those European countries (that there
is knowledge to be had of), vs. just one single USA :-)
(I used to think like that, but know better now.)
> opinion seems to be held by a good bit of the world. What I would like to
> know, seeing as how I can receive international input, is this: what does
> the world have against the United States?
Rather a bit of envy, and quite a bit of holier-than-thou-ness based
on misinformation. E.g. the you'd-have-to-see-it-to-believe-it
window and bumper stickers full of "we're so advanced" self-back-patting
stuck on by German car manufacturers when they began introducing catalysts
for German-market cars (10 years later than in the US).
Bottom line: K-12 education in the US generally stinks, with worthy
exceptions being just that - exceptions; even with my wife and I
enhancing our children's education a lot, the general public still
gets a bad deal.
That, however, concludes my criticism of this country.
Other than that, it's a fine place to live and work - I'm certainly
not planning on moving back to rude, crowded, self-impressed Germany.
-gbr
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