What Should We Teach The Next Generation?

TruckerT

Since we can no longer do sums or read maps, and presumably the people who program our gadgets will not live for ever, then we are surely doomed

On the other hand, I hope I never have to share the motorway with a bunch of frustrated boffs, reduced to driving trucks because of the inadequacies of the education system

TruckerT

chewmylegoff

pqrdef wrote: »

But why vocational? Why not art history or film studies? These things are available as degree subjects, but they don't seem to depend on any particular facility in grammar or arithmetic.

And why only them? Why would vocational subjects not be a serious and credible option for everybody?

We can't seem to get away from the idea that the academic route is the main line and anything else is a side track.

Actually, the academic route would be the raw deal if we didn't make sure that everything else was worse.

the reason i suggest it is that it's not available in any meaningful form at the moment. frankly i don't think that we need to do a lot more to encourage people to do history of art, or film studies, but i think there are large number of people who are made to feel useless by the education system because they are unable to make much progress academically. trying to force them to continue through the academic pathway is useless, if someone is struggling with the basics, then they're hardly going to get physics. if classroom study was focussed on the basics, but outside of that there was the opportunity to do something that you were actually good at / interested in then the education system might add rather more value at the bottom end than it currently does.

joe_blotts

Britain ranks 28th in the world for overall quality of its education system – behind Romania and Costa Rica – despite a doubling of spending since 2000. :eek:

zagubov

chewmylegoff wrote: »

no-one should be obliged to do anything, but they should be given the opportunity to do something vocational if they want to.

chewmylegoff wrote: »

the reason i suggest it is that it's not available in any meaningful form at the moment. frankly i don't think that we need to do a lot more to encourage people to do history of art, or film studies, but i think there are large number of people who are made to feel useless by the education system because they are unable to make much progress academically. trying to force them to continue through the academic pathway is useless, if someone is struggling with the basics, then they're hardly going to get physics. if classroom study was focussed on the basics, but outside of that there was the opportunity to do something that you were actually good at / interested in then the education system might add rather more value at the bottom end than it currently does.

Somebody suggested we (taxpayers) should just fund useful courses and let people pay for self-indulgent ones that don't fit them into a job.

joe_blotts wrote: »

Britain ranks 28th in the world for overall quality of its education system – behind Romania and Costa Rica – despite a doubling of spending since 2000. :eek:

Don't knock Cost Rica!
The original quote is from their university archives.
I guess we just don't preserve our original wisdom any more. :rotfl:

chewmylegoff

zagubov wrote: »

Somebody suggested we (taxpayers) should just fund useful courses and let people pay for self-indulgent ones that don't fit them into aa job.

to be honest i think any course that keeps a young person engaged with education is a worthwhile course (and better value for the money for the taxpayer than leaving people to fail and rot in the current system). obviously there is no silver bullet for that particular problem but clearly mroe can be done.

pqrdef

Callie22 wrote: »

'English lit' per se may not be useful to many people, but again it's about the skills you learn whilst studying it. Analysis of text, developing an idea, constructing an argument and communicating that effectively - they're all very useful things to know, and worthwhile transferable skills.

And at the end of all that, you could get a qualification in English Lit without knowing the first thing about English Lit. This kind of confusion of objectives is a big part of what's wrong. Oh, it doesn't matter if they don't learn the content, they'll be learning something else. Huh?

If we want kids to learn study skills, let's call it Study Skills and then work out how best to teach that. There are much better vehicles than English Lit.

Then English Lit will need to have specific content and will need to be taught as if the content is worth learning, if at all.

Callie22 wrote: »

And to go back to an earlier post, I disagree that people would get 'burnt out' studying a full curriculum.

I was making a distinction between doing the courses and understanding the content. Most people will find that they only really engage intellectually with one or two subjects, if any at all, and just go through the motions in the rest of the courses.

moneyinmypocket

The next gen should be taught iPhones, sky sub and beer money don't come before saving for a dep on a house - they want it all now!!!

abaxas

To accept when the make incorrect decisions, not blame others.

yertiz_2

moneyinmypocket wrote: »

The next gen should be taught iPhones, sky sub and beer money don't come before saving for a dep on a house - they want it all now!!!

Why? (save for a deposit on a house.)

moneyinmypocket

yertiz wrote: »

Why? (save for a deposit on a house.)

Why not save for a dep