Posts tagged education
Posts tagged education
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I just wanted to archive the text dealing with education for my own personal purposes; hopefully others may find this useful. The following makes me very optimistic, which exactly how I want to feel regarding the future of the United States. I also want the government to back up these ideas with actual concrete change and positive growth, of course, so we’ll see what happens.
Now, this year, we’ve broken through the stalemate between left and right by launching a national competition to improve our schools. And the idea here is simple: Instead of rewarding failure, we only reward success. Instead of funding the status quo, we only invest in reform — reform that raises student achievement; inspires students to excel in math and science; and turns around failing schools that steal the future of too many young Americans, from rural communities to the inner city. In the 21st century, the best anti-poverty program around is a world-class education. (Applause.) And in this country, the success of our children cannot depend more on where they live than on their potential.
When we renew the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, we will work with Congress to expand these reforms to all 50 states. Still, in this economy, a high school diploma no longer guarantees a good job. That’s why I urge the Senate to follow the House and pass a bill that will revitalize our community colleges, which are a career pathway to the children of so many working families. (Applause.)
To make college more affordable, this bill will finally end the unwarranted taxpayer subsidies that go to banks for student loans. (Applause.) Instead, let’s take that money and give families a $10,000 tax credit for four years of college and increase Pell Grants. (Applause.) And let’s tell another one million students that when they graduate, they will be required to pay only 10 percent of their income on student loans, and all of their debt will be forgiven after 20 years — and forgiven after 10 years if they choose a career in public service, because in the United States of America, no one should go broke because they chose to go to college. (Applause.)
And by the way, it’s time for colleges and universities to get serious about cutting their own costs — (applause) — because they, too, have a responsibility to help solve this problem.
— Source
As a bonus, here’s what the GOP response had to say about education (because education really should be something that can cross party lines, I feel):
The President and I agree on expanding the number of high-quality charter schools, and rewarding teachers for excellent performance. More school choices for parents and students mean more accountability and greater achievement.
A child’s educational opportunity should be determined by her intellect and work ethic, not by her zip code.
— Source
Your thoughts? Are you as hopeful as I am regarding educational reform and progress in the United States? Are you skeptical?
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Education is learning what you didn’t even know you didn’t know.
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(reblogged from researchnews)
This is an interesting look in educational practices outside of the US — in this case, the UK, and it seems to reinforce the attitudes present in this op-ed from The Guardian. Here are some definitions for US visitors like me who were a bit confused—
Streaming meant splitting pupils into several different hierarchical groups which would stay together for all lessons.
Setting meant putting pupils of similar ability together just for certain lessons. So, for example, it would be possible to be in a top set for French and a lower set for mathematics. (BBC)
I’m pretty interested in the benefits of collaborative peer learning and how it can be positively used in the formal educational setting so this kind of research interests me.
I’m curious, though, about the implication that this has for education in the US. After all, what are Honors and AP classes if not a form of setting? The same BBC article describes the current state of education in UK schools as follows: “three-quarters of maths lessons observed by inspectors used ability sets and it was used in well over half of all lessons in science and foreign languages.” Indeed, my middle & high schools used setting for these subjects and I personally found them pretty beneficial. I actually have a hard time imagining mixed-ability classes in these subjects in the higher levels of K-12 education (this is probably because I’ve only read literature that looks at peer collaborative learning in the elementary setting) or even in other subjects.
On the other hand, most music classrooms in K-12 education can likely be described as mixed-ability classrooms. Band, orchestra, and choral ensembles are frequently mixed-age and, by extension, pretty mixed-ability, and students bring a varied background of pre-existing musical knowledge to the general music classroom at every grade level. What implications does the research on setting/streaming/etc in other subjects hold for music education?
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A really interesting look at “how the largest school districts in the country are funded and how they spend that money.”
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If a child can’t learn the way we teach, maybe we should teach them the way they learn.
Christy F, on A to Z Teacher Stuff Forum (via dazzled)
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When faced with the choice between the classic How Children Learn and How Children Fail (both by John Holt) in one of my classes earlier this semester, I opted to be optimistic and read the former. It was a really inspiring read but I was left with the disconcerting sense that something written in the early 1960s to highlight the failures of education should still not ring so true now, at the end of the 2000s. I plan on reading the latter book during my winter break.
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We watched this (titled “A Vision of Students Today”) during this past Monday’s new technologies class (thanks, Dr. Frankel!) and I found it thoroughly thought-provoking. I don’t want to post my thoughts right off though lest they influence your preconceptions of the video prior to watching.
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This is something I’m really interested in seeing. I wrote an essay for my Emotions & Social Life class at Goldsmiths College 2 years ago about the prevalence of CCTV and how we’re all so used to being observed—
(How? Well, I theorized that it was partially due to
1) the popularity of reality TV; &
2) the increase of infotainment that has resulted in us seeing the same horrific images over and over, thus oversaturating our culture with emotions to the point where they lose their significance
but this is a little off topic and there’s a bit more to that than just those two points.)
— but I hadn’t given much thought to the impact of oversurveillance on education until this movie came to my attention. I was lucky enough to grow up in the exact opposite type of learning environment (at least, as far as I could tell we had no 24/7 surveillance!) but I think it’s important that these kinds of films are made in order to expose the negative effects of something we think can only help, not hurt.
