Post #63,071
11/15/02 2:06:04 PM
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*sigh* - Alternatives?
You were born...and so you're free...so Happy Birthday! Laurie Anderson
[link|mailto:bepatient@aol.com|BePatient]
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Post #63,075
11/15/02 2:25:16 PM
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How about...
A Federal Government who doesn't threaten to shut your ass down if you don't have enough kids fill in the right dots? WTF is this? You're always railing against old, stodgy methods of instruction, how many fscking jobs do you think involve filling in little dots, within the timeframe, on a shitty little piece of paper?
I'm oversensitive on this. In high school I was told by my mathematics teacher that "some people get mathematics and some people don't. Nothing to be ashamed of, you just don't get it and never will." Why do you suppose he said that? Because I FAILED to commit to memory (or indeed, see the value of committing to memory) trigonometric identities! Why the fsck should I memorize that IF I CAN GENERATE THE IDENTITIES? Which is more important? The memorization of formulas or the ability to generate them? I'd say the latter, but if a student had poor rote memorization skills, but the intellect to generate the formulas, he'd still fail your "fill in the box" tests. Now, did society gain anything? I'd submit they lost something, and something more important.
Tests are popular because they don't require thought. All they require is regurgitation and they're easy to understand (Oh, you're and 80, you're a 90, you're a 40) but they don't really tell you anything.
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Post #63,082
11/15/02 2:46:04 PM
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*sigh*2 - Alternatives?
Until there is a better way to quantify and measure the system...there is no other objective basis to determine if one way is better than another.
Without that, there can be no improvement.
So while I understand your frustration...it does less than nothing to assist in the improvement of our educational system.
You were born...and so you're free...so Happy Birthday! Laurie Anderson
[link|mailto:bepatient@aol.com|BePatient]
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Post #63,095
11/15/02 4:07:39 PM
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?
I think we agree that standardized tests are not the answer, but you want to use them anyway? Or do you really think they measure "education" in any meaningful way? I think they're worse (as my anecdote demonstrated). You accuse me of contributing "less than zero", yet I cite an example where standardized tests contribute less than zero and you apparently agree (at least somewhat) but are willing to stick to them anyway? And I off no solutions?
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Post #63,112
11/15/02 4:32:55 PM
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I didn't read it that way
I read that as a statement that standardized testing is better than nothing, and that you haven't yet given any superior alternative other than repeated assertions that it's bad.
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Post #63,114
11/15/02 4:38:41 PM
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*clap*
You were born...and so you're free...so Happy Birthday! Laurie Anderson
[link|mailto:bepatient@aol.com|BePatient]
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Post #63,113
11/15/02 4:38:00 PM
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Not quite.
I agree that the current tests may not be ideal. But they are currently the only viable source of objective data available.
That...again...is why I ask for alternatives instead of complaining about them.
Until an alternative obejective measure can be established...these tests are all we have. And we don't have time to invent something else. Thus, I advocate their use until an alternative is established. Short term we may look at ways to increase the test's applicability.
So lets get started on that.
Testing is going to have to be a cornerstone...especially in lower grades that are less concentrated on objective thinking and more concentrated on the fundamentals.
You were born...and so you're free...so Happy Birthday! Laurie Anderson
[link|mailto:bepatient@aol.com|BePatient]
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Post #63,142
11/15/02 6:58:09 PM
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But not your implicit presumption throughout:
That objective tests make sense in evaluating the entire *&%*&$ Gaussian of human beings! further implicit - that [some fucking-HOW].. a bunch of NUMBERS can, shall, Should! - actually indicate something 'Real'.
Never mind that your presumptions are Popular and oft-regurgitated. I assert that the mindset which imagines that ANY #*%& NUMBERS can remotely characterize.. other than a rote-learned list.. is fatally flawed at the root.
I OTOH go with A Einstein, things should be made as simple as possibe, but NOT SIMPLER [emph. add.] I also go with, for a second time in recent days - [link|http://www.preservenet.com/theory/Gatto.html| John Gatto], also [link|http://www.cantrip.org/gatto.html|here].
CPA/Econ NUMBERS have gotten us squarely within simplistic useless ways of dealing with ALL evidently complex topics; no wonder our society is fucked and getting fuckeder - and nowhere more evidently than with THIS TOPIC.
You want simple. You want a number-characterization of Success. I want [at very least] - a wide-range of 'methods' via an equally wide-range of teacher talents: to produce results measured by ESSAY performance and not NUMBERS. Harder to multiply-'grade'? - You Bet.
Worth it? I BET.
Ashton
Neva hoppen though; we're hooked on EZ, not honest. And damn well not on - 'intelligent'.
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Post #63,223
11/16/02 11:52:14 AM
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Xactly. Well said.
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Post #63,247
11/16/02 1:52:16 PM
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It might very well have been.
But it won't >solve< anything.
You were born...and so you're free...so Happy Birthday! Laurie Anderson
[link|mailto:bepatient@aol.com|BePatient]
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Post #63,261
11/16/02 4:40:00 PM
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Notwithstanding this thread's length,
we started it off wrong. You and I will likely NEVER agree on how to "fix" education for a very simple reason. You and I have irreconcilable differences on what the product of an American education should be. Neither of us has discussed this, and I've yet to see a serious discussion of it anywhere. We can't know how to "correct course" until we know where we want to go. We can't know where we want to go until we agree on a destination. I suspect that the reason that "there are no easy answers" is because "there is no agreement" on what we seek of our public educational system. We will remain at odds about the fixes because we are trying to accomplish entirely different things.
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Post #63,327
11/16/02 9:33:28 PM
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I doubt that very much.
At least on the fundamentals I'd think we'd agree that having a vast majority of the population able to read and do basic mathmatics is a start. In alot of places we fail at even this simple task.
What else are you trying to accomplish?
You were born...and so you're free...so Happy Birthday! Laurie Anderson
[link|mailto:bepatient@aol.com|BePatient]
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Post #63,357
11/17/02 12:36:22 AM
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How about a *civilized* population, while we're at it ??
That which requires a bit more than how to address the envelope to pay the MIN on one of yer un maxed-out CCs after a hard day flippin burgers; and enough historical lore to have some idea what the word civil-ization might connote (also what connote means).
Settle for less you say? Hey - we already Have. Like it? Should we save a few more bucks for Defense, say? Or maybe just Offense can do - if we're Quick.. and vicious enough, next.
Pshaw Beep
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Post #63,425
11/17/02 2:53:52 PM
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Priceless
Continue along on your (nearly) incomprehensible diatribes...all of the time telling us the evils of the world as we know it. Railing on me and anyone who you disagree with in, oh-so lofty terms...
Care to suggest a course or 2 in "civil-ization" that we can drop into a 3rd graders backpack? Make sure its a >really thin< book...because we have weight restrictions on learning now too...so we can make sure we're being really >nice< to everybody.
I got it. Lets everyone throw away all trappings of everything...grow our hair...go back to barter and live in nice communal settings.
Oh...wait...Johnny can't read or write...let alone apply a trade to make something of value in a barter society...Johnny doesn't understand basic unit of measure...hmmm...but I guess, in the interest of making nice, that requiring Johnny to (gasp) memorize some basic facts before we unleash him to the world is an uncivilized method of teaching.
At least mmoffitt and jb4 made an attempt at offering solutions.
You, on the other hand...seem to just want to drop in to tell me to feel sorry for myself for living >in the real world< (whether or not you like it here is beside the point)
You were born...and so you're free...so Happy Birthday! Laurie Anderson
[link|mailto:bepatient@aol.com|BePatient]
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Post #63,488
11/17/02 9:19:23 PM
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We have no? little disagreement re Basics
(far as I can guesstimate from your occasional actually stated personal opinions)
We might argue about what Must be on that list, what Should be on that list. And you may be right that - only the basic survival skills might have be on the emergency list, for many years. I will still argue that we had better not stop with that crude-survival assortment, a month longer than necessary.
I do not deem it a trivial exercise to design.. these promised tests. And however clever might the tests become (??): that is still only Phase 0. We shall measure the damage. Maybe..
I have linked to a person I believe capable of answering more questions than you can ask; I suspect that he has some (small number) company - as to Phases 1 through ..42?
None of this topic could possibly be significantly altered in the reign of one Resident: it is that which I see as a huge hurdle; we Love the quarterly returns and.. Chortle at the cancelling-out of the previous Republicrat trends with the New Republicrat's ascension. If this pattern continues re Polit-football Edjakayshun -
How much more fucked can we get? I'd rather not find out. And I don't have any young kids to watch floundering (or I'd have been outta here much earlier).
Civility: is more important than math or history - you can't even begin to learn those, in a zoo. Much of That inculcation begins at 'home' - so as the bottom 20% lose ground every year: what do You think leads to a siege mentality in their little cheeldrun; street-wise from daily necessity? Gets back to wealth distribution every time, even for those with the iron gates - up on the hill. Don't it?
Ashton
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Post #63,290
11/16/02 7:08:27 PM
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No, 'saying it' won't.
But I submit that if.. more voices are not raised, speaking in intentionally polit-buzzword-free syntax - about what is wrong in our basic lazy ideas about 'assessing people': then no amount of money thrown at the package (that popular shibboleth) will make a slightest dent overall.
Can a 'modern' nation actually reconfigure its entire attitude and approach to something as massive in implications as this topic - a Problem with the momentum of the Titanic on a slalom course? Have we enough of the ilk of John Gatto - and will anyone Listen to them? Finally?
All I can see clearly-enough to bet on is: if the usual Left/Right, One-Party slogans are allowed to prevail in this area as everywhere else - it is moot. We shall continue our decline in overall 'citizen competence' as "things [we never pay to maintain] fall apart".
See.. for all the talk about "the cheeldrun" - we behave as if we don't really think THEY are as 'cost-effective' an investment as say - armaments and gasoline subsidies: THOSE are where we will SPEND BIG $$, kill / be killed, and where our largest Attention really is, especially with today's 'excuse' to further ignore The USA At Home. [oil] is Elsewhere, we see.
We could.. look at the budgets, methods of advanced countries - but natch, we see ourselves as #1: no need. Ditto re 'medicine'. Hmmm - a pattern?
Ashton
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Post #63,321
11/16/02 9:11:10 PM
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What do you prefer?
Do you prefer passing someone through high school until (still unable to read) he gets to college and even *thinks* he can get to college, but can't comprehend an English 101 class?
Testing won't solve how to teach this person how to read, but it will sure show that he can't read at a point where maybe he *can* be taught.
*I* expect that, at the end of first grade, all first graders will be able to read (maybe not comprehend what they're reading, but still be able to read) and do simple addition and subtraction. Standardized testing won't find that out (geez, try giving a first grader a standardized test.) An exercise of reading out loud from a simple book (no, not the Run Spot Run books, which I fortunately never had), but something maybe out of Dr. Seuss.
Of course *that* is never going to be able to be standardized, and really it's at first grade we need to catch any problems in teaching methods and learning problems.
But as he says, what is *your* suggestion for an alternative to standard testing?
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Post #63,358
11/17/02 12:57:54 AM
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Re: What do you prefer?
For the edjaKayshun Resident to top his agenda with 'Testing' and have no remotely incisive idea of ~ the shambles of the system which has brought us 'measurably increasing' dumbth, is par for the course. The course of mere political slogan trading with no brains or actual concern behind the slogans. Yes of course *some* means must measure how far we have fallen - so what? It's Nothing compared with the will to seriously proceed; to place Home USA infrastructure repair over a likely series of wars against folks we think Might.. not like us and might.. commit suicide to act on the dislike.
I've already linked to at least One person who could walk even a Dubya and the Oil-guys through: what needs to be done + (I cannot doubt) a number of feasible approaches to making the transition. It can't be done in even a few years: many years == well beyond any One Resident's political mini-plan du jour.
Gatto's time would be wasted - talking to a smoke blower. And That is all we're willing to put in power: BS artists who give a shit only about the Power and personal wealth gleaned from leveraging it.
Nationally - we'd pay Trillions in a wink of a Contractor's eye - for a mere illusion of 'security' against the enemies we add-to daily - but not a fraction of that time/money to *seriously* seek to recreate a working and excellent edu system. Won't happen. We're gonna do wars for a long time, next. We'll need the money == perfect excuse to Wait. As before and before that.
Never mind.
Ashton
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