Dumbing Us Down: The American Tragedy
I personally don’t think that kids are dropping out because they are stupid and don’t want to learn. I think the problem is that as a student ages (especially at sixteen when they get a job and learn about life) they start to realize that you don’t really need to know what schools teach you. Not to mention that they go about it in the most horrible and boring way. The only thing I took out of school that I still remember to this day (other than small facts about science and history) is math. Every thing else was forgotten as I graduated high school and took a career into computing.
I personally believe that there needs to be a whole revamp of what students learn in school and how it is learned. Do not simply have a teacher read out of a book and ask you to memorize things. Make sure you portray facts about the subject you are learning in a fun and useful manner. Hell, actually teach the WHOLE side of the story. I can guarantee 80% of the historical ‘facts’ I learned in school were half truths or only one side of the story.
If anything kids should be allowed to pick and choose which subjects they want to take (other than math and science, which should be mandatory.) after elementary school for a career that they would like to do. Screw college just being the way you learn for a career, every school year should be useful for later in life.
Most of that isn’t important anyway, I’m from the UK and I don’t know any of the non-popular US presidents, and I find it hard to believe Americans would have an advantage in life because they knew about them all….
You cant teach kids what they have no care for, or know that it will be no use to them. If you tell somebody who loves computers that maths is a vital subject for a future in computer science, guess what he/she is going to do?
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