School is Too Easy, Students Report
It is no surprise to me that students would describe school as "too easy". One of the worst aspects of school life today is the pervasive lack of content, papered over by utterly pointless projects and activities. A bright kid who needs intellectual engagement will find slim pickin's in the average classroom.
I take violent exception, however, to this statement:
Ulrich Boser, a senior fellow at the center who co-wrote the report, said the data challenge the "school-as-pressure-cooker" image found in recent movies such as Race to Nowhere.Unfortunately, lack of content does not imply lack of pressure. The pressure-cooker aspect of school is caused by large volumes of homework, the jumped-up competition to get into "good" colleges, and stress over grades. It is entirely possible, and actually quite common, to have a pressure-cooker school with low academic standards. The fact that many kids are stressed out, missing sleep, and working every spare moment in an attempt to keep up with their homework does not imply that the school has high academic standards, or that the kids are learning anything.
"The fact that many kids are stressed out, missing sleep, and working every spare moment in an attempt to keep up with their homework does not imply that the school has high academic standards, or that the kids are learning anything."
ReplyDeleteVery important point!
Another source of pressure (overlooked by both Race to Nowhere and School is Too Easy) comes from the delayed effects of low academic expectations in elementary school. These low expectations result in kids who are ill-prepared for AP-level courses in high school--particularly in math and math-dependent subjects like physics.
This is exactly what my mom says she encounters as a communications instructor at a university. Her public speaking students generally don't understand the idea of writing and speaking concisely or have a good grasp of grammar and punctuation. They tell her they had to write 20-page papers for their AP classes and the teachers graded them based on how many pages they wrote.
ReplyDeleteMy local paper recently reported that our public schools expect this year's scores on the state standardized tests to be lower. The reason? The tests have changed, and they require more critical thinking. Apparently, we haven't been preparing the students for that very well. The article was framed from the perspective of, "It's just so hard to keep up with these changes and continue teaching to the test."
"The fact that many kids are stressed out, missing sleep, and working every spare moment in an attempt to keep up with their homework does not imply that the school has high academic standards, or that the kids are learning anything."
ReplyDeleteAs an AP English teacher, I fight this same myth every day. My students all claim that we "don't do anything" in class, and then all say after they leave, "You know? We learned way more in your class than in other classes." And even after admitting it, they still don't know why. They're so socialized into believing that WORK is what leads to learning that even ACTUAL LEARNING doesn't lead to their recognizing what just happened to them.
Thoughts on common core?
ReplyDeletewww.corestandards.org
@Josh, that's interesting. I think we've reached the point where a lot of our kids don't really know what learning is. They know what school work is, and the good students know how to do what they're told and hand things in on time, but actual learning is a very rare beast.
ReplyDelete@Anonymous, I'm skeptical of the common core standards, as I am of practically everything in this weary moment. How will the standards be implemented? Will teachers feel this is one more fad to grudgingly deal with? Time will tell if any useful reform comes of the standards.
@ Josh, my year 9 English teacher was also one of those teachers who taught us so much, and yet we never felt like we were learning because everything was just so fun. On the other hand, there are teachers at my school who make learning such a painful process, and while we can still learn as much from them, we're not having fun in the process. What's the point of learning without fun when you can learn WITH fun?
ReplyDeleteAnother example would be my maths class from the same year. My teacher never assigned homework apart from what was unfinished in class. The teacher next door, however, assigned loads of homework every night. Both classes got roughly the same results on the tests.
Hienuri asks:
ReplyDelete***
What's the point of learning without fun when you can learn WITH fun?
***
The most depressing situation of all is no learning with no fun either.
Why has our education turned so dismal, joyless and desiccated? I know the short answer is that we've sucked the life out of the classroom because of testing, we need to keep up with China and India. But the long question begs deeper answers. Have we become so disdainfully anti-intellectual? Do our educational leaders scorn learning deep down?
ReplyDeleteSkimming the surface of the short answer, just what has happened to us? This nation was built on rebellion, inquiry, and a pioneering spirit. Why are we quashing free thinking, imagination and creativity now, when the world is so desperately in need of it? We seem to have reverted back to some Calvinist version of learning, a redemption through suffering model. As Alfie Kohn writes, who says religion has been removed from the classroom?
I wonder if the culture isn't just completely fearful. Anytime we revert to low levels of functioning or regress, it's usually because we're fearful.
ReplyDeleteThere is no time and energy to relax and be creative when one is mortally afraid all the time.
What are on earth are we so afraid of? Not being Number One? It's like anxiety and sleep. Imagine you have a job interview tomorrow. You find yourself waking up all night. Your primitive brain detects anxiety and translates that into DANGER. Evolution causes your brain to undistinguish between a sabre-toothed tiger just around the bend and fears you might screw up the job interview, thus costing you the position. So your brain prevents you from drifting off into deep sleep so that you can be alert and prevent catastrophe. But the stupid irony is that your sleeplessness won't help you do better, you'll actually do worse. You wish evolution could just correct this annoying glitch.
ReplyDeleteSame here with our anxiety over how we fare competitively. Some measure of anxiety is warranted. If we didn't have what we like to call "good stress" we wouldn't have any reason to get out of bed in the morning. Nothing wrong with keeping up our national ambition, our competitive edge. But just like generalized anxiety disorder, when it becomes too big, when it takes over, we just don't function well. All this worrying and hand wringing has brought about precisely the opposite of the desired effect. A little bit went a long way. We got so slavish to scores, we forgot to actually do better. All we've learned is how to worry better. We wound up killing the very thing we were trying to preserve. Kids are working harder than ever but in fact, they really aren't working hard at all. You know the expression, work smarter, not harder. We're doing the reverse. And managed to squeeze out any last bit of passion in the process.
P.S. Fear and authoritarianism inevitably go together. Now THAT'S something to fear.