Modern education

Is education going downhill?

Does it crush creativty and promote utter nonsense?

Is it, quite franky, useless to teach facts to be written down and recited, then forgotten? Do you believe education is like this?

Is education becoming too politically correct?

And is education not challenging enough?

I'm referring in general to secondary school.

Discuss.

Reply 1

cottonmouth

10

Wootcannon

Is education going downhill?

Does it crush creativty and promote utter nonsense?

Is it, quite franky, useless to teach facts to be written down and recited, then forgotten? Do you believe education is like this?

Is education becoming too politically correct?

And is education not challenging enough?

I'm referring in general to secondary school.

Discuss.

Yes. Yes, Yes. No. Depends, generally.

School foceses way too much on learning for the purpose of passing exams. And its because there is far too much emphasis on league tables, which should be abolished immediately.

Reply 2

paddy

14

GCSEs certainly are the biggest load of BS these days. Unless you actually carry a subject on then they're totally useless.

Reply 3

fundamentally

15

Wootcannon

Is education going downhill?

Yes, because state schools are designed to educate chavs to become the next generation of factory fodder.

Reply 4

wendy_17

1

Well it really just depends. I think in general secondary schools are all too keen to help you pass exams and nothing more. I feel you should really understand the subjects you study rather than "learn" the questions and the answers like we did at school, I don't feel learning lists of facts truly "teaches" you anything. I also don't think there is enough practical work in involved (at least in standard grades and highers) to put what you learn in class into practise. I was really let down by the way things were taught at my school :frown:

Reply 5

dynamism

7

I want to learn just the facts to pass the exam but these facts should be the interesting and important parts.

Reply 6

cottonmouth

10

tickular

I want to learn just the facts to pass the exam but these facts should be the interesting and important parts.

See, its such a shame that school has conditioned ou to just want to pass exams. I love learning. I love reading. When we studied Thackerey at school(one book) i loved his work so much that i went a bought a load of his books. I was so interested in outer-space, i went and bought loads of books, and subscribed to a space magazine. All the time, i felt as though i was just being given a load of facts that would help up my marks in an exan. I just wanted to learn, whether it would get me 4 extra marks or not. But at school, there is no time for segueing and going on a trail of learning- to the point where if you did, you'd lose marks for lack of structure! Its just ridiculous.

Reply 7

person 34

9

I agree with the above person. When I enjoy something, I will expand my knowledge outside of school. If there's a subject I really hate, I will just learn what I have too (if i can be bothered) and hope to God the questions I like come up - and when they do and I get an A, then I'm a lucky bugger, not clever. So, in that sense education is stupid. There are some people who get by exams simply by memory and very pushy parents, but there are some who genuinly like learning and work extremely hard. It's really obvious who's who in my school. And then there's people like me, who are reasonably clever, although nothing special, who don't work that hard and will do fine in exams. And then you get dumb people who work hard and do ok too. So, everyone can get along ok in today's education, but I really do think it's the people with good memories who flourish in today's educatin system, unfortunately. We are definately pushing out creatvity. It's also really sad, that if you want to get on in today's world you simply have to go with the system which makes education so boring and pointless.

I personally don't agree with exams in the slightest. However, I know finding a different solution would be hard. I think what should be done in education, is to pick out people's strengths from an early age - whether that be academic or not so they can further their ability in this area and thus become an "expert". This would rid the world of much unemplyoment, and would probably give people a lot more satisfcation out of a job when they were older.

Reply 8

wiwarin_mir

fundamentally

Yes, because state schools are designed to educate chavs to become the next generation of factory fodder.

And private schools will bar you from doing a subject if they don't think you can get a high grade to preserve their league table position.

Reply 9

paddy

14

wiwarin_mir

And private schools will bar you from doing a subject if they don't think you can get a high grade to preserve their league table position.

Not true, they didn't stop me taking a subject they thought I would do badly in, in fact they encouraged me to do what I wanted.

Reply 10

wiwarin_mir

paddy

Not true, they didn't stop me taking a subject they thought I would do badly in, in fact they encouraged me to do what I wanted.

I was generalising in the same way that the thread starter was. There may be some state schools that do stifle the academic growth of people and teach them useless things, but that is generally down the the teachers. A good teacher will make a subject fun, which in turn will make a student more likely to remember what they have been taught.
As for saying that teaching people things they will not uselater in life, that may be true, but for the most part what you learn before A-levels will prepare you for when you specialise. At the end of year 9, no student is going to truely know what subjects they are going to take at A level, so giving them a choice to do fewer GSCEs in an effort to make sure they do not learn anything irrelivent for their future career is unwise.

Getting students to do so many GCSEs mean they have a wider choice of A levels they want to do and therefore a wider choice of a career.

Reply 11

fundamentally

15

wiwarin_mir

And private schools will bar you from doing a subject if they don't think you can get a high grade to preserve their league table position.

That is not necessarily a bad thing, because that happens at university too.

eg: Oxford will send you down ( expel you ) if you do badly in the collections
( exams that do not count to the degree classification ) and so effectively prevent you from doing the real exams ( the public exams ) if they think that you are a wretch.

Reply 12

gemgems89

15

I think education nowadays is focused too much on the exams and syllabus to actually have a more positive impact on the students. For GCSEs in particular, the teachers strive to stay on topic and to not teach anything more than stated on the curriculum. I believe this leads to a very limited knowledge in that topic area and because teachers are too frightened to talk about something not on the syllabus (HEAVEN FORBID) the students are only spoonfed specified material and are unable to develop their knowledge further.

Reply 13

ChemistBoy

16

fundamentally

eg: Oxford will send you down ( expel you ) if you do badly in the collections
( exams that do not count to the degree classification ) and so effectively prevent you from doing the real exams ( the public exams ) if they think that you are a wretch.

That is a bit different to being unable to do a certain subject because you may not achieve as good a grade in it as another subject.

Modern education

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