Students don't grasp U.S. History

reply to post by Totalstranger

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Maybe your father thought you meant the last ELECTED president when you were born. LOL!

Education ultimately is the responsibility of each person. What passes as education is usually what confirms the consensus reality of society. Most people are so caught up in the 'consensus' they don't seek for anything beyond it and when they do they are discouraged from pursuing it. Transcending one's own societies views is difficult and daring. Understanding history requires that one look at a views of all cultures and be able to see the connections and validity of them. The citizen card does little to promote critical thinking. Typically college has served the purpose of opening horizons that would otherwise be unexplored. But didn't Socrates once say

"If I am the wisest man on earth it is because I alone know that I know nothing"

The pursuit of knowledge for the sake of knowledge is not for everyone.

trust me bro, it was about who was in office. not conceived,elected or otherwise. we had this fight circa 86 when I was a kid. and when I won we had a dominoes pizza for dinner. that was the bet. and it took 2 hrs to get there. avoid the noid my arse.

I'd bet any lurkers here can't say who the only bachelor pres. was, or which pres. was married to jefferson davis' daughter.

I'm sorry but that stuff interests me. shoot, Johhny Cash is cool right? and he sang a song about garfield

so then would you agree that college or university is nothing but paying money to an institution for a licesne to work for more money than the working class?

Total Stranger,

I think that does sum it up. The pursuit of that 'paper' is culturally acceptable and encourages being a cog in the machine.

I am stiil in high school and i agree that there are many problems with our education in this country. this pasted semesters i only showed up for one day for finals and its usually 3 days with 80 min periods (3) to work on each day. i only went for 1 period and finished my only finals (4). in my past three years i have never used a caulculator but i never really needed it. teachers never understood the concept "i did it in my head" i could easily do things in my mind or on a piece of paper if it was something like dividing a long decimal by another. but this year in precalc i could still factor imaginaries when factoring easily but when it got to things like radians and degrees converstions i never got extra time but other students "just plugged it in thier calculators". for that final it was all scantron and straight answers. after 30 minutes and only ten questions i decided to put all "B's". i think the teacher only taught the class a was in to use a calculator. i failed the class mostly because i never did homework and was never there because the teacher would tell every one how to do it on their TI-89s and i would sit their and do nothing. i would ace the tests almost always. its the only class i have ever failed. i passed all my other ones.

My physics teacher didnt know how to teach but he made tests straight from the test books so if i wasnt there it didnt really matter. it was memorization and understanding how things worked. i remember recall one time in that class i was sleeping and i woke up not even for ten seconds and nobody could tell him the universal gravity eqaution. it was in the book and everyone looked at thier notes (notes in that class means to copy parts of your text book). i answered the question from the top of my head and went back to sleep.

what im getting to that it is the students responsibility to learn. teachers may teach the wrong things but students have to look for the right answers. parents can have positive influence but it is not their fault if the kid doesnt want to learn.

honestly i think that the whole system is messed up. you are learning something as some one interprets it. its like telephone. also you might not be getting all the facts especially when it comes to history. only kids that not necessarily have the skill but they do thier work as they are told (eg go to school everyday, turn in their homework, ect ect) are the ones that are succsessful- yeah sometimes they do deserve it.but there are some people that are clueless and they are in honor classes (meaning an B is an A, C is a B, etc). i have only been in one honors class (french IV) and thats how alot of people were. i helped alot of them on their math and other things that were confusing to them. they are like shells. every year in every class the teachers say that if you do all your work you will get at least a "B". every year its pretty much the same material.

last year the classes were all teaching us specificlly for ACT contents. after that the whole curriculum pretty much was dull. if we are taking a standarized at least the it should have been incorperated in the lessons.

well i have to get to school now. its time to memorize. i wish i could keep rambeling but i really only have 2 classes this semester and im going to one now. i was supposed to go at 8. not like ill learn much anyways.