Dumbing down the population?!! See if you can pass this 8th grade test from 1895

Originally posted by killerkitten
I have a 6 and an 8 yr old. I homeschooled 2011-2012 and did a poor job of it, or so I thought, but my 3rd grader jumped into 3rd grade at a public school head first and has been scoring very high (which is all schools care about now, is test scores). BUT, she has lost her natural curiosity and a lot of her zest for life.....
Now her school wants her to do her homework online so that "the students can be better prepared to take state tests which are now given online." So all they care about is test scores. Sad. Very sad.

I noticed that my loving, caring, helpful, respectful, wonderful children (now 8 & 10 yrs old) turned into something completely different when I placed them into public school. My daughter came home every day in a bad mood, tired and frustrated and still had @2 hours of work sent home EACH day!! By the time we did homework and dinner and showers... we had no family time. She wasn't even interested in family time because she was too tired and worn out from school. Yes they make friends and have social interaction but what is the *quality* of that social interaction? Pulling them out turned out to be the best thing I ever did.

They can learn the same amount in 3-4 hours of homeschool that took them all day to learn in public school. A couple of experiences I had that helped my decision were...

Went into school for the quarterly parent / teacher conference... floors were flooded in the halls and into some of the classrooms.Apparently a 3rd grader across the hall decided that he wanted to flush the bathroom toilet over and over again and the parents didn't care enough to come try to stop him. So while the officials waited for a court order to lay hands on the kid to pull him away he continued to flush.

6th graders at the middle school down the street pregnant. Saw them walking to school almost every day. It is NORMAL now and acceptable for babies to be having sex.

I definitely want my kids learning it is ok to act like that from other kids in their classrooms...

Another occasion, the next school year, I went in to my son's class for an early morning conference. Instead of leaving and coming back an hour later, I just hung out in the room and quietly watched. The first 30 minutes the students stood in a line while the teacher looked over their folders one by one. This whole time none of them learned anything. Then they were paraded down the halls to another classroom where they had computer class. I got permission to spend the day with my son and found that EVERY day they spend more time traveling between classrooms and being "settled" by the teachers than they did learning.

Then when they did "learn" it was an over-burdening "gotta pass the test, gotta pass the test" until the kids were so stressed about it that they could not be kids!

It may be a pain some days to teach my son when he is on one of his hyper days but the reality is that I love every second of it and feel incredibly blessed that have every moment with them and KNOW what they are being taught and how they are being treated.

To all of you on ATS, if you have children, I encourage you to spend the day with your child. Drop in once in a while and see what goes on in the classroom without warning. It will be well worth it. If only to show your babies you care enough to be involved. You might find out that you are not happy with the school system and can give them a better upbringing than the school (state run daycare) can give them!

reply to post by apokalupsis33vital


"Christians" in Rome didn't like books "Christians" in Spain and Switzerland among other places were writing. You make it out to be that some well-numbered organization of atheists and skeptics have been quietly working to increase the world's scientific, mathematical, and artistic knowledge for the last 2000 years, and that only when Christianity became the dominant religion in the West were the atheists somehow foiled in their efforts. That's not history, that's the atheistic outlook on history.

Christianity is a religion that was followed by great scientists like Newton, Bacon, and Kepler, thinkers like Arminius, who showed us how God acts in relation to our world, and was praised by skeptics such as John Stuart Mill, Thomas Jefferson and others who praised it as the greatest moral system the world had ever known, greater than that of the Greek philosophers.

Christianity is a great religion, but you wouldn't know that from meeting some of its "adherents". I agree with you in some ways, but we must call them for what they are, they are people who only used religion at the time to further political ambitions. That is no reason to slander every believer or the religion itself.

Here are some reasons as to why I think the school system is as bad as it is today:

1. Most schools today are prison-like, you sit in a classroom for 8 hours in a day, being able to go outside is extremely limited, and whenever you ask to leave the classroom for any reason you get hassled. My high school was creepily lit, whenever it rained certain areas of the building would leak, and teachers would have to go and put a bucket underneath the source. Our heaters and air conditioning barely worked.

2. Anytime you learn something or have your own opinion on the subject, teachers don't bother trying to debate with you.

3. School's are basically just a training area for people to become loyal workers.

4. Most teachers today are under qualified. most of them don't even know extensive information on the subject their teaching. Anytime I would ask a good question, they would try and come up with an educated guess, rather than fact.

5. Most schools are practically a little mini police state. At the high school I was at, I had a police officer each morning standing in from of the main entrance. Camera's were setup in the hallways, and even my school bus had a camera in it. Some schools even go as far as setting up metal detectors. Which to me can help get people used to a police state that may arise, because they've gotten used to it, and don't really see how that is wrong.

6. Some teachers today actually make it simple for kids to pass. I remember when I was taking a world history final my sophmore year, We needed to fill out a study guide, and we ended up being able to use the study guide on our own final. Needless to say, I easily scored about 98% on that test. It seems like the school system is lowering the bar that way more kids can pass, and when kids pass, the school gets more funding, making it even more incentive for teachers or other faculty to make it easier to pass.

7. The food in public schools is terrible, I never ate a single school lunch throughout my time in high school. I either didn't eat at all, or I would buy french fries that were separate from the main meal of the day.

8. Kids today always complain how stupid, or boring school is. And I do agree to some extent. I'm sure any of you that was in school at one time would say that school is very boring. And when you think learning is something boring to do, people typically stay away from trying to learn new things, because in their mind they've associated boredom with learning. If education was more appealing more people would go and learn new things.

9. Some people in a schools faculty may feel they've gained a certain amount of authority, since they can tell other people what they can do, some teachers end up abusing this.

10. Some schools express a harsh dress codes, and may strip some kids of their individuality.

11. Schools don't really work out so well. And what I mean by that is, most things people end up learning in school they forget later on in their life. Unless the job they choose is linked to something they learned previously in school. If you walked up a someone who graduated from high school, and gave them a exact same test they took 5-10 years ago, and told them to do it. I guarantee a vast majority of people would score quite low on it.

Well, these are some things I thought of off the top of my head, there's plenty of other reasons as to why our school system is so flawed.

Originally posted by Lingweenie

1. "Most schools today are prison-like, you sit in a classroom for 8 hours in a day, being able to go outside is extremely limited..."
2. "Anytime you learn something or have your own opinion on the subject, teachers don't bother trying to debate with you...."
3. "School's are basically just a training area for people to become loyal workers...."
4. "Most teachers today are under qualified..."
5. "Most schools are practically a little mini police state..."
6. "Some teachers today actually make it simple for kids to pass...."
7. "The food in public schools is terrible, I never ate a single school lunch throughout my time in high school..."
8. "Kids today always complain how stupid, or boring school is...."
9. "Some people in a schools faculty may feel they've gained a certain amount of authority, since they can tell other people what they can do, some teachers end up abusing this.
10. Some schools express a harsh dress codes, and may strip some kids of their individuality."
11. "Schools don't really work out so well."

1. Agreed!!! I saw that in my kid's schools before I pulled them out. My daughter would have to sit during recess (IF they got one that is...) and do MORE homework for the miserably short time they got outside.

2. I remember in high school that I could do the math in my head. I was actually smart back then. (Go figure!) But I did the math differently than the teacher wanted. Though I got it all correct within seconds, I was berated and made to feel horrible because of it...

3. Yup. Come here little sheep!!! Follow the line, don't speak, don't question, and work, work, work!!

4. Though there are some really great ones that try, they often don't last long because they actually care and that isn't allowed. Besides, one year with one teacher that cares is hardly enough to get you through the entire system.

5. Agreed.

6. This doesn't *really* apply because it was college but a course I was in we could make a study guide any way we wanted as long as it fit on one page. Technically the never ending roll of printer paper with 4pt font was one page. ~.^ However, having worked as a TA in my community college I found that most students actually do worse because they rely heavily on the study guide for the answer and spend too much time looking for the answer when they actually already know what it is.

7. Ditto. LOL! Chili-cheese fries were a staple for me for 2 years.

8. Why should we try harder when it doesn't hold our interest and as kids we cannot see the true benefit of an education?

9. & 10. My high school principal was going to police academy so that he could write students CITATIONS for having their shirts un-tucked. Is it any wonder why I opted to get my GED and get the heck out of there 2 years early?!

11. As silly as this may sound, I almost feel like an apprenticeship should be offered to students starting in upper jr. high / high school to help them decide what they want to do for a career and give them the opportunity to really learn life skills that carry into their adult life. I know I would have benefited as I would have been able to try different fields and would not have 60k+ in student loans for a degree in a field I really have no interest in working.

Originally posted by VforVendettea
reply to post by Chrisfishenstein

 

School is meant to...
Break up the family,
Get children used to the idea of them having to work without pay (Go into a mall and try to buy something with that A you worked so hard to get),
To teach the used to authority figures,
To accept what they are told is the truth
Keep them from leaning to critically think and figure out situations.
In short to teach them to think like the slaves they are.

Schools are for animals, Academies are for humans.
Guess where they send the children of the masses.


Read the book 'The underground history of American education' (I think you can find it free to read online)

Dont forget, to get them used to being medicated on Ritalin because " they have ADHD".