I have been trying to figure out wether schools are less demanding now than when I was young. The thought occurred to me because of a project Daughter is working on.
Daughter's class is doing a module on space. The children have a project to prepare that they will present to the class in small groups. Daughter's team is going to talk about artificial satellites. She has been doing her research and pooling her findings with her teammates and they are starting to put their presentation together. What bothers me is this: they have decided to dress up as Darth Vader and some storm troopers. O-kay... Are they going to talk about the battle station that was orbiting a planet, the one that Han and the gang mistook for a moon in one of the movies? Are they going to mention that the battle station was an artificial satellite of the planet? No... but they do need light sabers and fake blood. (If you're thinking, HUNH?!?!?! - I'm with you!)
This doesn't make any sense. If this is to be a serious scientific presentation, why is my daughter concerned about getting her hands on some fake blood so that one of the storm troopers can kill her with a light saber and it can be realistic? Does the teacher know about this? Is she encouraging it? The mind boggles.
I think that the problem is that today's kids are encouraged to do too many things in the interest of building up their self-esteem, but it would be better if sometimes we just outright told them that an idea is... not educationally sound. (I tried to put that as nicely as I could.) This presentation is supposed to be scientific. It is for school. Simulating acts of violence while dressed as Darth Vader and storm troopers would never have been acceptable in my day. In fact, it wouldn't be acceptable now if I were the teacher. Learning about space is cool enough. You shouldn't have to dress it up.
Another example that had me thinking about the mediocrity of today's education was when daughter's class, along with the two other classes in her year, held an international food-tasting event during nutrition month. They were to work in groups of two or three to prepare an international dish for the event. They also had to prepare a poster, handouts and a presentation on the food. Of the twenty-some groups presenting a dish, about five of them had prepared smoothies and presented them as an American dish. FIVE! I guess there was no rule saying you couldn't prepare the same dish as another team, but there are three classes, so some of these kids were preparing the same dish - and I use the term "dish" loosely - as other teams in their own class. Why wouldn't a teacher pick up on that?
Maybe I am just being a culinary snob, but the fact that the farthest some people were willing to go for international cuisine was the US really bothered me. I think that this was a lazy way out, especially when compared to the dishes some of the other teams prepared. There were hot and cold dishes, main courses and desserts, and there were some that even in this day and age of globalization, I had never heard of before. These dishes actually taught me something.
Getting back to the quality of education... Education is supposed to prepare children to be responsible, useful citizens in tomorrow's world. As many people are fond of saying about a new-born baby, "This child could grow up to be Prime Minister." So, how are our schools preparing our children to face the future? I gotta tell you, I don't know. When I went to this international food event, held in the school gymnasium, I was disappointed in the presentations that the children made. Basically, all they did was stand there with a piece of paper in their hands and read off the recipe for their dish, despite the fact that their handout WAS the recipe. Back when I was young, we would have had to say why we chose the dish, what we liked about it, what country it came from, what we learned from this project... just to name a few ideas. These kids printed out the recipes and read them to us. They didn't even bother to convert to the first person so they could say, "I took these ingredients..." No! They just read the ingredients off in point-form, then talked in the infinitive. "Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Wash and peel the potatoes. Cut them into cubes."
I feel really mean griping about this, but it really isn't the kids that I am complaining about here. The way I see it, the kids are the victims. They are not being taught important skills such as thinking and communication. I know they practiced their presentations before the big day. Did it never occur to the teachers to ask them to do a little more work? To at least memorize what they were going to say?
Recently, there was another module presentation at Daughter's school gymnasium: the Middle Ages. That day, when going from one table to the other, I was actually glad that the posters the children had prepared mostly had their presentations printed on them word for word. This is because you couldn't understand a word of what anyone was saying. I think there were about three children in the whole fifth-grade year who were able to talk loud enough to be heard from across the table that they were standing behind. Everywhere around the gym, parents were leaning in and furrowing their brows in concentration, trying to understand what was being said. Then, everyone politely nodded and told the kids what a good job they had done! I admit, (and maybe they thought I was being rude, but) I interrupted and asked the kids to speak up. I couldn't hear a thing!
Again, I am not saying that it is the children's fault. The teachers were walking around looking so proud and commenting about how the kids were doing it "comme des grands". (Like big kids.) They are big kids! But they aren't being challenged! Why can the teachers not teach them to do better than what they can do on their own? PUSH them a little, for goodness' sake! Not to mention the fact that this is supposed to be a really good school. Daughter had to pass an entrance exam just to get in. But I really don't see it challenging her at all. Overcrowded classrooms and minuscule budgets are not a problem for these teachers. I'm starting to wonder if the extra money to pay for this program isn't just going out the window. Is she really benefitting from this education any more then if she were in a regular school? Sometimes I wonder.
What really annoys me is when I have to be the bad guy and push the kids to do better when they have finished their homework and think they did it well enough. When First Son finishes his math problems, he is outraged that I would think to look it over. He says there is no need to correct it because the teacher will correct it. Well, that's not good enough for me, especially when I see that he has made mistakes in the word problems. But his attitude completely baffles me. He is perfectly happy to hand in things that are full of mistakes. What has happened to the work ethic? In my opinion, the teachers should be stricter about the quality of homework that gets turned in, not to mention that the work should be neat, not covered in smudges and stains.
I don't mean any malice by this post. After all, I myself went to university to become a teacher. When I taught, I was demanding with the kids, but they knew that when the job was finally done right, the praise was well-deserved. I have no right to be condescending towards teachers because I admit, I couldn't teach today. I don't have the patience for it. But, the teachers in our schools chose to be there! They studied and couldn't wait to get their diplomas so they could bring their enthusiasm and motivation to the classroom. They have a responsibility to our kids. But, standing on the sidelines, I am having a lot of trouble cheering for a team that doesn't care about the game. If the teachers don't push the kids more, they don't care enough about their vocation. And kids don't care. They don't want to do better. They just want to do what little is expected of them and they expect high praises when they are done. They have come to see that this is enough. They can just do this, the parents and teachers will ooh! and aah! over their mediocrity, and the kids will never know that they could have been so much more. Go Canada!
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