# Bad ideas in education **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 19, 2011, 7:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893 "2011-02-19T07:48:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Dogzilla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e480ec/32.png) [@Dogzilla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dogzilla)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2011, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/61 "2011-02-23T15:44:09Z")
> [@Superhal](#): > > Long story short: there’s no “right” way, and we’re still in the process of figuring it out. Pedagogy, as a science, just started around 1960. > > However, to address the OP, there’s a fault in the underlying premise: education used to be better. In 1914, drafted soldiers were given literacy tests and 90%+ passed. In 1942, after the public school system was started by FDR, the number of literate drafted soldiers dropped to below 50%. This indicates the public school system we have today is seriously flawed. > > Is pre-1914 the way to go? No. Back then, we were still a rural economy with farmhouse schools where all the grades were put into the same room. Schooling largely ended at 6th grade. The reason literacy was so high back then was reading was the only source of entertainment when living on a rural farm, and as children did 8-10 hours of chores, they would dream of going back to their room and reading a book instead of doing backbreaking labor all day. > > Pre-Civil war, only rich white children or those living in the NE had a chance to get educated, and it wasn’t free. The public school system did not begin with FDR. America had a public school system for quite some time prior to that. [This first public school was located in Boston and was founded in 1635 – about 100 years prior to the United States actually becoming the United States. [url=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History\_of\_education\_in\_the\_United\_States”]Cite.](http://www.servintfree.net/~aidmn-ejournal/publications/2001-11/PublicEducationInTheUnitedStates.html%22Cite.%5B/url) [Here’s one more article](http://www.hyperhistory.net/apwh/essays/cot/t0w20education.htm) on the history of education in the United States. I can find no reference whatsoever to FDR starting the public schools. Therefore, seeing as how you appear to be making facts up, the rest of your post must be summarily dismissed unless you can provide citations demonstrating that public schools actually make people less literate. ---
**Author:** ![furt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/439d5e/32.png) [@furt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furt)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2011, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/62 "2011-02-23T16:11:21Z")
> [@even\_sven](#): > > I’ve taught high school and college on two continents. > > For all the talk of “OMG China,” I don’t know a single American teacher in China- and I know hundreds- who thinks the Chinese school system is better. > > Yes, it is better at producing high test scores. Years of drills combined with test-taking technique training can produce great test scores. > > But a lot of things we consider extremely important are not included at all. Even university level Chinese students have trouble organizing and coordinating even the kinds of simple group projects we learned in late elementary and middle school. The whole “Choose a group leader, a secretary, a timekeeper…get each other’s contact info and set a time to meet” thing comes naturally to us, but is actually the result of years of learning and practicing. China doesn’t do this. > > Original research and higher-level analytical writing are not taught at all. Critical thinking and creative problem solving are not taught at all. > > It’s not better. I’m not sure why people are so attached to thinking that it is. I’ll just chime in here and add that I taught in Korea and Taiwan, and agree with every word of this. I was asked by parents on several occasions how they could make their schools as good as American ones. I would much rather have my kids attend a typical American school than one in Asia; with the caveat that the word “typical” is important. ---
**Author:** ![Sitnam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2011, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/63 "2011-02-23T18:04:51Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > …So, in summary, I think that education should be grim and joyless, kind of like it’s depicted in old-timey sources such as Mark Twain. Sure, it wasn’t any fun for kids to solve endless multiplication problems on slates with chalk, but they actually learned the right things. I have an absolute passion for history and my alternate career choice would have been to become history teacher mostly because I was continually disgusted with the dry boredom teachers presented the subject. I LOVE this stuff and they were boring _me_, they made it harder to learn, the other students couldn’t have stood a chance. If a teacher can’t engage their students they are not doing their job…aren’t you a science teacher? ---
**Author:** ![CJJ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecc23a/32.png) [@CJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CJJ)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2011, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/64 "2011-02-23T20:17:50Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > This idea has lead some teachers and experts to try to pump fun into every lesson. This can have bad effects. For example, suppose we start with this math problem: “A pencil is four inches long. How many pencils would you need to line up to reach fifty feet?” By itself this problem is not fun, because a typical kid doesn’t care how many pencils it takes to reach fifty feet. A modern teacher might try to increase the fun by replacing pencils with candy bars, on the grounds that kids like candy bars more than pencils. “Pencils” vs. “candy bars” doesn’t make one whit of difference in this example. Once a student reaches an age where they don’t just blindly do what an authority figure tells them to do, they’re going to conclude what most any sane person would conclude about this problem: “Who the hell cares? Who in the world would line up 50 feet worth of identical pencils or candy bars?” The traditional-education answer to those questions is a variation of “Trust us–it’s good for you.” For math, that answer has produced generations of students who rightly wonder what was so damn important about solving quadratic equations, or knowing that the interior angles of a triangle add up to 180 degrees. Let me be clear: I’m not saying those things aren’t important, just that most students (who don’t naturally love math, and they don’t really need a teacher) aren’t persuaded even once in their academic career; they simply do it to pass the class, move the hell on, and promptly forget everything about the hoops they were once forced to jump thru to appease some math geek. > [@](#): > > The same problem occurs in many situations and on a larger scale. For example, consider the recent trend to assign PowerPoint presentations rather than old-fashioned reports. A kid working on a written report about the Battle of Gettysburg will put most of his mental effort into things related to the Battle of Gettysburg, and thus he will (ideally) remember that. But a kid who does a PowerPoint presentation on the Battle of Gettysburg will put mental effort mostly into the details of the presentation: searching for pictures, choosing fonts, adding builds and transitions, and so forth. He’ll remember the PowerPoint but not the Battle of Gettysburg. The presentation is more fun but the report produces more education. **Tripolar** has the correct response to this, but it brings me to a larger point. The real important lesson here is for a student to produce a presentation on a complex topic; knowing the details of the battle of Gettysburg are far less important. I’d apply this same lesson to subjects like Algebra and Geometry. The primary educational benefit of these subjects is that they present a complex yet logical system for the student to explore, one which–as students move toward mastery–teaches them how to negotiate similarly complex systems in a wide variety of subjects. This isn’t to say that the subject matter itself doesn’t have some use, but for most folks–e.g ones who aren’t pursuing technology–this educational benefit is a distant second. I’d argue that it’s still second place even for those in a technical field like myself. I can certainly perform algebraic calculations and geometric proofs, and often pursue these as a fun leisure activity, but I’ve gotten far more benefit out of the careful, analytical approach to problems such study has honed than from knowing how to factor x^2 + 5x + 6. ---
**Author:** ![Isamu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/7c8e57/32.png) [@Isamu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isamu)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2011, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/65 "2011-02-24T01:41:29Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > our school system … used to be the envy of the world. Cite? ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2011, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/66 "2011-02-24T02:15:54Z")
> [@Superhal](#): > > One more point: don’t knock the scores because it matters how they’re calculated. > > Example 1: If you look at the top SAT scores, the states with the highest scores are the ones sending the least number of students. They understand that only a small percentage of students will succeed in college. On the other hand, every state who sends more than 50% of their eligible high school students to take the SAT has the lowest average scores. Schools don’t send students to take the SAT; it’s a test the student has to schedule for themself and pay for themself. The fact that you have this fact wrong is making me less than eager to accept any other information you present or give much credence to your opinions. I mean, you aren’t just mistaken here; you’re flat out wrong about everything concerning the SAT except for the fact that it’s a test. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2011, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/67 "2011-02-24T02:22:00Z")
> [@Dogzilla](#): > > The public school system did not begin with FDR. America had a public school system for quite some time prior to that. > > [This first public school was located in Boston and was founded in 1635 – about 100 years prior to the United States actually becoming the United States. [url=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History\_of\_education\_in\_the\_United\_States”]Cite.](http://www.servintfree.net/~aidmn-ejournal/publications/2001-11/PublicEducationInTheUnitedStates.html%22Cite.%5B/url) > > [Here’s one more article](http://www.hyperhistory.net/apwh/essays/cot/t0w20education.htm) on the history of education in the United States. I can find no reference whatsoever to FDR starting the public schools. **Therefore, seeing as how you appear to be making facts up, the rest of your post must be summarily dismissed unless you can provide citations** demonstrating that public schools actually make people less literate. (bolding mine) That’s funny, kinda. I was reading thru this thread a few hours ago on my phone, and I saw something in a post from **Superhal** that I wanted to comment on, but I was at work and using my phone, so I decided to wait until I got home to post. Well, I got home, opened the 1st page of the thread, found the post I wanted to comment on, and only after I posted my reply did I scroll up page 2 and see that you had the same issue with something **Superhal** wrote and reached the same conclusion I did. And, because we each had issue with a different bit from **Superhal** , now we have 2 things to call “bullshit” on. ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2011, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/68 "2011-02-24T03:37:52Z")
> [@CJJ](#): > > “Pencils” vs. “candy bars” doesn’t make one whit of difference in this example. Once a student reaches an age where they don’t just blindly do what an authority figure tells them to do, they’re going to conclude what most any sane person would conclude about this problem: “Who the hell cares? Who in the world would line up 50 feet worth of identical pencils or candy bars?” > > The traditional-education answer to those questions is a variation of “Trust us–it’s good for you.” For math, that answer has produced generations of students who rightly wonder what was so damn important about solving quadratic equations, or knowing that the interior angles of a triangle add up to 180 degrees. Let me be clear: I’m not saying those things aren’t important, just that most students (who don’t naturally love math, and they don’t really need a teacher) aren’t persuaded even once in their academic career; they simply do it to pass the class, move the hell on, and promptly forget everything about the hoops they were once forced to jump thru to appease some math geek. > > **Tripolar** has the correct response to this, but it brings me to a larger point. The real important lesson here is for a student to produce a presentation on a complex topic; knowing the details of the battle of Gettysburg are far less important. I’d apply this same lesson to subjects like Algebra and Geometry. The primary educational benefit of these subjects is that they present a complex yet logical system for the student to explore, one which–as students move toward mastery–teaches them how to negotiate similarly complex systems in a wide variety of subjects. > > This isn’t to say that the subject matter itself doesn’t have some use, but for most folks–e.g ones who aren’t pursuing technology–this educational benefit is a distant second. I’d argue that it’s still second place even for those in a technical field like myself. I can certainly perform algebraic calculations and geometric proofs, and often pursue these as a fun leisure activity, but I’ve gotten far more benefit out of the careful, analytical approach to problems such study has honed than from knowing how to factor x^2 + 5x + 6. Heck, I had some classes in college where I wound up in a lecture wondering whatever I would use this for or even why I had picked that class (assuming it wasn’t a requirement with no options.) An Intro Psych class comes to mind, as does a required computer class in my first semester (the only useful thing I learned was how to fix a reference in Excel, which is quite useful to me now) and I’m not sure why I took a year of Biology. Then again, I also took a number of classes that really aren’t all that useful but I enjoyed–a number of religion classes for instance (a semester on eschatology and dispensationalism and a semester on theodicy have been surprisingly helpful in dealing with parts of American culture), or even music ensembles and lessons for credit (and some semesters I was already taking a max load and just showed up.) Then there were the classes that I generally enjoyed and are helpful, even if I don’t use them every day–German, basic accounting, things like that. And of course there were the major courses–as a Chemistry major for me it was tons of chemistry, a year of physics, and a year of calculus. I may not have done any physical chemistry since I passed the class but it’s handy knowing the basics and being able to quickly pick up anything that’s faded some if I do need it. The problem I see at the lower levels is that there is a fairly broad swath of time where the student doesn’t have much choice. Here are the standards, you must have classes in them, and if it doesn’t leave you any real free time for anything fun that’s too bad. In high school, for instance, I had four years of English, four years of math, four years of varying science (one biology, two chemistry, one physics), three years of German (had to take at least two years of a foreign language, three was suggested for college), a number of “gifted” classes that filled in for other things over those four years, and of course various other things like a semester of civics, a semester of health (complete waste of time), a couple different history courses, and I took four years of band. The one year of required PE I got rid of through six weeks in summer school as well as the required semester of economics (three weeks of summer school) that would have otherwise screwed up my scheduling. Now some of those were obviously my choice, but it would have been nice to be able to do something practical like shop as well. And for a number of those classes, between students that really didn’t want to be there and didn’t care if they made it harder for others, teachers that were useless (only a couple, thankfully), the various other official crap that goes in high school, not to mention the unofficial crap, it could be hard to see school as not a waste of time. I think part of the problem is the idea that everything can somehow be measured and if we can improve those metrics things must be getting better. When I was a kid, we had to take the ITBS tests in 3rd, 5th, and 8th grades; an English standardized test in 9th grade and the exact same test again in 12th grade (never did learn why); and the state’s required graduation test. I also took the PSAT (twice, once for practice and the second in an attempt to get scholarship money) and the SAT (once, and scored high enough that I didn’t bother again, nor did I take the ACT as all the colleges I was looking at accepted SAT scores.) Were the required tests helpful at the time? I have no idea. But I always scored really high on those required tests. True story: In that required English test, when I got the score back it put me at something they called a 17th grade level–in other words, first-year graduate-level skills. With that as a baseline, how in the world could taking the same test four years later tell you anything about me personally? (I realize that they are interested in the aggregate, but still.) Anyway, this reliance on metrics seems to be something that has infiltrated the business world and is making its way into academics, and it seems like it’s being pushed by politicians who think government can and should be run like a business. How many threads have we had about the latest consultant gimmick–Six Sigma and Lean Six Sigma, Total Quality Management, and hell, probably anything that’s shown up in Dilbert in the last 20 years. Ideas that are very good for the niche they were designed for and then used promiscuously in all sorts of businesses where it doesn’t really make sense. There’s been a lot of it in the pharmaceutical industry over the years, for instance. So, to bring this TLDR post to a close, I’d say it’s a number of things. Sometimes it’s poor parental involvement. Sometimes it’s that students are bored, or disruptive, or just aren’t interested. Sometimes it really is poor teachers or a poor system. And I think that some of it is this trend that seems to be metrics above all. And of course sometimes it’s a combination of multiple issues. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2011, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/69 "2011-02-24T13:07:40Z")
> [@Shawn1767](#): > > Because of high-stakes testing in our state, the principals are so worried about test scores that in my district they’ve eliminated P.E., recess and anything NOT related to math or language arts. They have students coming in on Saturdays for three hours every weekend. The teachers are so pressured to improve math and language arts skills that Science and Social Studies AREN’T being taught in classes any more because of all the emphasis on Math and L.A. And yet scores continue to be poor! But of course! I didn’t learn Math in Math class (well, rarely): I learn any subject a lot more easily when it’s applied and most of my Math teachers had gotten stuck with teaching that (either they hadn’t really meant to become teachers or they had no particular interest in Math), so I learned Math in Science classes. I had better teachers for Spanish than Math, but the work we did in Spanish was reinforced in History, Geography, Languages other than Spanish… It’s like… they want to make sure the kids get enough vitamins, so they stuff them full of vitamin pills while taking away the food. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/70 "2011-02-25T02:47:32Z")
Seems to me that if the schools back then were so great, I wouldn’t have to help my in-laws order things off the Internet, and old people could program their TiVos. Contrariwise, the druids decried the advent of the Romans, because the introduction of a commonly-used written language ruined the ability of students to memorize long sagas, and what kind of slack educational system doesn’t emphasize hours-long recitations? Don’t even get me started on the appalling handwriting that followed behind the introduction of the printing press. Thanks a lot, Gutenberg! Yes, yes: the advent of computers has meant that certain skills have been lost. They’ve been superceded, because knowing how to use modern technology is far more important than knowing, for example, how to divide three-digit numbers by two-digit numbers on paper. Rather than reducing computers in the classroom, I think we need to step up the requirements for teacher technological savvy. I’ll be teaching a class to elementary school teachers next week on how to use Excel, not because I have any great training on it, but because my unique experience entering education after spending the better part of a decade in nonprofit administrative work means that I know how to find my way around a spreadsheet. I’ll literally be teaching these teachers the difference between a column and a row on the spreadsheet, how to name a particular cell, and how to reference cells. These are absolutely useful skills for kids: when I’m teaching patterns, for example, I build a spreadsheet for my second-graders to fill out, with the hope that by fourth grade they can build their own simple spreadsheet to search for patterns themselves. They’re excellent tools for analyzing data students gather during science experiments. If students perform fundraisers, shouldn’t they be involved in seeing how expenditures or donations break down? And if my kids become wizzes at Excel, I really couldn’t care less if they can’t remember where to put the decimal point when multiplying two decimal numbers together. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/71 "2011-02-25T03:23:06Z")
> [@LHoD](#): > > And if my kids become wizzes at Excel, I really couldn’t care less if they can’t remember where to put the decimal point when multiplying two decimal numbers together. As a mere notational convention, I agree that learning the rule for placement of the decimal point in the product of two numbers isn’t very substantial in terms of “education”. As a consequence of an important mathematical principle about how multiplication works and an indicator of basic numeracy, though, I think it **is** pretty important. If your kids can’t tell whether multiplying, say, 10.2 by 5.6 produces 57.12 or 571.2, then they’ve got an educational deficiency that all the Excel wizzery in the world can’t compensate for. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/72 "2011-02-25T03:28:33Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > As a mere notational convention, I agree that learning the rule for placement of the decimal point in the product of two numbers isn’t very substantial in terms of “education”. > > As a consequence of an important mathematical principle about how multiplication works and an indicator of basic numeracy, though, I think it **is** pretty important. > > If your kids can’t tell whether multiplying, say, 10.2 by 5.6 produces 57.12 or 571.2, then they’ve got an educational deficiency that all the Excel wizzery in the world can’t compensate for. Fair enough–I almost didn’t put that in as an example, but I was feeling too lazy to think of a better one :). I will say that I’d much prefer kids be able to figure it out than be able to recall it on command: the former demonstrates an understanding of the underlying mathematical principles, whereas the latter is a pretty useless skill in a world in which a calculator will be at hand almost any time you need to perform this relatively rare calculation. (To be fair, I’d have real trouble articulating the reasons for the decimal point’s placement off the top of my head, and my **job** is explaining how math works). And you’re certainly correct that in your example they need to have estimation skills that help them avoid an egregious error. What about a different example, however, say, 348.19 \* 348.19? It takes me awhile to figure out what the range for the correct answer would be: if a kid thinks 12123.62761 looks right, that doesn’t point to a terrible deficit, I think. ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/73 "2011-02-25T03:41:30Z")
> [@Snowboarder\_Bo](#): > > Schools don’t send students to take the SAT; it’s a test the student has to schedule for themself and pay for themself. > > The fact that you have this fact wrong is making me less than eager to accept any other information you present or give much credence to your opinions. I mean, you aren’t just mistaken here; you’re flat out wrong about everything concerning the SAT except for the fact that it’s a test. Schools don’t physically “send” the kids to take SATs, but they certainly can encourage or discourage it. Our high school honors classes had a very SAT-centric curriculum. We did endless SAT drills, studied SAT vocabulary, took practice SAT tests, etc. Our teacher kept day-by-day countdowns on the blackboard and made sure we had all the information we needed on deadlines, etc. The non-honors classes did none of this, and there were a number of student who didn’t understand what the SAT was, why it was important, or how to register it for it. Kids aren’t born knowing this stuff, you know, and not every family is familiar with the college application process. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/74 "2011-02-25T04:03:58Z")
> [@MsRobyn](#): > > It’s actually not that difficult to teach essay writing by rote. Most of the state-mandated writing tests use the traditional five-paragraph format, which involves a thesis paragraph, three supporting points with evidence, and a conclusion. Scorers look for specific elements in the essay, so the essay can still be complete garbage, but as long as the scorers find those elements, the essay will still pass. I’ve read essays from students who were in the advanced English class that sucked pretty badly, but which were well-constructed because the students were taught to make the scorers happy, not to write a good essay. The rote part comes in when that’s all a kid needs to do, so teachers can assign these and drill them. Now, teaching how to write a good essay that is enjoyable and worth reading is a different matter entirely. That does take effort and skill. I think I’m willing to argue that, if we’re going to be teaching everyone in the country how to write an essay, we’d better instill the some “rote” format like the one you mentioned as the standard. For to teach anything of better quality will require that the teacher _knows_ how to produce something of better quality–and there just aren’t that many people who both can write and teach. Hopefully the good writer teachers will somehow be empowered to find the good writer students and they can find ways to write their better essays. (In my case–not that I’m a great writer but I was certainly past the five paragraph concept you mentioned–I was simply lucky enough to have teachers who understood that someone who breaks writing rules _because he understands them_ hasn’t made a mistake.) ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/75 "2011-02-25T04:52:12Z")
> [@LHoD](#): > > I will say that I’d much prefer kids be able to figure it out than be able to recall it on command: the former demonstrates an understanding of the underlying mathematical principles, whereas the latter is a pretty useless skill in a world in which a calculator will be at hand almost any time you need to perform this relatively rare calculation. I’d agree that understanding the principle has a deeper significance than merely knowing the rule, but I don’t agree that knowing the rule has become useless: see below. > [@LHoD](#): > > (To be fair, I’d have real trouble articulating the reasons for the decimal point’s placement off the top of my head, and my job is explaining how math works). My handwaving explanation is that every digit to the right of the decimal point stands for taking a tenth or a hundredth or a thousandth and so on of what it would be as an integer. When you multiply a number N by .001, for example, you’re taking a thousandth of N and consequently have to write it as .00N. So every decimal place in either one of the factors has to correspond to one decimal place in the product. > [@LHoD](#): > > And you’re certainly correct that in your example they need to have estimation skills that help them avoid an egregious error. What about a different example, however, say, 348.19 \* 348.19? It takes me awhile to figure out what the range for the correct answer would be: if a kid thinks 12123.62761 looks right, that doesn’t point to a terrible deficit, I think. No, but this is exactly where learning the rule is helpful: as a substitute for intuitive estimation skills when the numbers get too big for intuitive estimation to work reliably. We may not expect kids to intuitively see that 348.19 \* 348.19 is 121236.2761 instead of 12123.62761, but if they know the simple rule about how many decimal places to count over, they know for sure which answer is the right one. Nowadays, although learning these calculation rules is indeed pretty much obsolete as a means of getting the answer, I think it’s still pretty helpful as a means of checking the data entry on the electronic device that gets the answer for you. Electronic computation devices are terrific and indispensable for doing math in the real world, but the rule “garbage in, garbage out” still applies, and knowing how to spot garbage will never be obsolete. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 8:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/76 "2011-02-25T08:48:28Z")
> [@even\_sven](#): > > Schools don’t physically “send” the kids to take SATs, but they certainly can encourage or discourage it. Our high school honors classes had a very SAT-centric curriculum. We did endless SAT drills, studied SAT vocabulary, took practice SAT tests, etc. Our teacher kept day-by-day countdowns on the blackboard and made sure we had all the information we needed on deadlines, etc. The non-honors classes did none of this, and there were a number of student who didn’t understand what the SAT was, why it was important, or how to register it for it. Kids aren’t born knowing this stuff, you know, and not every family is familiar with the college application process. wow really no kidding i had no idea :rolleyes: Srsly, what I was calling out was not only how completely wrong it is that schools send kids to take the test, but also that they do it in some kind of strategic way to skew the results per capita or something. **Superhal** ’s whole freaking idea of what the test is and how it’s taken and why is just completely absent of any resemblance to reality. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 11:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/77 "2011-02-25T11:47:20Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > No, but this is exactly where learning the rule is helpful: as a substitute for intuitive estimation skills when the numbers get too big for intuitive estimation to work reliably. > > We may not expect kids to intuitively see that 348.19 \* 348.19 is 121236.2761 instead of 12123.62761, but if they know the simple rule about how many decimal places to count over, they know for sure which answer is the right one. > > Nowadays, although learning these calculation rules is indeed pretty much obsolete as a means of getting the answer, I think it’s still pretty helpful as a means of checking the data entry on the electronic device that gets the answer for you. Electronic computation devices are terrific and indispensable for doing math in the real world, but the rule “garbage in, garbage out” still applies, and knowing how to spot garbage will never be obsolete. That’s an excellent point. I guess I’d say that emphasizing the rule solely as a means to cross-check an electronic calculation sounds like a good idea, therefore. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tao_s_Revenge)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/78 "2011-02-25T14:23:03Z")
I’ll give my experience with education. The most important thing I learned in school was reading. The most important skill I neglected in school was writing. Reading was this magic thing that fed an insatiable curiosity. Writing was this gigantic choir that made my hand cramp up sometimes. Reading just magically improved it’s self. I’d read and I’d pick up new words without even trying. Whereas writing was full of arcane rules, and seemingly esoteric spellings that had to be memorized by brute force, written, repetition. Further they even treated writing as punishment. Get in trouble and spend your lunch writing your name repeatedly as you would some spelling homework. And so it went. I was very headstrong and stubborn child. If I thought the subject was interesting such as science, math, social studies, or reading I sailed through with great grades. It was a treat. If I hated it I wouldn’t bother and get a terrible grade. For spelling repetition homework I ended up settling on assembly line system. I’d write all the first letters in each copy of the word, then the second and so on. It made my hand sore and I hated it. The only spelling class I liked was by this fellow named Mr. Gerber. We did spelling repetition variably. It didn’t hurt my hand, it was like a chant and more fun. To this day when I spell the world “people” I hear “P E O P L E” in my head. Sadly most spelling classes weren’t like that. I didn’t finish high school, but when I took the GED, with no prep, I scored a perfect score in Social Studies which is 800, 780 in science. This put me in the 99th percentile for both. Math was 85th percentile. Whereas for writing I ended up with a 21th percentile grade. I wonder where that puts me on the statistics? I’m a drop out with mediocre grades who evidently learned a lot. In my adult life my spelling has improved greatly because of computers. Typing doesn’t make my hand cramp up, but Word, Firefox, and Google let me know when I don’t spell something right (assuming it’s not a homophone) I get this nice squiggly redline, or “did you mean…”. Fix the word and make a note of it. Spell check has turned spelling improvement from a troublesome choir to a subset task of a more engaging activity. So from my own experience I don’t think naming things “candy bars” would help. What helped was not using tedious tasks, but engaging tasks. The phrase “candy bars” doesn’t help, unless there’s actually candy bars present, and relevant to accomplishing some task. Further one thing I’ve learned in college is that people have different styles of learning. Some are auditory, some are visual, some and are kinesthetic, but most are a mix that strongly favors one or the other. Because of that, there are no universal solutions such as jazzing up lessons with the phrase “candy bar”. To make it click material needs to be presented in alternate ways. ---
**Author:** ![MsRobyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/90ced4/32.png) [@MsRobyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsRobyn)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/79 "2011-02-25T16:58:24Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > I think I’m willing to argue that, if we’re going to be teaching everyone in the country how to write an essay, we’d better instill the some “rote” format like the one you mentioned as the standard. For to teach anything of better quality will require that the teacher _knows_ how to produce something of better quality–and there just aren’t that many people who both can write and teach. > > Hopefully the good writer teachers will somehow be empowered to find the good writer students and they can find ways to write their better essays. (In my case–not that I’m a great writer but I was certainly past the five paragraph concept you mentioned–I was simply lucky enough to have teachers who understood that someone who breaks writing rules _because he understands them_ hasn’t made a mistake.) I agree with you that the standard five-paragraph essay is a good thing, because you can still use that framework to write term and other papers. It’s just a way to organize one’s thoughts on paper. My beef is with the fact that the structure matters more than the content, as far as the scorers are concerned. A good analogy would be that scorers are only looking for oak trees when the forest also has maples, birch and elms. You need the oaks, but the other trees add to the beauty. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2011, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893/80 "2011-02-25T17:05:38Z")
Structure DOES matter more than content during the learning process. You have to teach the skill sets first. You don’t let a music student play free form jazz before they learn basic theory. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-ideas-in-education/571893.md?page=5)