Tag Archives: Education

Being DUMB about EDUCATION

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One of the most significant challenges facing our nation lies in its approach to education, spanning from elementary school through advanced academic pursuits.

Reading is the cornerstone of learning, and without strong literacy skills, personal growth becomes significantly challenging. Successful individuals often attribute their knowledge and achievements to extensive reading, with research suggesting that over 90% of their learning occurs through written materials. Developing robust reading comprehension is essential for anyone seeking to expand their understanding and advance in their personal and professional endeavors.

A failing primary education system reveals its deepest shortcoming when students graduate without mastering fundamental literacy skills. Similarly, higher education institutions are fundamentally flawed when their graduates struggle to secure meaningful employment or achieve professional sustainability.

Despite the allure of higher education, many prestigious institutions perpetuate a cycle of academic detachment from practical life skills. The real-world education gained through four years of hands-on work often surpasses the theoretical knowledge acquired within the sheltered confines of academic campuses, leaving graduates more intellectually burdened than professionally prepared.

In short, looking back over the years, I would have to give our public and college education system a grade of F in teaching the basics and an F- in advanced subjects. I would certainly have to give them a B on teaching students how to fail. I say this because some have succeeded despite the quality of education.

Despite substantial financial investments in education, particularly in urban and well-funded school districts, academic performance appears to be declining. Conversely, smaller rural school systems demonstrate more effective educational outcomes. Historical evidence suggests that educators in the past, such as those teaching in single-room schoolhouses, often achieved greater academic success with students, despite many teachers lacking formal higher education credentials. This observation raises important questions about the relationship between educational spending, teaching methodology, and student learning achievements.

Are we potentially misdirecting educators in their professional development and training approaches?

Simple Question, Complex Answer

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Memories eluded me at first, a blank canvas of experience. Yet, as I delved deeper into the recesses of my mind, a handful of extraordinary moments emerged, standing against the backdrop of my past.

Nonetheless, they all had one big failure. While I was never diagnosed as dyslexic, I definitely have many of the symptoms. By the fifth grade, certainly by the sixth grade, I should have been tested. I went all the way through high school, and apparently not one teacher suspected anything.

Before I go further, I should probably say that the influence does go both ways. My seventh-grade world history teacher did so much to discourage me that I virtually threw my hands up in frustration and gave up. It did have a bleed-over effect into other subjects, but, well, I did get my high school diploma. This post would have to be too long to explain it all. However, he essentially made it impossible for me to succeed. Try or not, I failed. So, why try?

During my eighth-grade year, my US history teacher stood out as an exceptional educator who possessed a remarkable ability to engage students and inspire learning. Her teaching style was so compelling that I developed a solid understanding of US history, with a particular depth of knowledge about the Constitution. Despite her instructional prowess, she, like the others, did not recognize the underlying signs of my lifelong struggle with dyslexia.

Dyslexia often manifests through slow reading speeds. Despite my best efforts, I can only manage around 150 words per minute, which is significantly below average. Auditory learning is my strength; I can effortlessly retain information from hour-long lectures with remarkable clarity. In contrast, reading the same material proves challenging, with comprehension and retention markedly reduced. This learning difference created significant obstacles, particularly in my seventh-grade history class, where the teacher predominantly relied on reading assignments rather than engaging lectures.

Actually, I deviated from my original destination. The meandering nature of my journey speaks volumes about my perspective on the experience.

Daily writing prompt
Who was your most influential teacher? Why?
View all responses

Please Give Your Children a Big Head Start

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Many moons ago, they came up with a program called “Head Start.” I don’t have a clue if it did any good or how much. However, the idea was to help underprivileged children get a leg up on education. As far as I can figure, they don’t seem to be doing better; maybe worse.

However, I can tell you how to give your children a real head start that you will be able to see very quickly. Many say that three is too young to teach a child how to read and write. The best way to give your child a leg up in school is to prove the experts wrong. By not teaching to read early, you give up the years that a child is best able to learn.

Besides, if you teach them, it will give the both of you an excellent chance to do some serious bonding. Reading a book together will be far better than watching TV together. Consider switching every paragraph. The parent reads one, the child reads one. In the end, your child will be grateful of the time you spend with him or her. Also, they will be thankful for the skill that they will carry with them all through their life… not just for learning, but also for enjoyment. This is especially true given the quality of entertainment on TV and in the movies these days.

I am sure there are those among you that say you would rather a professional do the teaching; someone who knows how. Well, apparently they don’t know how. Have you seen the recent statistics. Most kids by the end of the third grade can’t read at second grade levels. Besides, these are minimum. I suggest that your child should be reading at least third grade level by the end of the second grade.

And so it is that it starts with memory. It is that way with most stuff. Beyond that, it’s practice. practice. It is how we learn to speak, though we don’t realize it. If we do learn the words to speak and never practice, none of us would be good at speaking either. So we speak every day, getting better with practice. Hopefully, our parents correct us from time to time when we use the wrong word in the wrong place.

I would say I could write a book about it, but it would be little more than a pamphlet. It does not take a lot to teach a child to read. It mostly takes time patience with a lot of love tossed in for good measure.

To start with, there are two methods of teaching a child how to read. Some say that phonics is the best. Others will say, no. It slows their reading down. As in many cases, they are both right. However, both methods do require a little memory and drills at the front end.

Regardless of the method, the child must learn the alphabet and the name of every letter. Per se it is not important to know but rather it is an important tool for the teacher. It is also important to understand the concepts of vowels. To be sure, it is important to know them, but more, they should learn that vowels and only the vowels are pronounced with the mouth open. The sounds that the letter “A” makes cannot be properly pronounced unless the mouth is open. The sound itself comes from way back in the throat.

Now, consider that there are 26 letters in the English language. The vowels have 2 or even 3 sounds. “A” has 3 sounds. (aim, apple and amount) Two consonants have 2 sounds, “C” and “G.” For the most part the others have but one sound. If the child memorizes these thirty-some sounds, he/she is well on the way to learning how to read by phonics.

If the child learns the sounds of 3 letters a day, we are talking less than 10 days to conquer the entire alphabet. To be sure, there are a few curves, TH, CH, SH. And then there are the silent letters. That always adds a little fun to the process, but they can be easily overcome quickly. Children pick up that kind of stuff fast. I did. I never had to be told a second time about the silent “E.”

And so it is that a child armed with phonics can pretty much sound out the majority of the words in the English language. The hitch is that sounding out words can take time. It is why so many don’t like the phonics methods. If a person only learns phonics, they will likely never get above 200 words a minute, if that.

And so it is that recognition comes into play. When you realize the number of words in the standard sized college dictionary, it makes the recognition method unsurmountable, but it’s not.

Someone did the research and found that if a person was to just memorize the 100 most modt common words used in English, a person could read about 70-75 percent of the words in a common fiction novel.

So, while the student memorizes the letters and their sounds, in a second session, he also learns to recognize the 100 most common words. 5 a day. That takes 20 days. That means, if the student really works on the phonics for ten days and the appearance of words for 20 days, a three-year-old should be able to read at least a first grade level. That is not too much to expect from a three year old. A few flash cards and an hour a day should be more than enough.

By the way, consider what those 100 words are. Most have four letters or less. (a, the, an, he, she, it. them, they, him, etc.) If you want to find out what the 100 words are, you can google them. They are listed and you can easily make 100 flash cards for them. Most kids love flash cards.

If you go 1000 most common words, if my memory serves me right, a person can read nearly 90 percent of the words in a novel. Hence, we find that the recognition method, when used in conjunction with phonics, a three-year-older can learn a lot of reading, probably in a couple of months. After that, it’s practice. I’d say 1 to 2 hours a day. If it catches on, you might not have to make them read that long. You might reach a point where they want to read more. If it gets to that point, your child will outperform almost every kid in the first grade, and perhaps the second. When kids read a lot, they start learning a lot, many times not on purpose. Many times, they will start reading for the fun of learning. That reading can help them build confidence, which might lead to better public speaking. Now wouldn’t that be a good thing?

Two of the Meanest Things We Can Do to Our Children!

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First and foremost, if we let our children grow up without knowing the Jesus and the plan of salvation. What a horrid thing we will see one day if we find out one day that we failed them and they will never be in heaven with us. If we never teach them another thing, we need to introduce them to the Savior early and frequently. They need to have an excellent example and they need to learn the Bible as early as they can read and maybe a little sooner.

That actually leads us into the second. Turning our children over to schools that won’t teach. It is especially important that they be taught to read. Note, I didn’t say, learn how to read. Reading is a skill that needs to be practiced regularly as well as just learned.

To be sure, writing, math, science and history are very important too. But, you see, it all hinges on reading. It is far more important than ever before as even a mechanic has to know how to read.

And yet, we think we have done what we should when each day we turn our children over to glorified babysitters. Both of my sons were reading in the first grade, and actually pretty well. There is absolutely no reason that by the time a child finishes kindergarten should have any less than a 300 to 400 reading vocabulary. They need to read some each day. I should have had them read to me while I listened. Better for them. Better for me. It will help them feel better about themselves and it would have given me an idea of their progress. Almost as important, it would give us some time together.

At this time in their life, their little brains are start forming based on what they do. They might indeed just hate it, but it is very important. If they learn how to read early, they will learn how to write. Learning history is very important. And, of course, you learn history by reading. Science is important. And science is learned by reading.

Math and algebra. Well, that is a different story for a different post. However, that is important too. It too should be practiced and practiced. With practice comes accuracy and speed.

Getting back to the point. Our schools are run by the government, not by teachers. Our teachers belong to unions whose interest is not the students. They just want to make sure the teachers have jobs and that they are well paid. For some reason, they seem to have more control of the schools than the parents or even the government. Who came up with the idea of doing things that way?

And by the way, when it is suggested we go to private schools, who are the first ones to complain? The democrats and the education unions. Which by the way, are the two most guilty of the poor education our children receive.

My conclusion. Get the government and the unions out of our schools and we might have a good education system. Letting the government and unions teach our children is a horrid thing, start to finish.

We aren’t all sixth-graders

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Honest, I don’t remember exactly when it was, but it seems it was before I went into the Marines that I heard on the TV that commercials are designed for six-graders. Most people don’t like more complex things explained to them. So, if you hope to sell your product, you make sure the commercials are simple and don’t require a PhD to understand, even if your target sales is for PhDs.

I guess, in a way, we as commercial watchers are lazy. We really don’t want our minds taxed after working hard all day. On the other hand, maybe the PhDs are too smart too buy products they don’t need, especially the overpriced ones.

I suppose it does have one other side effect. It might actually make it so the commercials aren’t as expensive. After all, isn’t it all about that important bottom line?

I have taken writing tests before. I don’t know if they still have them, but according to the tests, I write at about sixth grade level. Now isn’t that convenient. My readers do not need to strain their brains in order to understand what I have to say. I guess I could say that it is convenient to be less intelligent.

Thing is, (Shouldn’t use those words so much. I’ve been trying to break myself of that.) I was considering what I heard way back then and associated it with something I heard yesterday. If it works better to write commercials for 6th graders, maybe it is good to write political ads for 6th graders.

I got to thinking, is this a good thing. Do we really want the politicians to talk to us as if we are all sixth graders? Yet it would appear It’s common practice. Reagan was known as the great communicator. Maybe it was because his ads didn’t require so much thought. As the guy said, “Keep it simple stupid.”

Just so there are no misunderstandings. it’s not my words. I did not mean to imply that my readers are stupid. However, the saying has been altered to a short abbreviation, KISS.

It is something of a disadvantage for Republicans. The dems make a simple statement that sounds good and it takes hours for us Republicans to explain why the statement isn’t true. For instance, the dems say how nice it is to tax the rich and provide for the poor. Sounds good. Doesn’t work. Never did. And yet we spend hours and hours explaining why and the general public still can’t understand it.

The same thing can be said of many things the dems try to tell us is good, open borders, weak military, and de-funding the police. (Hint: Since de-funding police, crime has sky rocketed. Since the border was opened, fentanyl has gone from about 50 thousand deaths a year to about 150 thousand a year. Tell me how that worked out, but it sounded good didn’t it. In a way, that is perhaps one of the most expensive decisions Old Joe made. It cost us more lives than Vietnam, both sides. It is why I don’t call him president. He will answer to God for all those deaths.)

It is why I don’t like what the dems are doing. It is especially why I don’t like the methods and the means of Old Joe.

At one time, Democrats and Republicans tried to maintained a closed border, a strong defense and strong law enforcement. Since Obama, not so much. Since Old Joe, even worse.

Then again, if they can successfully treat their followers as 6th graders, what can we expect.

When They Want to

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I wish I could say for sure, but I thought I heard something about big improvements in the reading and math test for third graders this year. If so, I guess it would show what a little encouragement will do. When they knew they’d get promoted regardless, the students and teachers did not put that much effort into it. When they realized the students would not be promoted without good scores on the tests, both the teachers and the students improved.

That is sort of the way things work. When the teachers started really looking bad, they did better. Moreover, they encouraged the students to try harder. In a way, it is the purpose of the test.

When I went through instructor training, they told us there were three reasons for tests. It measures the students individual progress. It measures the teachers effectiveness. Finally, they alert management to trends. Is just one student having problems, is one class having problems, or as in Memphis school’s case, is there something wrong with the system. I mean the whole school system was failing, not just one student, class or even school. It was a school system wide failure. That’s when the administrations start having to answer questions. That’s when they have to start making changes.

Finally, if they are having some success now, it does show, when they want to do it, they can. If we let them come up with excuses they will.

High Quality AM Reception

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Now that I hardly watch TV, I listen to news on the radio much more. It does have a downside. The station I listen to is weak. Any kind of a storm, and I get very bad reception. As a last resort, I have taken to listening to the station on the internet. It is far better. The voices are far clearer and crisper. As a small side benefit, it’s stereo. It is a small point, given as it is news, it’s still a little nicer. I am sure there are some stations where that would make much more beneficial.

There is another advantage. Sometimes, for hours, the station is off the air but continues to transmit on the internet. It does make me wonder. Is the conventional radio station, AM & FM, going the way of the horse whip. It seems that I get more reliable internet than radio, an important factor in emergencies.

I don’t know. At one time, I was amazed at 3 minutes for a dollar over the AT&T long distance phones. Now, as long as I pay my cell phone bill, There is no extra charge at all if I should talk all day. We might be looking at a day when the TV stations disappear too. I really don’t think ABC, NBC, or CBS will much care for that. For decades, they have ruled what we watch on TV. Shortly, anyone who has the know-how and a little content will be competing with what little is left of the big networks. You notice that I left FOX out. They apparently saw it coming and are well on the way to the conversion. They already have 2 internet news channels that are doing very well. (Then that might have something to do with the content too.)

One more little thing. If I don’t like what is on the radio stations here around Memphis, I can just as easily listen to Milwaukee or Atlanta just as easily. It does broaden the competition, doesn’t it.

A Simple Question, Which Requires a Very Complex Answer

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When I first went to instructor training, about the first words out of my instructors mouth was that, in order to teach, the teacher must motivate the student. That is to say, before any student will learn he must want to learn. Indeed, the rate at which any student will learn will depend on the motivation of the student.

That, however, is only the beginning. The second thing, at least to some degree, the teacher must take what he knows and place it in the students mind. This, to be sure is an art within itself. There are a myriad of things standing in the way. For the young man, perhaps baseball, football and basketball. A few will be thinking about cars, and of course girls. Young girls, of course, have their own distractions such as that good looking quarterback.

Before lunch, everyone thinks of hunger and what they will eat. When they get back from lunch, it is a matter of keeping them from falling asleep. As it nears the end of the day, there are hundreds of things which distract child and adult alike. They are anticipating their afternoon plans, whatever they might be. This makes Friday afternoon one of the most difficult times to teach.

Teaching and learning is not just passing information from a teacher to a group students, though. It is easy to think of it as such, but it is so much more. Ultimately, it comes to a point where the teacher teaches, not what to know or think, but how to learn and think. In the end, the student will know so much more than the teacher. It is the way knowledge grows in a society. After we finish school, we must know how to teach ourselves. It is the ultimate thing that a teacher can teach. I suppose close to 95% of what I have learned, I learned from doing or reading. I only learned about 5% in school.

It certainly starts with reading and writing. The person unable to read and write is seriously hampered in our current society. It is not enough for the cobbler apprentice to learn the craft of making shoes. Nowadays we make machines that make shoes. Then too, some people must occasionally repair those and other machines.

It means thinking beyond knowing our current world but what it will be decades from now. The current teachers might teach Edgar Allan Poe, but more important, how to write even better than Edgar Allen Poe. It must be new, different and, of course a joy to read.

At one time, society didn’t believe that bridges could be made from steel. One day, someone built a bridge from steel and they’ve been doing it ever since. I would hope the really great teacher would prod people into such things in a wide variety of various fields far beyond the knowledge of the teacher’s knowledge.

However, the basics cannot be overlooked. The things a child learns in the first 6 grades may very well determine the success of the students later. Indeed, the teacher that teaches the more advanced subjects relies very much on how well the teachers teach in the the lower grades.

Then too, just how great a teacher might be somewhat based on what is expected of him. Is he supposed to teach physics or how to fix an air conditioner. Each has his own problems and each has its own methods. Each student is different and presents a different challenge. For instance, try telling a sixth grader learning algebra the importance of being able to represent values with letters. Quite frankly, I am still at a loss of knowing the importance of knowing anything about the fictitious character of Silas Marner. Let’s face it, for some teachers, their task is simply improbable at best for some students.

Perhaps two of the biggest requirements of the really great teacher is really strong determination and very thick skin. I’m sure a love of teaching and the subject they teach is important.

Then, oddly, occasionally, you see a student react to something you teach and you see that little light inside their mind come on. As an instructor, I have seen it happen. It makes the difficulty and frustration worth it.

Daily writing prompt
What makes a teacher great?
View all responses

The Experts

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I actually did have some college. I had 1 semester in electronics, in which I carried a B+ average. I really should have stuck it out but there was a lot going on back then an I ended up in the Marines. There were downsides, but the Marines did give me the equivalent of a 2 year degree in electronics. By the way, they did teach me a few other things too, such as how to shoot.

Going back to the college, I had a teacher that said a thing that really stuck with me. He said that an expert is someone who knows a whole lot about very little. His argument, of course, was that we should never zero in so much on learning one thing such that we remain ignorant in all others.

It is so true and, as I go through life, it only becomes clearer to me how true it is.

However, it is also true about turning things over to so-called experts, people who know a whole lot about so little. So I ask, are teachers experts? Have they become highly knowledgeable on teaching while not really knowing what they should teach and why.

I have seen teachers I could not understand. I have seen English teachers that sent notes to parents with subject verb disagreements. My son’s teacher accused him of losing a book later found in the teacher’s lounge. Now just what does all this teach our kids?

We have turned our government over to experts who know how to write laws without knowing what kind of laws are needed. Some of them have never run a business or even held down a real job. A great many of them don’t understand the basics, such as the law of supply and demand.

Some experts seem to think they know about gender changes when they never learned the difference between wrong and right.

As you can well imagine I can go on, but you get my point, or I hope you do. I suppose you might be one who wants to turn the world over to a bunch of people who have a great deal of knowledge on very little.

It’s All Important

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When I was in high school, I noticed the first 15 to 20 minutes of every class started the same, more-or-less. The math teacher told us that the world would nearly come to an end, if we didn’t learn math. Of course, all communications would cease if we didn’t learn English. It was a little more difficult for the chemistry teacher, but he did manage to open with a convincing argument for us to all learn chemistry. Finally, of course, the history teacher had to come up with the impossible task of making us realize the importance of learning about what the Egyptians did thousands of years ago.

In all honesty, I wish I had paid a lot more attention to my history teachers. Believe me, if you are in high school, pay attention to history. I know it is hard to believe it, but it really is important, boring as it may be.

When I was in school, I wondered why all the teachers wasted all the time. The fact is, I for one would have much rather been playing baseball. I’m very sure I had company. The reason we were there was that we had to be there. It was kinda senseless to explain why I should be there.

Then I went through instructor training while in the Marines. The first thing the instructor taught us was that students learn better when motivated. One way to motivate is to explain the importance of the subject.

Voila! The light was turned on. I finally understood why all those teachers wasted all that time trying to increase my interest, which, by the way never worked. I mean, the reason I was occupying that desk instead of trying to throw a 90 mph fast ball was entirely because it was required of me.

Nonetheless, I did learn very much in that first day of instructor training. I learned that everything is important to special people. Some folks get horribly upset when I use rather instead of whether. To them, proper English is all important. To a mathematician, knowing when to use a sin or cosin is all important. Hopefully, I don’t need to go through the whole list. Maybe you get the idea.

My point is this. It’s all important, depending on who it is.

I have noticed, from time to time, some will take this to an extreme. Some teacher or professor put the idea in someone’s mind the importance of the subject is all important, and they just might have a tendency to think too highly of himself.

Some doctors do have a tendency to think heart surgery is more important than everything. On the other hand, that doctor might not think so if there is an area power failure and someone needs to get out in the ice and cold to restore power to the hospital.

The computer wiz might like to think how extra important he is, until he is suffering heart pains and he is waiting for an ambulance.

Then again. There are those as me. I walk into a place where they make a wonderful sandwich for me at a reasonable price and I am very much impressed. Believe me. I know how hard they work.

It is the way our economy works. When there is an important need, someone will do it, even the thankless ones, as like garbage collectors. They, too are important