Seeking straight A's, parents push for pills

"Herman Rubin" wrote in message
...
In article om,
wrote:

When my daughter was in high school, there were NO
grammar classes, and she realized her grammar was
weak. Strong English grammar is needed, and rarely
available.

You really should stop using your daughter as an example of today's poor
educational system. She's 50 years old, hardly an example of today.

I do not know what the Regents diploma tested, but
what you have listed is unimpressive. High school
laboratory science is not of much use, and neither
is computational mathematics. Nor am I willing to
put much value to teaching a foreign language other
than grammatically oriented. The contents of those
three or four years of a foreign language come down
to less than two if grammar oriented, and I have
stated my opinion on the required propaganda known
as literature.

Because the courses are not of much use to you, it doesn't mean they are
useless to someone else.

Herman Rubin wrote:
You live in Indiana. Have you looked at the HDCore-40 requirements
lately?(Essentially the college prep program.) It's quite a bit more
rigerous than the Regents level program I went through in the 1970's in
NY State.

Possibly on paper, but not in actuality.

4 years of English, 4 years of math (through pre-calc or
finite or AP statistics), 3 or 4 years of laboratory science (Bio,
chem, physics and, if you take 4 years, one AP class), 3 or 4 years of
a foreign langauge (either 3 years of one language or 2 years each of 2
languages), 3 years of Social Studies (including required classes in
government and economics, along with a year of U.S. history and a year
of world history or geography.) Plus health, PE and at least two fine
arts (art, music or theater) classes. Plus whatever electives and/or
additional academic classes are needed to fill out the schedule.
(Shaina plans 4 years of Japanese and wants to take AP European History
plus some elective writing classes.) About a dozen AP classes are
offered in most subject areas and finite math, while not an AP course,
can be taken for college credit.

The number of years of X, Y, or Z means nothing.

When my daughter was in high school, there were NO
grammar classes, and she realized her grammar was
weak. Strong English grammar is needed, and rarely
available.

Tell that to my daughter. She's in 9th grade. She just had to take a
grammar test that included stuff that I KNOW I never learned in high
school. Some of it I don't even know now (and I was a journalism major
in college and write professionally) and much of what I DO know (i.e.
what a 'demonstrative pronoun' is) I only recently learned while taking
a college level foreign language class! (And the professor seemed to
assume that most of the students [who are 25 years younger than I]
already knew what the term meant. I had to puzzle it out from context.)


Four years of essentially computational math are
of little value. As a statistician, I strongly
condemn all statistical methods courses without
a much stronger mathematics requirement than is
available in high school; one will have at least
VERY great problems in understanding anything
about statistical problems. A good "Euclid"
course is worth more than all of that, especially
if followed with a decent "college algebra" course,
which emphasizes concepts. Where do you think
students get the idea that instructors should not
teach the "theory", but prepare them for the exams
by drilling them in the methodology.

Euclid? That's, like, 'proof' based Geometry? (Sorry, math isn't my
strong suit, though I did take 4 years in high school and one year in
college. [Barely passed the last two of those five years.] I
certainly learned that (though don't remember much 30 years later) in
high school, and I'm sure Shaina will learn it in honors geometry next
year.)


Also, there are lots of college students who have
not taken that program. Purdue requires one
Carnegie unit in algebra and one in geometry, and
has correspondingly low requirements in other areas.
One can list courses, but not content.

Well ... I could toss in the random comment about Purdue vs. IU ... but
I won't.


As was the case when I was a student, and when you were a student, kids
can opt for low level classes or high level ones, and they will come
out of school with whatever amount of learning they have chosen to
pursue. (Students seeking a regular diploma need fewer credits in all,
fewer academic credits (3 years of English/2 years math/2 years
science) and the classes they take can be far less rigerous.



IIRC, when I went to high school in the 70's, a regents diploma only
needed 2 years of laboratory science (bio and chem) and 3 years of math
(through trig/intermediate algebra). No foreign language was required,
though most college bound students took one.

I do not know what the Regents diploma tested, but
what you have listed is unimpressive.

There was no single test. You took a state-administered Regents exam at
the end of each year of Regents level English/Math/Science, and an exam
at the end of the third year of a foreign language. I don't recall
precisely how many courses were required to get a Regents Diploma.

High school
laboratory science is not of much use, and neither
is computational mathematics. Nor am I willing to
put much value to teaching a foreign language other
than grammatically oriented. The contents of those
three or four years of a foreign language come down
to less than two if grammar oriented, and I have
stated my opinion on the required propaganda known
as literature.

So ... maybe it's buried somewhere in the 250+ posts, but what DO you
think students should be learning in high school. I learned sufficient
Spanish in 3 years of high school to be able to communicate on a
competent, if basic level. I learned enough in high school biology and
chemistry to gain a fair understanding of how the scientific world
works. (And to take, and get a 5 on, the AP bio exam. Chemistry was
never as strong a subject for me.)

Seems to me that high school coursework fills 3 basic needs:
1. To give the student the skills and knowledge necessary to function
in the adult world. (Enough math to be able to balance a check-book and
do common every-day computations [multiply a recipe, calculate gas
milage, etc.], the ability to read and understand newspapers and
general adult (non-specialist-oriented) literature, and to write
clearly and grammatically; sufficient typing skills to manage a
computer on a basic level; some understanding of history, geography and
civics, to allow one to be an informed and productive citizen.

2. To teach the student how to think and reason, and how to learn, and
how to be --- generally speaking, an 'educated and well-rounded
person.' I think most upper level math, history, literature, science
and grammar fills this function. (For most people -- my husband, who is
in a skilled trade, uses geometry on a daily basis. As for me -- I
can't think of the last time I needed to determine the area of a circle
or the slope of a line, or analyze the contents of chemical compound,
or give the grammatical name of a particular term or tense.)

3. To give the student the grounding he needs to pursue higher level
studies in the career field of his choice.


While endlesss coursework on 'theory' may, to some extent, meet the
needs of catagory 2, it should not be the end-all and be-all of
education. (I'm reminded of early 19th century education, when students
were expected to memorize (and recite orally) long lists of spelling
words -- but were not expected to know what they meant; and rattle off
mathmatical and grammatical rules, translate long passages in Latin,
and diagram sentences -- but students never learned to WRITE or read
for comprehension. (Noah Webster, author of the famous dictionary and
spelling book actually wrote that he didn't think students SHOULD learn
to define words, since the goal of education was to train the memory,
and children learned best by rote.))

My daughter and I have talked a bit about the courses she needs to
take. And we both wonder WHY she really needs to take pre-calculus and
physics. Her career goal, at this point, is to become either a
journalist or graphic artist, so surely her limited class-time might be
better served by another writing or art class, or by some other
elective (academic or not) that interests her.

Naomi

In article ,
toypup wrote:

"Herman Rubin" wrote in message
...
In article om,
wrote:

When my daughter was in high school, there were NO
grammar classes, and she realized her grammar was
weak. Strong English grammar is needed, and rarely
available.

You really should stop using your daughter as an example of today's poor
educational system. She's 50 years old, hardly an example of today.

Do you think the general level of teaching grammar has
gone up? It has at this school, because others were
in the same category, and this is a college community.

I do not know what the Regents diploma tested, but
what you have listed is unimpressive. High school
laboratory science is not of much use, and neither
is computational mathematics. Nor am I willing to
put much value to teaching a foreign language other
than grammatically oriented. The contents of those
three or four years of a foreign language come down
to less than two if grammar oriented, and I have
stated my opinion on the required propaganda known
as literature.

Because the courses are not of much use to you, it doesn't mean they are
useless to someone else.

For a terminal high school diploma, they may be of some
little use. For anyone else, and for many of those, they
are woefully inefficient.


--
This address is for information only. I do not claim that these views
are those of the Statistics Department or of Purdue University.
Herman Rubin, Department of Statistics, Purdue University
Phone: (765)494-6054 FAX: (765)494-0558

"Herman Rubin" wrote in message
...
In article ,
toypup wrote:

"Herman Rubin" wrote in message
...
In article om,
wrote:

When my daughter was in high school, there were NO
grammar classes, and she realized her grammar was
weak. Strong English grammar is needed, and rarely
available.

You really should stop using your daughter as an example of today's poor
educational system. She's 50 years old, hardly an example of today.

Do you think the general level of teaching grammar has
gone up? It has at this school, because others were
in the same category, and this is a college community.

You are using her as an example of the woeful inadequacy of today's
educational system for all your arguments. She is not a part of today's
high school education system. It has been decades since she was ever in
high school. She is your point of reference and she is not an adequate
representation of what is happening today. It has been 32 years since she
has been in high school. Things have changed in the 32 years since I've
been in kindergarten, which DS is in right now. I'm sure things have
changed for high school, as well.

In article om,
wrote:

Herman Rubin wrote:
You live in Indiana. Have you looked at the HDCore-40 requirements
lately?(Essentially the college prep program.) It's quite a bit more
rigerous than the Regents level program I went through in the 1970's in
NY State.

Possibly on paper, but not in actuality.

4 years of English, 4 years of math (through pre-calc or
finite or AP statistics), 3 or 4 years of laboratory science (Bio,
chem, physics and, if you take 4 years, one AP class), 3 or 4 years of
a foreign langauge (either 3 years of one language or 2 years each of 2
languages), 3 years of Social Studies (including required classes in
government and economics, along with a year of U.S. history and a year
of world history or geography.) Plus health, PE and at least two fine
arts (art, music or theater) classes. Plus whatever electives and/or
additional academic classes are needed to fill out the schedule.
(Shaina plans 4 years of Japanese and wants to take AP European History
plus some elective writing classes.) About a dozen AP classes are
offered in most subject areas and finite math, while not an AP course,
can be taken for college credit.

The number of years of X, Y, or Z means nothing.

When my daughter was in high school, there were NO
grammar classes, and she realized her grammar was
weak. Strong English grammar is needed, and rarely
available.

Tell that to my daughter. She's in 9th grade. She just had to take a
grammar test that included stuff that I KNOW I never learned in high
school. Some of it I don't even know now (and I was a journalism major
in college and write professionally) and much of what I DO know (i.e.
what a 'demonstrative pronoun' is) I only recently learned while taking
a college level foreign language class! (And the professor seemed to
assume that most of the students [who are 25 years younger than I]
already knew what the term meant. I had to puzzle it out from context.)

Good; it is time that grammar was taught.

Also, most of the students then really learned their
English grammar while taking a grammar-oriented foreign
language course. The so-called "college level" foreign
language courses should be taught in high school or
earlier. I would make it even stronger; the courses
(which have largely disappeared now) for graduate students
to read foreign languages for research purposes, often
one or two semesters, are the type which should be taught.
These courses do not ignore speaking, but do not stress it.

Four years of essentially computational math are
of little value. As a statistician, I strongly
condemn all statistical methods courses without
a much stronger mathematics requirement than is
available in high school; one will have at least
VERY great problems in understanding anything
about statistical problems. A good "Euclid"
course is worth more than all of that, especially
if followed with a decent "college algebra" course,
which emphasizes concepts. Where do you think
students get the idea that instructors should not
teach the "theory", but prepare them for the exams
by drilling them in the methodology.

Euclid? That's, like, 'proof' based Geometry? (Sorry, math isn't my
strong suit, though I did take 4 years in high school and one year in
college. [Barely passed the last two of those five years.] I
certainly learned that (though don't remember much 30 years later) in
high school, and I'm sure Shaina will learn it in honors geometry next
year.)

The honors geometry USUALLY is that. It was the only
"real math" course you had, alas, and the most important
part was understanding what is involved in a proof.

Also, there are lots of college students who have
not taken that program. Purdue requires one
Carnegie unit in algebra and one in geometry, and
has correspondingly low requirements in other areas.
One can list courses, but not content.

Well ... I could toss in the random comment about Purdue vs. IU ... but
I won't.

I doubt that IU has a higher requirement there. Other
than giving an examination, one cannot get much of an
idea what someone has learned.

As was the case when I was a student, and when you were a student, kids
can opt for low level classes or high level ones, and they will come
out of school with whatever amount of learning they have chosen to
pursue. (Students seeking a regular diploma need fewer credits in all,
fewer academic credits (3 years of English/2 years math/2 years
science) and the classes they take can be far less rigerous.

IIRC, when I went to high school in the 70's, a regents diploma only
needed 2 years of laboratory science (bio and chem) and 3 years of math
(through trig/intermediate algebra). No foreign language was required,
though most college bound students took one.

I do not know what the Regents diploma tested, but
what you have listed is unimpressive.

There was no single test. You took a state-administered Regents exam at
the end of each year of Regents level English/Math/Science, and an exam
at the end of the third year of a foreign language. I don't recall
precisely how many courses were required to get a Regents Diploma.

High school
laboratory science is not of much use, and neither
is computational mathematics. Nor am I willing to
put much value to teaching a foreign language other
than grammatically oriented. The contents of those
three or four years of a foreign language come down
to less than two if grammar oriented, and I have
stated my opinion on the required propaganda known
as literature.

So ... maybe it's buried somewhere in the 250+ posts, but what DO you
think students should be learning in high school. I learned sufficient
Spanish in 3 years of high school to be able to communicate on a
competent, if basic level. I learned enough in high school biology and
chemistry to gain a fair understanding of how the scientific world
works. (And to take, and get a 5 on, the AP bio exam. Chemistry was
never as strong a subject for me.)

I had 2.5 years of high school Spanish, one year of
college French, and one year of college German. At
the end of those, I could certainly communicate in
Spanish and French, but not that well in German; the
course was not logical enough.

I never took any of the regular science courses in
high school; I never had any intention of taking
biology. I deliberately tested out of physics, and
my chemistry teacher kicked me out of class for
asking questions which were too difficult. I did
pass the exam on that course. I do not know what
I would have gotten on AP exams if they had them,
but I doubt that I would have had any problems.

I did learn quite a bit when I was in elementary
and high school, but it was not from the teaching;
giving me the textbooks and telling me what was
to be expected would have worked just as well and
faster. My outside reading in elementary school
was not the best, as I had no idea what to read,
but in high school, with access to full library
materials, it went ahead quickly.

Seems to me that high school coursework fills 3 basic needs:
1. To give the student the skills and knowledge necessary to function
in the adult world. (Enough math to be able to balance a check-book and
do common every-day computations [multiply a recipe, calculate gas
milage, etc.],

You will find these abilities rare. My late wife,
who was a mathematics professor and certainly knew
what he operations were, did not hesitate to ask
me, especially if she could not find where here
mistakes were. I happen to be an accurate rapid
calculator, and if anything this may cause me not
to use computational aids often enough.

the ability to read and understand newspapers and
general adult (non-specialist-oriented) literature,

You are assuming that what is written is capable of
being clearly understood; this is rarely the case.
What is behind the biases of the authors? Also,
they do not know enough to understand much of it.

I doubt that most know enough American geography to
understand the current weather effects, or even what
the weather reports mean. When it comes to getting
any real idea of the science reports, not a chance.

and to write
clearly and grammatically;

See the quote of IP's comments in another posting.
Lots of college graduates have no idea of grammar.

sufficient typing skills to manage a
computer on a basic level;

I use a touch system myself; as I did not read what
the usual one was, I came up with one not as good.
But I know lots of people who gave up touch typing
to use "hunt and peck", which is generally adequate.

some understanding of history, geography and
civics, to allow one to be an informed and productive citizen.

The necessary knowledge of geography and history,
which I deliberately have put in that order, was
still being taught in the elementary schools when
I was there, but is no longer being taught at all.
One needs a good course on ancient history, not
the Marxist version which leaves out the importance
of the conflicts and the movements of peoples, before
American history. This is not being taught.

2. To teach the student how to think and reason,

How can you do this without teaching enough formal
logic to understand those problems? Otherwise, you
get only "philosophical" reasoning, which ignores
the facts in favor of what is effectively dogma.

and how to learn,

People do not learn the same way. How can you teach
someone how to learn?

and
how to be --- generally speaking, an 'educated and well-rounded
person.'

What does that mean?

I think most upper level math, history, literature, science
and grammar fills this function. (For most people -- my husband, who is
in a skilled trade, uses geometry on a daily basis. As for me -- I
can't think of the last time I needed to determine the area of a circle
or the slope of a line, or analyze the contents of chemical compound,
or give the grammatical name of a particular term or tense.)

3. To give the student the grounding he needs to pursue higher level
studies in the career field of his choice.

We have too many trying to do this; they do a poor job,
are passed because it would be politically impossible
to fail even half of those who should never have even
graduated high school. Again, see IP's remarks about
the functionally illiterate college graduates.


While endlesss coursework on 'theory' may, to some extent, meet the
needs of catagory 2,

Who said it should be endless? Concepts when learned are
learned and can be used, and the use should be practiced.
This does not mean memorizing theorems, but understanding
the concepts and how to use them. The use of mathematical
notation as language, which has essentially zero prerequisites,
belongs with beginning reading; with this, someone can
formalize problems for a machine to solve, which is far
more important than being able to laboriously solve a few.

it should not be the end-all and be-all of
education. (I'm reminded of early 19th century education, when students
were expected to memorize (and recite orally) long lists of spelling
words -- but were not expected to know what they meant; and rattle off
mathmatical and grammatical rules, translate long passages in Latin,
and diagram sentences -- but students never learned to WRITE or read
for comprehension. (Noah Webster, author of the famous dictionary and
spelling book actually wrote that he didn't think students SHOULD learn
to define words, since the goal of education was to train the memory,
and children learned best by rote.))

I have always opposed the use of memorization except when
necessary, and even more so, memorizing facts without
understanding the frameworks. Going from facts to structure
or generalities is research, and research ability is mainly
absolute, independent of the level. Structure used to be
taught first to a fair extent.

My daughter and I have talked a bit about the courses she needs to
take. And we both wonder WHY she really needs to take pre-calculus and
physics. Her career goal, at this point, is to become either a
journalist or graphic artist, so surely her limited class-time might be
better served by another writing or art class, or by some other
elective (academic or not) that interests her.

If she does not take those, she will not have any idea of
how to use such things. One of the late professors here,
from India, started out as a Sanskrit student, but after
taking mathematics courses, became a mathematical statistician,
and an expert in multivariate analysis.

Scientists have the linguistic and literary knowledge expected.
Those in the humanities and social sciences have been overly
philosophized, or if you wish to be blunt propagandized, into
how things should be, in total ignorance of what can be done.

Science cannot provide values, but it can give one a reasonable
idea of what is possible, and more importantly, what is not
possible. The humanists have to keep this in mind.

Naomi



--
This address is for information only. I do not claim that these views
are those of the Statistics Department or of Purdue University.
Herman Rubin, Department of Statistics, Purdue University
Phone: (765)494-6054 FAX: (765)494-0558

Another article on this subject.

http://www.dailyvidette.com/media/st.../2006/09/08/Vi...

Our View
A prescription of a different kind
Excerpts:


Every parent wants what is best for his or her child, to get good grades,
possibly go to college and live a happy life. But it seems that good grades
are now being redefined. For some parents, a B on a report card is no longer
acceptable. So what happens when their child gets a B? Take them to the
doctor and demand a prescription for Ritalin.


Unfortunately this is not a joke. According to an article on MSNBC.com
several pediatricians have begun reporting a trend of parents demanding
their child be diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder
simply because their child got a B on a report card. What's more is many of
these parents openly admit to knowing their child doesn't really have ADHD.
There goes getting by with just trying your hardest.


What's really sad is that this trend just furthers the image that, to
Americans, nothing is your fault. Your child is doing badly in school? Well
it's not because they're not doing their homework, it's because they have
ADHD. You eat McDonald's everyday and are now obese? It's obviously
McDonald's fault, not yours. And what do you do when something isn't your
fault? First you find whose fault it is and then maybe you can find a drug
out there to fix it. Had a bad day? Maybe you're depressed - bring on the
Prozac.


How can these parents sit down and tell their children not to smoke or do
drugs, but they knowingly have them abuse prescription drugs?


At the same time, every time a doctor has to see a child because they got a
B- instead of an A, they are not seeing a child with a serious problem. As a
society we need to stop this overwhelming competition among students. Not
every child has to be the valedictorian or star football player. Parents
need to realize that you don't have children in order for them to fulfill
all the things that you couldn't.


Perhaps the parents who cannot see this are the ones who need to be seeing
the doctors, not their children.

Herman Rubin wrote:
In article om,
wrote:

.. Also, there are lots of college students who have
not taken that program. Purdue requires one
Carnegie unit in algebra and one in geometry, and
has correspondingly low requirements in other areas.
One can list courses, but not content.

Well ... I could toss in the random comment about Purdue vs. IU ... but
I won't.

I doubt that IU has a higher requirement there. Other
than giving an examination, one cannot get much of an
idea what someone has learned.

IU requires 4 years of English, 3 years of math (Intro and Intermediate
Algebra, plus Geometry), one year of laboratory science and two years
of history. It also requires, for in-state students, a Core40 diploma
which, in itself requires some additional coursework (an additional
year of history and science, foreign language, etc).


So ... maybe it's buried somewhere in the 250+ posts, but what DO you
think students should be learning in high school. I learned sufficient
Spanish in 3 years of high school to be able to communicate on a
competent, if basic level. I learned enough in high school biology and
chemistry to gain a fair understanding of how the scientific world
works. (And to take, and get a 5 on, the AP bio exam. Chemistry was
never as strong a subject for me.)

I had 2.5 years of high school Spanish, one year of
college French, and one year of college German. At
the end of those, I could certainly communicate in
Spanish and French, but not that well in German; the
course was not logical enough.

Germanic languages are also very different from Romance languages. The
grammar is more difficult and there's more OF it. I took Spanish in
high school, but didn't learn a ton of grammar in it, because the
grammar of Spanish isn't very complex. I am currently studying a
slavic language, and there's a LOT of grammar in the class, because the
language itself has very complex grammar and you can't possibly frame a
setence without understanding it. So the first year was mostly a
reading course, teaching us a lot of vocabulary and getting us to
understand, on an intellectual level, how to
decline/conjugate/structure a sentence. Now, in the second year, the
focus is on actually using what we learned -- being able to
communicate.

I never took any of the regular science courses in
high school; I never had any intention of taking
biology. I deliberately tested out of physics, and
my chemistry teacher kicked me out of class for
asking questions which were too difficult. I did
pass the exam on that course. I do not know what
I would have gotten on AP exams if they had them,
but I doubt that I would have had any problems.

Well, you studied those things on your own. You didn't just intuitively
KNOW physics. And yes, of course most bright students can, if they
choose, read up on any topic on their own and learn quite a lot. (When
I decided to take classes again I first considered taking a history
class, since that's my main area of interest. But then I realized that
I can always (and do, often) read about any area of history I want, and
learn it on my own without paying tuition. But I've always liked
languges, but have had little success learning them on my own. So I
figured that a language course would make the most sense.


Seems to me that high school coursework fills 3 basic needs:
1. To give the student the skills and knowledge necessary to function
in the adult world. (Enough math to be able to balance a check-book and
do common every-day computations [multiply a recipe, calculate gas
milage, etc.],

You will find these abilities rare. My late wife,
who was a mathematics professor and certainly knew
what he operations were, did not hesitate to ask
me, especially if she could not find where here
mistakes were. I happen to be an accurate rapid
calculator, and if anything this may cause me not
to use computational aids often enough.

She was a math professor and couldnt' balance her checkbook? Or do
simple multiplication and division? Ok....

the ability to read and understand newspapers and
general adult (non-specialist-oriented) literature,

You are assuming that what is written is capable of
being clearly understood; this is rarely the case.
What is behind the biases of the authors? Also,
they do not know enough to understand much of it.

I doubt that most know enough American geography to
understand the current weather effects, or even what
the weather reports mean. When it comes to getting
any real idea of the science reports, not a chance.

But do we NEED to? Do we need to understand WHY a hurricane is coming,
as long as we know what to do to protect ourselves? By geography I'm
thinking more in terms of knowing where Iraq is located (roughly -- not
necessarily able to pick it out on a blank map)


and to write
clearly and grammatically;

See the quote of IP's comments in another posting.
Lots of college graduates have no idea of grammar.

I am aware of that. That means they aren't learning it; it doesn't mean
it isn't being taught. High schools these days generally put a lot of
focus on composition -- and I think being able to compose a clear
sentence is much more important than knowing how to define a past
participle. (Or much else that is taught in theoretical grammar
classes.)

sufficient typing skills to manage a
computer on a basic level;

I use a touch system myself; as I did not read what
the usual one was, I came up with one not as good.
But I know lots of people who gave up touch typing
to use "hunt and peck", which is generally adequate.

Absolutely. Shaina's counselor wanted her to take keyboarding this
year. I thought it unncessary since she's been using a computer for
years and, while she may not be a speed typist or touch typist, she can
get the job done. And, with more typing in high school,she'll get
faster with practice. (She had enough trouble squeezing the classes she
needed and wanted to take into her schedule without also taking a
useless keyboarding class.)

some understanding of history, geography and
civics, to allow one to be an informed and productive citizen.

The necessary knowledge of geography and history,
which I deliberately have put in that order, was
still being taught in the elementary schools when
I was there, but is no longer being taught at all.
One needs a good course on ancient history, not
the Marxist version which leaves out the importance
of the conflicts and the movements of peoples, before
American history. This is not being taught.

Why do we "need" ancient history? (Beyond, again, the basics -- who the
Greeks and Romans and Egyptians were and -- which I learned in 9th
grade social studies.)

2. To teach the student how to think and reason,

How can you do this without teaching enough formal
logic to understand those problems? Otherwise, you
get only "philosophical" reasoning, which ignores
the facts in favor of what is effectively dogma.

In your opinion. My understanding is that modern schools (which
includes both the school I attended in the 70's and the schools my
daughter attends in the 21st century) put MUCH more emphasis on thought
and reasoning (understanding WHY things happened) than pre-war
schools, which were still far more concerned with rote feeding of
facts, names and dates.

and how to learn,

People do not learn the same way. How can you teach
someone how to learn?

You can help them find how THEY learn best and make it necessary for
them to learn how to study and focus.

and
how to be --- generally speaking, an 'educated and well-rounded
person.'

What does that mean?

It's not really definable, which was sort of my point. Schools teach
students what people in our society are expected, in general, to know.
(Who Adolph Hitler was, what "Hamlet" is about, what the Reformation
was and, in general why it happened, why helium balloons float ... IOW,
stuff that has NO real relevence to the day to day life of 99% of the
populace but most reasonably educated people DO know.)

3. To give the student the grounding he needs to pursue higher level
studies in the career field of his choice.

We have too many trying to do this; they do a poor job,
are passed because it would be politically impossible
to fail even half of those who should never have even
graduated high school. Again, see IP's remarks about
the functionally illiterate college graduates


Some do a poor job, some do not. I've had good and bad teachers at
every level of education. I have to wonder how anyone who is truly
'functionally illiterate' however (as opposed to lacking some specific
areas of education that YOU believe they should have) could graduate
college, given the intensive reading required to get through even a
single class.


While endlesss coursework on 'theory' may, to some extent, meet the
needs of catagory 2,

Who said it should be endless? Concepts when learned are
learned and can be used, and the use should be practiced.
This does not mean memorizing theorems, but understanding
the concepts and how to use them. The use of mathematical
notation as language, which has essentially zero prerequisites,
belongs with beginning reading; with this, someone can
formalize problems for a machine to solve, which is far
more important than being able to laboriously solve a few.

My understanding of what you said was that math should be only theory
(Euclidian proofs) and foreign language and English should be primarily
grammar (forget about being able to communicate.) That says to me that
theory is more important than practice, to your mind.

My daughter and I have talked a bit about the courses she needs to
take. And we both wonder WHY she really needs to take pre-calculus and
physics. Her career goal, at this point, is to become either a
journalist or graphic artist, so surely her limited class-time might be
better served by another writing or art class, or by some other
elective (academic or not) that interests her.

If she does not take those, she will not have any idea of
how to use such things. One of the late professors here,
from India, started out as a Sanskrit student, but after
taking mathematics courses, became a mathematical statistician,
and an expert in multivariate analysis.

But surely 11 years of math should be sufficient for her to determine
if mathematics is her 'thing.' Why assume that one additional year
will make a difference? (And if one year might, why not demand two or
three additional years? Why not insist that all seniors take TWO math
classes?) I'm not suggesting that she should take no math beyond the
basic computational variety. But so far as I know, Calclulus offers
nothing practical for day to day life for ANYONE. Ditto physics. I
never took physics (beyond the basics taught at the junior high level)
and seem to get by ok. And if she should decide, at some point, she
wants to be a scientist, she can catch up. IU offers a basic physics
class that does not have, as its prerequisite, high school physics.

Naomi

Seems to me that high school coursework fills 3 basic needs:
1. To give the student the skills and knowledge necessary to function
in the adult world. (Enough math to be able to balance a check-book and
do common every-day computations [multiply a recipe, calculate gas
milage, etc.],

You will find these abilities rare.
Hey this is the kind of math I can actualy do :P Not that I am good at
keeping my check book balanced but the everyday stuff is understandable. I
hate it when older people make coments about us "younguns" needed
calculators for all math. I can do most pre algebra stuff in my head,
though I must admit if I dont write it down sometimes the numbers tend to
jumble.

I use a touch system myself; as I did not read what
the usual one was, I came up with one not as good.
But I know lots of people who gave up touch typing
to use "hunt and peck", which is generally adequate.
I can finaly touch type myself.. thanks to almost 10 years on the internet
:P It was a slow first 2 years though :P


Tori

wrote:


But surely 11 years of math should be sufficient for her to determine
if mathematics is her 'thing.' Why assume that one additional year
will make a difference? (And if one year might, why not demand two or
three additional years? Why not insist that all seniors take TWO math
classes?) I'm not suggesting that she should take no math beyond the
basic computational variety. But so far as I know, Calclulus offers
nothing practical for day to day life for ANYONE. Ditto physics. I
never took physics (beyond the basics taught at the junior high level)
and seem to get by ok. And if she should decide, at some point, she
wants to be a scientist, she can catch up. IU offers a basic physics
class that does not have, as its prerequisite, high school physics.

I don't know of too many people who don't change their career plans at
least a little bit from the time of middle or high school. And the
computational math that someone does in school is NOT the same as
mathematics in college. So, no, I don't think she can determine yet
if mathematics is 'her thing'. I don't even think that calculus is
anything but a stepping stone to 'real' math.

Somewhere, I don't remember where, I participated in a discussion
about who would ever use calculus or algebra in the real world. Or
would have to find the area of a circle. I happen to have been
(before retirement) in a job, which really did not exist when I went
to college and which did require those things. I was a zoology major
in college and I intended originally to get my MAT and then teach
biology in HS.

I did not take physics - either in college or in HS. I took trig (and
geometry) in HS and I took pre-calculus after I'd been out of college
20+ years and got a B in it (and also accounting just for fun), but I
never had calculus, and in fact flunked the test to go into calculus
which I took a year or so after the pre-calculus course.

I did substitute teach, and eventually went back to school and
student taught and got a teaching certificate and taught middle school
science for 7 years. I was working on my MAT when I had to miss orals
because of having my gall bladder out.

But in addition to being a wife and mother, I did a lot of other
things during my working life. I did medical proofreading and
indexing (for an atlas of anatomy). I coached age group swim teams.
I studied art and painted portraits. I did needlework, including
designing my own needlepoint canvases. I worked as a temp in
offices. I wrote newspaper and magazine articles. I did abstracting
of scientific papers. I was a District Commissioner for a Pony Club.
I did some computer programming and worked a little bit with
databases. [I love computer programming BTW.]

None of those things except for the proofreading and abstracting were
really in the area of my major study, and the swim team coaching was
completely outside of my experience, as I never swam competitively. I
did not at all anticipate doing any of those things

For 14 years before I retired, I was an Industrial Hygienist. This
requires doing air sampling (calculating volume of air processed), and
noise and radiation sampling. To figure the noise dose, I had to use
calculus.

I could not really understand the formula by which I derived the noise
dose (which involved logarithms), but it was simply a matter of
plugging in the proper numbers into the formula. Since my
computational skills are bad, I wrote a small spreadsheet for that, so
that I could be sure of getting the correct answer.

I took a two day test in order to get certified - beforehand I studied
very hard for several years (outside of working hours). I passed the
test on my first try - even though I have never had physics or
calculus. But I think that if I HAD studied those courses, I would
have had less trouble with it. Because given my lack of background I
just had to memorize everything without really understanding it.
Fortunately I have a pretty good memory.

wrote:
[snip]
basic computational variety. But so far as I know, Calclulus offers
nothing practical for day to day life for ANYONE. Ditto physics. I
[snip]

On the contary: to understand inflation, you have to understand
how calculus works.

--
Penny Gaines
UK mum to three