Re: 15% of Filipinos functionally illiterate


"nicky lee" <sylviapatis@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1126407630.757682.202220@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> right . you can teach them better with crappy books ,low pay,
> ramshackle buildings, poor teacher student ratios and outdated
> equiptment in public schools. all you need is love.

For centuries people were educated with few books. While the Chinese
developed printing, it was kept within the royal caste and few books were
produced, certainly not for the masses. Yet without books they were able to
educate a significant part of their country and make great advances in
navigation, science, medicine, etc.

The schools that educated the Americans who built the America the world
flocks to today (including your kin) was built by kids educated with few
books (a Bible, a McGuffy Reader, an outdated geography). Some of the most
fabled jurists were educated primarily by reading and learning Blackstone's
Comentaries on the Law and nothing else. Classrooms were often large and
multi-grade, with the one-room schoolhouse the most common in rural America.
Schools without great libraries, without modern AV equipment and computers,
produced the men and women who split the atom, discovered the cures, and
landed on the moon.

See, a good teacher can make a big difference, but a good student can learn
from a bad teacher under bad conditions. You and so many others put all the
emphasis upon the tools, conditions and techniques of pouring knowledge into
the passive vessel - but education is not passive. The good student learns
in spite of obstacles. Remember Lincoln teaching himself to write by
firelight with half-burned sticks on a shovel (nice imagery, which I cannot
vouch for historically)?

If parents do not encourage and support children to learn, if schools do not
expect students to perform and achieve and maintain discipline, and if the
schools lack the authority to enforce discipline, all the shiny toys and
small class sizes will not make Baby a better reader.

Books and tools are great, but without the desire to learn, discipline, and
parental involvement it is a waste of money.

> btw home schooling is not for all people. if you dont know what you
> are doing as a parent you can do more harm than good in " teaching "
> your own kid. in most cases leave it to the expert.

But the "experts" are being shown to not know anything, either. This is why
the NEA and other teachers' unions are against competency testing for
teachers in the US. The teachers have a rather dismall pass rate.

Home schooling is not some free-for-all; students have curriculum goals,
tere are resources for the parents, and there is standardized testing. If
you had ever taught anything you would know that often you are learning
along with your students, so a parent does not have to know everything to
teach their kids effectively.

It is hard work, and I greatly admire parents who do it.

> you dont do your own house building right if you are not a
> engineer or a carpenter? you are not bart simpson.

Actually, I did a great deal of the work when I remodeled my house in 1995
and added 1600 sq. feet. I did all the rough and finish electrical, part of
the framing, part of the drywall and plastering, part of the rough plumbing,
all of the finish plumbing, installed the fireplaces and built the oak and
marble surrounds, built the stair railings from scratch, laid the hardwood
floor in the kitchen and dining room, tiled and linoed the bathrooms, and a
few other things. I am not a carpenter, a plumber, an electrician or an
engineer.

How did I do it? I believed in myself, and took the time to learn how to do
things before starting. I learned as I went along, and got better with
time. I didn't need a teacher, or a degree, or an apprenticeship. I needed
the will and the patience to master new fields.

Jack of all trades Pig
(Master of one - eating)


.

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