Re: Apple and EMI

Tim Streater <timstreater@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

real-address-in-sig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Rowland McDonnell) wrote:

Tim Streater <timstreater@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

real-address-in-sig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Rowland McDonnell) wrote:

Tim Streater <timstreater@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

[snip]

Assertion: don't teach the little buggers what they want, but what
they need. And they're not allowed to opt out.

So what's the point in trying to get a slydexic clued up about
languages in the way suitable for `the rest of us'? Etc. Teach 'em
what they need; but on the other hand, one size does not fit all.

I was generalising and I agree with you here. Actually I'd like to
teach 'em to have some curiosity about the world around them.

<puzzled> That's one thing that no-one needs teaching. It might be
worth trying to train parents, teachers, and society at large to stop
destroying the interest in the world around you that pretty much
everyone's born with.

Perhaps it doesn't need teaching. Perhaps rather it needs stimulating
and encouraging.

Not at all. All you need to do is not stamp it out in early childhood,
and then allow the kids to use their curiosity at school. Modern
schooling discourages curiosity and questioning, and so do rather too
many modern parents. Of course, the drive to discourage questioning
throughout society has been government policy since Tony took charge, so
there's nothing to be done until he's gone - and what with Brown being
described as a `Stalinist', I doubt it'll get any better if he takes
over.

The primary schooling I had back in the 1970s was excellent - and it did
encourage curiosity and questioning. Unfortunately, all the `new
thinking' which allowed it to work that way has been gone back on and
primary schooling now is nothing like as good as it used to be.

The `permissive' early schooling I had was supposed to be ineffective
and leave me without a grasp of any useful academic skills. Well, they
gave me a solid grounding in grammar (it was high school that never
taught it), I had an really solid innate grasp of `number' by the time I
left infants' school (all those wonderful maths toys worked - I played
with 'em, and the feel for `number' they gave me has been useful all my
life), and - well, never mind the rest of the details: I reckon I got
the education I needed at that point. I wasn't unusually clever or
well-educated but I entered high school with a better understanding of
maths, English, and science than many modern high school leavers. I
know: I've taught 'em (the ones out of high school - you really can't
assume *anything* about what they know, honestly).

But no-one should be allowed to opt out of maths - unfortunately,
the national curriculum allows one to effectively opt out of maths
and get a GCSE in the subject...

Bizarre.

O Level maths was, when I took the exam, a pale shadow of what it had
been. GCSE maths? It's been watered down so far it's a joke. I have a
13 niece who expected me to be a lot more impressed when she told me
they were doing A level maths topics in class. But I know what's in
modern GCSE maths and modern A level maths, and it's not pretty at
all...

What's the hardest thing they do in GCSE or A-level Maths then?

Umm. I'm not up with A levels - but I do know you can get a pure maths
A level without touching calculus (but not an A - I think). Actually,
I'm not completely up with the *latest* maths GCSEs - I let out a shriek
when I'd heard how bad they'd got in one respect and didn't hear the
full sorry tale.

I was
out of the country for 25 years and have no children so I'm not in the
loop here.

The national curriculum has been a catastrophic disaster for science and
maths and that's the start and end of it. There's a letter from a
Mexican acadmic in a recent issue of Physics World (the Institute of
Physics's monthly glossy mag) pointing out that what we're setting up by
way of physics teaching in Britain at the moment is developing towards
something rather like the horrible mess they're trying to fix in Mexico
right now (he provides specifics). Yes, it's *that* bad - we're getting
Mexican-style education system.

He suggests that maybe the British approach to physics education isn't
going in quite the right direction.

Rowland.

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