I'm Getting old
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Jusatele
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I highly agree with thisSuperlizard said:
our schools do turn out some highly educated kids who go on to do some great stuff
but while doing that they also tend to just pass the under achievers along to the next teacher so they are that persons problem
if they can pass a certain low standard test, they move on,and that test gets lower all the time.
However there are always those who apply themselves and get a quality education, and they prevail.
in the mean time, common sense and true wisdom is a dyeing thing, you see more and more really stupid stuff going on because no one ever taught someone to not put knifes in dish water you could not see them in, and they go in to clean them and cut themselves trying to find them to clean them. (an example of what I mean, not to be taken as a quote point.)
sound stupid? it is a common thing, and that is why we are getting more and more stupid laws to protect us. Such as seat belt laws, now if someone had a device that could save your life if you used it, why would you refuse. I have gone upside down in a open top jeep, sliding along at 70 MPH the roll cage and seat belt keeping me from being ground to death. No one had to tell me I needed to wear a seat belt in a open top vehicle. But every day some one, or the child in their lap, is ejected from a car because of no seat belt. So we complain about another stupid law.
common sense, ever watch those to stupid to be real video programs, common sense,
the true tragedy is we do not let them kill themselves off. We protect them. I cannot figure it out.
Super Turbo Deluxe Custom
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Used to if you did something stupid, you paid with your life. GFCI receptacles, the banning of lawn darts, air bags, etc., etc., for every life they save, the world becomes dumber because those people have another oppurtunity to breed that they may not have had. The Mike Judge film, Idiocracy, nailed it too. The dumb breed more often than the smart.
Jusatele
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+1000Super Nigerian Turbo Deluxe Custom said:
by keeping dumb people safe we allow them to bring down the status quo. remember the saying survival of the fittest? well if you remove the predators, you remove what removed the unfit. and then you have to pander to the unfit, taking resources from the fit.
I have a buddy who wants to ignore the travel warning issued by the Government and go on a week long trip to party in Mexico, I told him "No Way Jose" and he is calling me a wimp, I told him to go, I will toast him from my house, oh, by the way he does not own a house, lives in a sparsely furnished apartment, drives a worn out car and makes the same money I do, his life is rampant with bad decisions. As it has been proven, the strong (smart) rise to the top, and the unfit get culled, but in our world we pander to the dumb.
Graffiti62
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pabloman said:
Wasn't that how Sammy Davis Jr. lost his eye?
In all seriousness, I'm in agreeance with how a portion of our youth have been. Not all of today's youth are a lost cause (we all can easily see and know that Max is an intelligent individual who applies himself and can hold an intelligent conversation with individuals sometimes years his senior), but some of them are because the world around them have let them become that way. Here are a few examples:
Spelling, grammar use and punctuation (especially spelling): Around 1996-1998, the personal computer quit being a geek box and a novelty and became a mainstream component in many homes. With the purchase of many of those computers, many also purchased Microsoft Office or Microsoft Works to go along with their new purchase. This coincided with President Clinton's intiative to put a computer in every public school classroom. Children hands over fist learned how to type and do work on a PC compared to kids ten years prior, who did their work primarily with a pencil and paper. What was one perk to doing your work on the PC? Spell check and grammer check! Who cares if you put a word in wrong in your paper? It'll show up with a red line underneath it and it'll fix it. The green lines? You can't rely on the suggested changes unless you have your grammer settings set to "anal retentive" mode. With that being said, many kids never learned a lot of difference between: "then" and "than," "there," "their" and "they're," "affect" and "effect," and so on and so forth, due to the fact that when you know that your computer can fix it, why put the effort in to know how to do it right?
Things around the home: I can see how someone may not know how to do a thing or two when they move to college and leave home. I admit that I didn't know how to iron clothes all that well, but I learned quickly, mainly due to the fact that I also learned that the collar on button-up cotton shirts develop the "bacon effect" when you machine wash and dry them, meaning you have to press them. However, I have heard stories many times over on how kids entering school do not know how to do their own laundry, cook a frozen pizza, cut a frozen pizza with a cutter, operate a hand-crank can opener, run a stove or oven or use cleaning supplies properly. Now, I know the joke of a kid bringing a rash of clothes home for mom to do when you visit home, but having no clue how to sort, wash, dry or fold is just sad. Also, with fewer and fewer mothers staying home and cooking themselves, dinner, in many times, comes out of a paper bag more than it does out of an oven. When I was nine, I knew how to turn on the oven, open a can of mushrooms, put them on my pizza, put the pizza in, set the timer, take the pizza out in time, shut the oven off, take the pizza out, cut it and enjoy it. When my brother and I became older, my mom and dad bought a pizza toaster which made life a little easier, but still required common sense to run.
Simple things on your car: I have been a long believer that part of a driving test should mean knowing how to check and top off your fluids and your tire pressure, changing a flat and knowing how to change a headlight or tail light. This argument has been around for a long time, and I guess that people throughout time have not known how to ever change or check anything. I'm fortunate enough to have a brother-in-law that agrees with me enough to have my niece stay with my wife and I for a weekend while she learns the ins and outs of car maintenance. She's not allowed to drive by herself without knowing how to do what she needs to do to execute the necessities of auto ownership.
Talk to each other: When I entered college in '01, AIM was just taking off. Now, AIM seems a little old compared to what everyone has now. Facebook, Twitter and text messaging have been so mainstream with kids today that some would rather text what they want to say in chip-chop text language rather than actually tell the person themselves what they want to say. Plus, nothing is private anymore--no secrets. In my day, we still had dumb useless things to say to each other and the world, but we did it in the men's room at school. We had the s**ter rather than Twitter, as Robin Williams once said.
I'll admit that I ranted and rambled a little, but hey, I'm an old fart now--I was born in '82, during Reagan's first term. There are some things kids today will never see or use that I know were commonplace in my youth, such as rotary phones (or landlines for that matter), TVs with two knobs, VCRs, vinyl, leaded gas, fax machines, rabbit ears, coaxial and RCA connections, Saturday morning cartoons, and many other things. But, I have found out something that does help me cope: the older I get, the more sense Red Green makes.
Graffiti62
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Max said:
I was a little guy when the country changed it out, but I do remember having regular and unleaded gas. My mom had an old Volvo for a little while when I was a kid that required regular gas, and I remember her teaching me to add lead additive to a tank of gas when I was learning how gas pumps worked. Suprisingly, they still label unleaded gas as being such, even though they haven't sold gasoline with lead in it for many years.
@marko: she's doing VWO (en, ps: onze relatie is al meer dan 2 jaar gewoon legaal hoor, en de 2 jaar daarvoor was het rechtsgeldig met toestemming van de ouders, en dat was er, dus; whats your problem? jaloers? 
)
for the non-dutch people: our highschoolsystem has 6 levels, of which 3 are only really used. VMBO (lowest level, not counting the lowest 3, which are just for kids who are just smart enough not to be named legally stupid), HAVO and VWO. VWO is the highest. VMBO is like uhm... preparation medium-hard craftsschool, HAVO is high-grade general preparationschool and VWO is preparation-scientific education (University is called 'scientific education' no matter what you pick at university). the translations are VERY crooked, haha, but it is just meant as an illustration. my girlfriend is doing the highest degree of education.
In my opinion, your exams at the end of your highschoolterm is just to see if you know it all, and thats the general purpose of those exams. If you have to study 8 hours right before your exam, and you have no sleep whatsoever, you're doing it wrong, and you have been doing it wrong all those years, for crying out loud. C'mon! She's even so psyched that she forgot to take her daily medication, she forgets to eat, to sleep... this can't be right, can it?! but if i look at classmates of hers, they all exhibit the same behavior.
And common sense is indeed scarce. What a shame.
Something I witnessed. I work in the cinema/movietheater (whatever you yankies call it just kidding!), and we have HUGE signs overhead which have an arrow pointing towards the sky, with 'auditorium 8 - 14'. c'mon, are they that dumb they don't understand that 8 through 14 is upstairs? yes, they are that dumb. from every 100 visitors, 70 ask 'where is auditorium *one of 8 through 14*. Same with toilets. They really are too blind to see the signs, it would seem.
To make things worst. People never, ever, never never pay attention to emergency exits. Its something I had to teach my girlfriend: when you enter a building, find an escape route! It has helped/saved us on multiple occasions. When you enter a building, find the exits, find the fire hoses, extinguishers, etc etc. When an accident happens on the street, or when you see a guy lying on the street bleeding, and you witness that occurrence, call the cops immediately.
This is not just my opinion, you know. The government has made advertisements and did come campaigning to promote this kind of behavior. For me its common sense, but its a shame people have to be TOUGHT this kind of behaviour. Its a shame people have to be shown what their mistakes are.
Talking about mistakes, people can't even talk right in their own language, let alone a foreign one! they say something, which is obviously wrong, and I correct them, but many don't understand, until I translate what they just said in English, French or German. Lets have fun, and here's one of those sa(i)d translations. 'Their parked their car'. I had to crunch my brain like crazy to find an appropriate example, but there you go
:help:
There are some shows here, to show how dumb people are. Correction: these shows are quiz shows and for 90% of the population they're just that; quiz shows. But for the other 10% of the people, these shows are a way of showing how stupid people are.
Some questions:
name a famous person from Surinam. given answer: uhm, Nelson Mandela?
Where is the red square? given answer: Spain, cause everything there is red!
Where is the 'Square of Heavenly Peace' (Tianamen square)? Uhm, On the moon, cause its always peaceful there!
(shown is a picture of the minister of education): who is this? given answer: uhm, I think he's from the mob, cause he has a hat.
(shown is a picture of the Pope); who is this? given answer: santa claus
)for the non-dutch people: our highschoolsystem has 6 levels, of which 3 are only really used. VMBO (lowest level, not counting the lowest 3, which are just for kids who are just smart enough not to be named legally stupid), HAVO and VWO. VWO is the highest. VMBO is like uhm... preparation medium-hard craftsschool, HAVO is high-grade general preparationschool and VWO is preparation-scientific education (University is called 'scientific education' no matter what you pick at university). the translations are VERY crooked, haha, but it is just meant as an illustration. my girlfriend is doing the highest degree of education.
In my opinion, your exams at the end of your highschoolterm is just to see if you know it all, and thats the general purpose of those exams. If you have to study 8 hours right before your exam, and you have no sleep whatsoever, you're doing it wrong, and you have been doing it wrong all those years, for crying out loud. C'mon! She's even so psyched that she forgot to take her daily medication, she forgets to eat, to sleep... this can't be right, can it?! but if i look at classmates of hers, they all exhibit the same behavior.
And common sense is indeed scarce. What a shame.
Something I witnessed. I work in the cinema/movietheater (whatever you yankies call it
just kidding!), and we have HUGE signs overhead which have an arrow pointing towards the sky, with 'auditorium 8 - 14'. c'mon, are they that dumb they don't understand that 8 through 14 is upstairs? yes, they are that dumb. from every 100 visitors, 70 ask 'where is auditorium *one of 8 through 14*. Same with toilets. They really are too blind to see the signs, it would seem. To make things worst. People never, ever, never never pay attention to emergency exits. Its something I had to teach my girlfriend: when you enter a building, find an escape route! It has helped/saved us on multiple occasions. When you enter a building, find the exits, find the fire hoses, extinguishers, etc etc. When an accident happens on the street, or when you see a guy lying on the street bleeding, and you witness that occurrence, call the cops immediately.
This is not just my opinion, you know. The government has made advertisements and did come campaigning to promote this kind of behavior. For me its common sense, but its a shame people have to be TOUGHT this kind of behaviour. Its a shame people have to be shown what their mistakes are.
Talking about mistakes, people can't even talk right in their own language, let alone a foreign one! they say something, which is obviously wrong, and I correct them, but many don't understand, until I translate what they just said in English, French or German. Lets have fun, and here's one of those sa(i)d translations. 'Their parked their car'. I had to crunch my brain like crazy to find an appropriate example, but there you go
:help:
There are some shows here, to show how dumb people are. Correction: these shows are quiz shows and for 90% of the population they're just that; quiz shows. But for the other 10% of the people, these shows are a way of showing how stupid people are.
Some questions:
name a famous person from Surinam. given answer: uhm, Nelson Mandela?
Where is the red square? given answer: Spain, cause everything there is red!
Where is the 'Square of Heavenly Peace' (Tianamen square)? Uhm, On the moon, cause its always peaceful there!
(shown is a picture of the minister of education): who is this? given answer: uhm, I think he's from the mob, cause he has a hat.
(shown is a picture of the Pope); who is this? given answer: santa claus
Jusatele
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but then governments promote stupid stuff
take the good ole USA, we have every night on prime time the government is running commercials on how bad tobacco is for us and we need to stop it, then they give money to the states for individual anti tobacco campaigns. so then people get the message and start to cut down on the use of tobacco. And we now have to give government subsidies to tobacco farmers and we have to raise taxes on tobacco products because not enough people are smoking to cover the programs those taxes are meant for.
and that is just the tip of the way governments do teach us how to manage money, I mean we tax smokers so we can tell them not to smoke, and when they listen we get upset that not enough tax money from tobacco is coming in? What moron invented that circle?
And we invent, staff and fund departments in our school boards to save money on books, we have to store the books we buy in bulk and they are delivered to warehouses not the school so we have to transport them costing a school board over a million a year to save 30 thousand on books. And someone with a Masters degree thought that one up.
oh well, let me be ignorant of government and life will be bliss.
take the good ole USA, we have every night on prime time the government is running commercials on how bad tobacco is for us and we need to stop it, then they give money to the states for individual anti tobacco campaigns. so then people get the message and start to cut down on the use of tobacco. And we now have to give government subsidies to tobacco farmers and we have to raise taxes on tobacco products because not enough people are smoking to cover the programs those taxes are meant for.
and that is just the tip of the way governments do teach us how to manage money, I mean we tax smokers so we can tell them not to smoke, and when they listen we get upset that not enough tax money from tobacco is coming in? What moron invented that circle?
And we invent, staff and fund departments in our school boards to save money on books, we have to store the books we buy in bulk and they are delivered to warehouses not the school so we have to transport them costing a school board over a million a year to save 30 thousand on books. And someone with a Masters degree thought that one up.
oh well, let me be ignorant of government and life will be bliss.
Superlizard
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What they should be teaching kids in high school these days are concepts that are actually useful, such as:
- credit
- balancing a checkbook
- loans
- investing
- buying a home
- people politics
- getting your foot in the door with a job
- networking
- taxes
- saving $$$ when shopping
etc...
But unfortunately, these are all concepts which appeal to the self-reliant, and our gov't
certainly doesn't want a bunch of self-reliant types running around out there.
- credit
- balancing a checkbook
- loans
- investing
- buying a home
- people politics
- getting your foot in the door with a job
- networking
- taxes
- saving $$$ when shopping
etc...
But unfortunately, these are all concepts which appeal to the self-reliant, and our gov't
certainly doesn't want a bunch of self-reliant types running around out there.
Nightclub Dwight
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Every generation since time began has always thought the younger generation is stupid, out of touch, crazy, out of control etc. Its natural. I remember hearing it as a kid growing up, and now I sometimes feel that way towards kids today. I think every culture has a variation of the phrase "Those damn kids these days!"
In moments of clarity though, I sometimes remember some of the dumb things I did when growing up, and I shudder in horror. Its all part of growing up. What we call common sense actually has to be learned. For example, its common sense not to put your hand on a hot stove, but if you've never seen a hot stove before, how would you know right off that its dangerous?
One more thing, about that theater sign...... If 70% of the people don't understand what the sign is trying to convey about the theater being upstairs, perhaps the sign could be improved. The message is not reaching its intended target. One way to interpret the situation is to think that 70% of people are stupid. While that may be the case, it would be smart to alter the sign so that the message is more easily understood. That's common sense!
I don't necessarily disagree with a lot of the thoughts expressed in this thread, I'm just providing perspective. Soon enough the youth of today will join us as adults, and together we will deplore the next generation to come along. Its a cycle thats going to continue.
In moments of clarity though, I sometimes remember some of the dumb things I did when growing up, and I shudder in horror. Its all part of growing up. What we call common sense actually has to be learned. For example, its common sense not to put your hand on a hot stove, but if you've never seen a hot stove before, how would you know right off that its dangerous?
One more thing, about that theater sign...... If 70% of the people don't understand what the sign is trying to convey about the theater being upstairs, perhaps the sign could be improved. The message is not reaching its intended target. One way to interpret the situation is to think that 70% of people are stupid. While that may be the case, it would be smart to alter the sign so that the message is more easily understood. That's common sense!
I don't necessarily disagree with a lot of the thoughts expressed in this thread, I'm just providing perspective. Soon enough the youth of today will join us as adults, and together we will deplore the next generation to come along. Its a cycle thats going to continue.
Orpheo said:@marko: she's doing VWO (en, ps: onze relatie is al meer dan 2 jaar gewoon legaal hoor, en de 2 jaar daarvoor was het rechtsgeldig met toestemming van de ouders, en dat was er, dus; whats your problem? jaloers?
haha, ik weet het, maar ik ga je er over 5 jaar waarschijnlijk nog steeds zo nu en dan aan herinneren..
B3Guy
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no, trust me. I'm in college now, but even in grade school I felt like 98% of my peers were idiots (probably because they were). I can honestly say teenagers don't give a crap (nothing new under the sun), and I can't say I don't blame them. Now I'm in college I see how much of a waste of time regular grade school is. I honestly think it is not serious or challenging enough. This is better in college, because everyone is fairly common sense, but the courses are still half baked. College adds up to a bunch of smart kids teaching themselves while paying professors to hand out assignments, 60% of which are useless in the long run. Basically, you learn to BS your way thru the useless assignments so you have time to learn what you want by yourself. But you get to know lots of cool people and do lots of cool things. Its just that the classes themselves aren't very beneficial.
B3Guy said:
Definitely, I could not agree more with you. I love my college and I love my course, but a lot of the assignments are a complete waste of time. It does give me the time to study music full time for as long as I want, with the benefit to ask questions and benefit from the enormous amount of experience and skills of the tutors.
Well I'm an old guy, and I have to say things have changed.... school used to be designed primarily to teach younger people that you had to wake up at an obscenely early hour and race around getting ready to go do some really boring, inane and pointless things - for the rest of your life. From what I hear from my guitar students, they've added the concept of "teamwork" - rather than competing against the less smart kids on a bell curve, the smarter kids are shackled with the responsibility of dragging them along. And I'm pretty sure that what's being taught in the elite private schools to kids named "Kennedy" and "Rockefeller" is this: BOY HAVE WE GOT SOME FLUNKIES FOR YOU!
But the Hollywood culture is totally at odds with the school's aim of turning kids into automatons - for factory jobs that aren't there anymore. Everyone's looking for the big score... I've heard people say they're "planning" to be a talk show host? With absolutely no idea of where those people come from, mostly from the ranks of stand-up comics. Even though I've done an amazing amount of really stupid things in my life, I always torched through school - by studying the teacher and figuring out what was on the test. And like everyone else, I got out of honors math programs with absolutely NO IDEA how to do my taxes, how to do bookkeeping for a small business, but I could calculate the hypotenuse to beat all.
If there would be a single course that I could add to high school, it would be formal logic - how to recognize the construction of false arguments. For some bizarre reason, it's taught as a side subject to philosophy, the Greeks in particular qualified formal logic to the nth degree, and now it's taught using Latin names. Uh-uh - there are half a dozen or so false arguments, you see them every day, every advertising and political writer leans on them heavily. And because they are designed to sidestep whatever actual common sense you have scraped up and appeal to the emotions, they work fantastically well.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies
If I could add two more courses, one would be in "Proportionality" - i.e. all the U.S. "welfare" put together is equal to no more than 1/5th of the military budget, there are roughly 40 times more people who die from a doctor's or hospital's mistake that die from all illegal drugs put together, i.e. there are no more child molesters, rapists or white slavers than there were 50 years ago but parents are terrified to let their children out of door or even out of sight because they treat "C.S.I." and the likes as a documentary... pretty much ALL the stupidity that metastacized through America is directly tied to TV, people honestly don't realize that it's sole purpose is to sell stuff - there's NO public service component to it.
And the other course would be in REAL math - the stuff you need to know.
But the Hollywood culture is totally at odds with the school's aim of turning kids into automatons - for factory jobs that aren't there anymore. Everyone's looking for the big score... I've heard people say they're "planning" to be a talk show host? With absolutely no idea of where those people come from, mostly from the ranks of stand-up comics. Even though I've done an amazing amount of really stupid things in my life, I always torched through school - by studying the teacher and figuring out what was on the test. And like everyone else, I got out of honors math programs with absolutely NO IDEA how to do my taxes, how to do bookkeeping for a small business, but I could calculate the hypotenuse to beat all.
If there would be a single course that I could add to high school, it would be formal logic - how to recognize the construction of false arguments. For some bizarre reason, it's taught as a side subject to philosophy, the Greeks in particular qualified formal logic to the nth degree, and now it's taught using Latin names. Uh-uh - there are half a dozen or so false arguments, you see them every day, every advertising and political writer leans on them heavily. And because they are designed to sidestep whatever actual common sense you have scraped up and appeal to the emotions, they work fantastically well.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies
If I could add two more courses, one would be in "Proportionality" - i.e. all the U.S. "welfare" put together is equal to no more than 1/5th of the military budget, there are roughly 40 times more people who die from a doctor's or hospital's mistake that die from all illegal drugs put together, i.e. there are no more child molesters, rapists or white slavers than there were 50 years ago but parents are terrified to let their children out of door or even out of sight because they treat "C.S.I." and the likes as a documentary... pretty much ALL the stupidity that metastacized through America is directly tied to TV, people honestly don't realize that it's sole purpose is to sell stuff - there's NO public service component to it.
And the other course would be in REAL math - the stuff you need to know.
Jusatele
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I used to think those math courses were useless, but now I can find an answer to a problem in my head, Algebra, while most guys are pulling out paper I do it by formula, trig, I work it in my head and calculate measurements at ease, while guys who took none are pulling out calculators, and it goes on, those courses are useful in life. The English and lit. courses and you learn to understand, and how to not look like an idiot. Yes guys notice grammar and spelling when looking at applications you submit and they judge you by yours. I can say most college graduates do not work in the field of their studies, college preps you for being able to learn and adapt, Yes many in science and math careers do need specific training, but a lot of them realise what they study in college is outdated 4 years after they are out.
Mini college and trade training are also extremely important to consider, such as places teaching career specific training. All education transmit knowledge, and knowledge is power, and the power to succeed is what you need to obtain.
The main problem I see in younger kids is we are no longer teaching kids to work hard and succeed, we are teaching to do as little as possible, to look for a way to sue, to look for the once in a lifetime opportunity.
But in truth, the world needs street sweepers as much as business moguls, we need people in the gas station behind the register, we need grocery clerks and construction workers, Doctors are needed as much as a guy to clean out a stuck drain. No Matter what you choose to do, do it the best you can and try to succeed at it. It takes an uneducated person to fall into a career that will suffice and stick with it because it is good enough, but yet complain about the guy doing better because that guy applied himself.
Kids are not any more stupid, but between political correctness, the non competition rules, and parents teaching kids that "do you want to be a ditch digger ?) mentality we do not teach our kids to apply themselves and get the most out of life but instead teach them to look for the easiest way out and let others do the work.
Mini college and trade training are also extremely important to consider, such as places teaching career specific training. All education transmit knowledge, and knowledge is power, and the power to succeed is what you need to obtain.
The main problem I see in younger kids is we are no longer teaching kids to work hard and succeed, we are teaching to do as little as possible, to look for a way to sue, to look for the once in a lifetime opportunity.
But in truth, the world needs street sweepers as much as business moguls, we need people in the gas station behind the register, we need grocery clerks and construction workers, Doctors are needed as much as a guy to clean out a stuck drain. No Matter what you choose to do, do it the best you can and try to succeed at it. It takes an uneducated person to fall into a career that will suffice and stick with it because it is good enough, but yet complain about the guy doing better because that guy applied himself.
Kids are not any more stupid, but between political correctness, the non competition rules, and parents teaching kids that "do you want to be a ditch digger ?) mentality we do not teach our kids to apply themselves and get the most out of life but instead teach them to look for the easiest way out and let others do the work.
Patrick from Davis
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I know several teachers here in the States, and the fact of the matter is their jobs depend on the kids passing the standardized exams. It is how their districts get money, and they keep their jobs. The teachers don't particularly care for the system, but it is in place now, and difficult to change.
I breezed through most of high school. Most subjects were not that hard, or interesting. But, I had very stern parents at home that expected me to do well. There was no sense in arguing a reason that you got a bad grade because you didn't understand the class, that meant you had to work harder. I went to college and the same rules applied to those courses, but they expected more in less time. So I got better at figuring out classes. I also tied several concepts that were being drilled into my head with repetition to something in the real world which made everything much easier for me to get. I learned again that there was no use arguing about what appeared to be useless classes that were required for graduation. I discovered it was much easier for me to get through them if viewed them as, "things I needed to learn about stuff I didn't care about because I had to prove I could do something I thought was pointless in order to get to a goal I did want." The degree. With the, "just get it over with," mentality in place, the classes were much easier to get through. And, I know I can do things I don't really care about for long periods of time at a high level.
Then I went to graduate school. At this point there was a lot more responsibility on me to learn what I needed. There were no classes on the subjects I needed to know. There was a lot of time in the library, third floor section 501, going through dusty journals. Online journals were starting up at that time, but not all there. Not much fun, but hey I want to know it. This went on for a long time, but my experiments went well, so it was generally worth the time in the library. With no grant money, I TA'd a lot as well. No better way to flip your knowledge sideways than to explain it to a class full of people that don't understand it. You learn a lot that way. Especially how to MacGyver ancient half working equipment so that the lab you are TA'ing will work.
Now I am older and do research for a living. These days kids are far beyond me in ability at somethings because I didn't grow up with the tools that they have. Other things I am much better versed in. The one thing I have noticed is that asking for help and practicing things seems not to happen like they did when I was in school. I could be making myself feel better with the fuzzy memories, but I don't remember it that way. School was work for me, and I worked hard at it. But if I needed help, I asked. I taught myself what I know about guitar building, pedal building, and amp building by reading, asking questions, and having enough sense to not electrocute myself. I continue to slowly put things in place as time goes on because there is always something new to learn. Through out all of this process what I learned was how to learn things. (Slightly off topic, but if anyone has a 5 MHz oscilloscope and wants to decipher why external word clocks sound better than the ones in digital encoder/decoders, I'd love to know. There is no straight forward reason (that reason is that they don't help) so I am guessing that the signal does something to the encoder, even if it is only a clock. But the external ones do sound better. Perplexing.)
While I do not think that students are dumber these days, it seems that the approach has changed. Still, you get out of it what you put in. If the desire is not there, it won't really matter much in the end. Enough ranting, off to find another API 500 module I need to learn more about.
Patrick
I breezed through most of high school. Most subjects were not that hard, or interesting. But, I had very stern parents at home that expected me to do well. There was no sense in arguing a reason that you got a bad grade because you didn't understand the class, that meant you had to work harder. I went to college and the same rules applied to those courses, but they expected more in less time. So I got better at figuring out classes. I also tied several concepts that were being drilled into my head with repetition to something in the real world which made everything much easier for me to get. I learned again that there was no use arguing about what appeared to be useless classes that were required for graduation. I discovered it was much easier for me to get through them if viewed them as, "things I needed to learn about stuff I didn't care about because I had to prove I could do something I thought was pointless in order to get to a goal I did want." The degree. With the, "just get it over with," mentality in place, the classes were much easier to get through. And, I know I can do things I don't really care about for long periods of time at a high level.
Then I went to graduate school. At this point there was a lot more responsibility on me to learn what I needed. There were no classes on the subjects I needed to know. There was a lot of time in the library, third floor section 501, going through dusty journals. Online journals were starting up at that time, but not all there. Not much fun, but hey I want to know it. This went on for a long time, but my experiments went well, so it was generally worth the time in the library. With no grant money, I TA'd a lot as well. No better way to flip your knowledge sideways than to explain it to a class full of people that don't understand it. You learn a lot that way. Especially how to MacGyver ancient half working equipment so that the lab you are TA'ing will work.
Now I am older and do research for a living. These days kids are far beyond me in ability at somethings because I didn't grow up with the tools that they have. Other things I am much better versed in. The one thing I have noticed is that asking for help and practicing things seems not to happen like they did when I was in school. I could be making myself feel better with the fuzzy memories, but I don't remember it that way. School was work for me, and I worked hard at it. But if I needed help, I asked. I taught myself what I know about guitar building, pedal building, and amp building by reading, asking questions, and having enough sense to not electrocute myself. I continue to slowly put things in place as time goes on because there is always something new to learn. Through out all of this process what I learned was how to learn things. (Slightly off topic, but if anyone has a 5 MHz oscilloscope and wants to decipher why external word clocks sound better than the ones in digital encoder/decoders, I'd love to know. There is no straight forward reason (that reason is that they don't help) so I am guessing that the signal does something to the encoder, even if it is only a clock. But the external ones do sound better. Perplexing.)
While I do not think that students are dumber these days, it seems that the approach has changed. Still, you get out of it what you put in. If the desire is not there, it won't really matter much in the end. Enough ranting, off to find another API 500 module I need to learn more about.
Patrick
O
OzziePete
Guest
OK just some random observations from me...
* It would seem that the systems of education are very laissez faire, and by that, I mean that the opportunities to succeed are there but there is no one pushing you greatly towards that goal. From what I have seen, the kids get told where they have to be, what is at school to help them achieve it etc. but once they reach high school and learn to talk back at teachers, no one takes them to task when they veer away from that til their behaviour becomes a criminal matter!
* That means they react very indignantly to any intervention as they are not used to being corrected, they take great umbrage to being told 'no'.
* It leads to a lack of respect for those who are actually in positions of authority trying to tell these people that the answer is no, NO, NO!!! and a demanding nature from them whenever they seek service, bordering upon a boorish behaviour or sheer arrogance...(Why can't I have that. :confused4:...)
* I have observed this attitude still pervading amongst young adults now, an attitude they picked up in high school and still continue with.
* Whenever the 'penny drops' and they find themselves in a no win situation the usual method of saving face is blame everything or everybody else for their failure....they find it hard to accept failure or accept responsibility. They also believe that saying 'sorry' is the 'get-out-of-jail-card' word to say for any manner of indiscretion or illegality.
* It would seem that the systems of education are very laissez faire, and by that, I mean that the opportunities to succeed are there but there is no one pushing you greatly towards that goal. From what I have seen, the kids get told where they have to be, what is at school to help them achieve it etc. but once they reach high school and learn to talk back at teachers, no one takes them to task when they veer away from that til their behaviour becomes a criminal matter!
* That means they react very indignantly to any intervention as they are not used to being corrected, they take great umbrage to being told 'no'.
* It leads to a lack of respect for those who are actually in positions of authority trying to tell these people that the answer is no, NO, NO!!! and a demanding nature from them whenever they seek service, bordering upon a boorish behaviour or sheer arrogance...(Why can't I have that. :confused4:...)
* I have observed this attitude still pervading amongst young adults now, an attitude they picked up in high school and still continue with.
* Whenever the 'penny drops' and they find themselves in a no win situation the usual method of saving face is blame everything or everybody else for their failure....they find it hard to accept failure or accept responsibility. They also believe that saying 'sorry' is the 'get-out-of-jail-card' word to say for any manner of indiscretion or illegality.
