Neutral Education

Message 32 of 34 (566985) 06-29-2010 2:04 AM

Reply to: Message 31 by celia19O5 06-28-2010 9:47 PM

The little mites are too uneducated and untamed to select what they need to learn.

They need to be taught the basics whether they like it or not.

(You can't live on just cookies and chocolate, can you?)

Message 33 of 34 (567139) 06-29-2010 6:45 PM

Reply to: Message 31 by celia19O5 06-28-2010 9:47 PM

Well, they can always slack off. They're forced to turn up, but no-one can make them succeed.

Message 34 of 34 (567146) 06-29-2010 6:55 PM

Reply to: Message 31 by celia19O5 06-28-2010 9:47 PM

What makes you say this? What reason do you have to be of the opinion that children willl be better served by being taught "what they like" and not the less "fun" subjects?

What about subjects that require additional prerequisite knowledge?

When does this period of self-direction end? How do we ensure that our kids wind up at the end-point of their education with at least the bare minimum to participate in modern society? For example, if a child really doesn;t like reading, at what point do you force him to learn? What about math? Both are absolute necessities in modern Western society, and in fact without at least some progress in both subjects, the child will be unable to proceed into other subjects they may find interesting.

Do you have a study or some actual form of evidence that suggests children are actually able to choose topics for their own education, or does the idea just "sound nice" to you?

Because honestly, this sounds like a complete load of bullshit to me. Kids are curious, and yes they'll pay better attention to things they think are fun, but the fact is a child is simply not intellectually well-developed enough to choose their own coursework; they have no reference point to be able to distinguish what is more or less important to their futures, all they see is "dinosaurs are cool," and "I don't want to read See Spot Run again, it's boring!"

Personally, I think the real trick is not to let the kids choose topics based on what they find interesting, but rather to find ways to make the important topics interesting to the child. The adults, being the responsible party, should take responsibility for the education of the children, not foist the responsibility onto the child who's nowhere near competent enough to even realize what they don't know or what's important.