Godzone falling in the international education ratings [Archive]

Blackbird

4th December 2013, 12:50

...with a large percentage of kids aspiring to be a 'barista' or doing, 'graphic design', and a large percentage of the kids not being able to spell any of those three words and a large part of the remainder being on another planet, I can see why...I also happen to know a hell of a lot of high achieving, thoughtful and hard working youngsters also...

Back on the 80's, the company I worked for used to have an annual apprentice intake of up to 20 school-leavers, mainly engineering but a few others. One of the other positions was for an apprentice soignwrotter..... at least, that's what one of the applicants put, I kid you not - still chuckle about it! Just to add to your comment, we took in quite a few kids who didn't get good grades as they didn't really connect with learning at that stage but the school reports said they still had good attitudes. Most of those kids really took off once they saw the value of learning when applied practically. One of them became NZ apprentice of the year in boilermaking and another eventually ended up with a BE (Hons) and running a factory overseas. There's always hope for the ones who want to get on.

MSTRS

4th December 2013, 12:50

BoristheBiter

4th December 2013, 12:52

It started back in the 80's and probably before.

e.g. We did school "C" maths but for some that was too hard and they failed so some bright spark said we can't have people failing so lets give them an easier test and along came Auckland maths.
a waste of paper as it meant nothing, you couldn't get into uni with it I guess they thought these thickies won't be going anyway.

they have been dumbing down kids since ages ago to make the teachers and figures look good.

Not just this government but all of them over the last 40+ years.

Blackbird

4th December 2013, 13:01

So - NZ is failing in the education dept? Nothing to worry about then. It's all the other areas we are failing in that I would be concerned about...
You only have to take a look at what pass for 'the leaders' of the country for answers as to why.

True leadership (as opposed to being a good manager) is a really rare commodity, not only in NZ. In my entire working life, I'd only rate 2 people as true leaders - the sort you'd walk over broken glass for time and time again.

yod

4th December 2013, 13:06

*bitch, moan, bitch, moan, bitch, moan, bitch, moan, bitch, moan, bitch, moan*

wasn't sure what topic to choose, just wanted to join in....

thanks

awa355

4th December 2013, 15:26

NZ education on 'right track' - Gluckman This from the PM's science advisor. He must be right, he is a " SIR ".

Also from the same guy,

" He pointed out limitations with such ranking systems, saying it was difficult to make objective comparisons between a diverse range of variables across local situations.

"Limitations notwithstanding, there is no denying PISA’s utility and the importance of understanding our performance trends over time. But it is just as important to understand that learning contexts are notoriously difficult to capture and that context matters, especially when it comes to devising mitigating strategies an appropriate interventions.

“There is no quick fix for raising student performance; success is the product of multiple internal and external factors, and the results of the National Monitoring survey (NMSSA), announced last week, have given us an important edge in these efforts," he said."

I have no idea what he said, but sounds really important. :weep:

I can remember a teacher back in 1961, saying " Those of you who fail, will be back in this class next year, and by God, you wont fail a second time ".

MisterD

4th December 2013, 17:18

Last completed under the Key Governmetn in 2009 - so all this under National's stewardship ...

Yeah right. Consider that the OECD said that Britain's likewise poor performance "couldn't possibly" be blames on their current administration, who came to power like a year after our Blueteam govt.

This is just what happens when celebrating excellence and success becomes taboo.

Motu

4th December 2013, 17:28

It started back in the 80's and probably before.

e.g. We did school "C" maths but for some that was too hard and they failed so some bright spark said we can't have people failing so lets give them an easier test and along came Auckland maths.
a waste of paper as it meant nothing, you couldn't get into uni with it I guess they thought these thickies won't be going anyway.

We've been dumb forever - back in the '60's we called it Trade Maths, just basic 3rd form maths, arithmetic and some very basic algebra. Not that we did any Trade Maths, usually we did homework for the next period, actually we only did homework for one subject, and ignored the rest. There was no intention of going to uni, why the hell would I want to do that?

mashman

4th December 2013, 17:39

Yeah right. Consider that the OECD said that Britain's likewise poor performance "couldn't possibly" be blames on their current administration, who came to power like a year after our Blueteam govt.

This is just what happens when celebrating excellence and success becomes taboo.

Really? You're gonna blame the left or the right? They've fucked it up between themselves over the years. Education is a business now, not something that should be given every resource it requires. I mean why bother teaching anyone anything.

waaaaaaaa waaaaaaa waaaaaaaaaaaaa... that has next to fuck all to do with it. Thing is though, excellence and success is what's taught at school, albeit a bit too PC at times. On those grounds, there's more to it than petty envy's.

BoristheBiter

4th December 2013, 17:39

We've been dumb forever - back in the '60's we called it Trade Maths, just basic 3rd form maths, arithmetic and some very basic algebra. Not that we did any Trade Maths, usually we did homework for the next period, actually we only did homework for one subject, and ignored the rest. There was no intention of going to uni, why the hell would I want to do that?

Yep, and now everyone does it.

MisterD

4th December 2013, 17:54

Really? You're gonna blame the left or the right? They've fucked it up between themselves over the years. Education is a business now, not something that should be given every resource it requires. I mean why bother teaching anyone anything.

waaaaaaaa waaaaaaa waaaaaaaaaaaaa... that has next to fuck all to do with it. Thing is though, excellence and success is what's taught at school, albeit a bit too PC at times. On those grounds, there's more to it than petty envy's.

Oh fuck off is it. Success isn't celebrated and failure isn't mentioned. If we were to be truthful we'd re-name the whole shebang the Indoctrination System, it's designed to turn out unthinking, compliant, PAYE ballot box fodder.

Once upon a time it was used to try to suppress the Maori language, now the wheel has turned and it's used to glorify anything that's *not* Anglo-Saxon in origin. The last thing that our take-it-in-turns political "elite" want is actual freethinkers trained to use their intelligence to the maximum.

mashman

4th December 2013, 18:13

mashman

4th December 2013, 18:16

Yep, and now everyone does it.

Good. Fiscally responsible people not taking on any debt.

Zedder

4th December 2013, 18:27

carbonhed

4th December 2013, 18:32

Funny how the teachers aren't lining up to take the "credit" for this result... when we do well you have to beat them off with a stick :rolleyes:

oldrider

4th December 2013, 18:41

Funny how the teachers aren't lining up to take the "credit" for this result... when we do well you have to beat them off with a stick :rolleyes:

Excellent observation! :first:

scissorhands

4th December 2013, 19:03

The jobless job market is hardly inspiring. Social media has taken attention away from academia.

NZ like the US is in a state of decay.... new tigers are on the upswing, like Africa, Brazil and many small countries.

The dollar is doing well

Bean

4th December 2013, 19:36

Maybe good academic results from an education system, are merely by-products of effective societies. Unfortunately for NZ, the opposite might also be true?

Ocean1

4th December 2013, 19:37

You don't have to tell a kid that they've failed. They know. They know when they've succeeded too. They talk about these things in terms that they learn from us...

You do have to tell a kid he's failed. You have to tell them when they succeed. And you have to be honest in both cases. We've not been honest with them since I were a nipper, it'd hurt their feelings. Apparently.

As for NZ's education system results, they'll improve when the choices made during your school years and your success in achieving them produce appropriate consequences in your working years. And not until.

mashman

4th December 2013, 19:55

You do have to tell a kid he's failed. You have to tell them when they succeed. And you have to be honest in both cases. We've not been honest with them since I were a nipper, it'd hurt their feelings. Apparently.

As for NZ's education system results, they'll improve when the choices made during your school years and your success in achieving them produce appropriate consequences in your working years. And not until.

True, but they do see it and learn it from other kids too. Tell your kids to say hi to Santa for me.

Quite possibly. It's a shame we can't send them to school when they're "ready" or pull them out when they're really not into it whilst giving them something to do. Some may never go. I have no problem with this if it results in better workers.

BoristheBiter

4th December 2013, 20:17

True, but they do see it and learn it from other kids too. Tell your kids to say hi to Santa for me.

Quite possibly. It's a shame we can't send them to school when they're "ready" or pull them out when they're really not into it whilst giving them something to do. Some may never go. I have no problem with this if it results in better workers.

I still blame the teachers.

we had good ones that taught you because they were passionate about it, to others it was just a job and they didn't care as they got paid either way.

Ocean1

4th December 2013, 20:28

True, but they do see it and learn it from other kids too.

What they see is that there's no point in putting in any effort because there's no real difference, the more you earn the more someone takes off you, so you might as well not bother.

Quite possibly. It's a shame we can't send them to school when they're "ready" or pull them out when they're really not into it whilst giving them something to do. Some may never go. I have no problem with this if it results in better workers.

Yeah, why not, someone else will always pay for your time off school, just like they pay for your time off work.

Ocean1

4th December 2013, 20:34

I still blame the teachers.

we had good ones that taught you because they were passionate about it, to others it was just a job and they didn't care as they got paid either way.

There's a quantifiable difference in performance across cultures in NZ. Same teachers. Same syllabus.

There's a quantifiable difference in performance between generations in NZ. Same measuring stick.

Common variables? Parents who have actually lived with the natural consequences of any lack of individual performance, at school and at work. It's a life-changing experience. Our children need that lesson more than any other.

mashman

4th December 2013, 20:45

I still blame the teachers.

we had good ones that taught you because they were passionate about it, to others it was just a job and they didn't care as they got paid either way.

Maybe they're disenchanted given the political tug of war they've witnessed over the years? What do you do after 10 - 15 years in one profession? that doesn't involve taking a salary hit?

What they see is that there's no point in putting in any effort because there's no real difference, the more you earn the more someone takes off you, so you might as well not bother.

Yeah, why not, someone else will always pay for your time off school, just like they pay for your time off work.

Then that's our fault. I'd go for, there's no space for them at the economy. They're gonna have to wait for a job or make an opportunity. And what about, not all kids want to be schooled. Tough shit? Suck it up youngun? Best thing about it, is that there's always room at the bottom and they do their own thing, not to dissimilar to the escapades at the other end of the societal spectrum really.

It's a case of. Would it be better for kids if they went to school when they were ready? Right? If the answer is no, then you need a better reason than, oh it costs too much money. NOW caters for these things without any detrimental affect on society or the economy for that matter. Wonder if the students would be better and potentially kids in general. Ideally a parent should "home-school" during that time, which'll mean that they'll need to be paid if they're a single parent. Money in the way again. Tsk, you get what you are willing to pay for?

mashman

4th December 2013, 20:54

Common variables? Parents who have actually lived with the natural consequences of any lack of individual performance, at school and at work. It's a life-changing experience. Our children need that lesson more than any other.

Meh. If they won't listen and won't perform... then what?

Ocean1

4th December 2013, 20:59

Meh. If they won't listen and won't perform... then what?

Nobody owes you a living. Tell your kids to produce something worthwhile or go hungry.

Tsk, you get what you are willing to pay for?

And when you get what you earn you'll see some improvement in the decline in performance of most aspects of society.

mashman

4th December 2013, 21:06

Nobody owes you a living. Tell your kids to produce something worthwhile or go hungry.

And when you get what you earn you'll see some improvement in the decline in performance of most aspects of society.

Yes they do if a living leads to a better life. I will teach my kids: "Try not to become women of success, but rather try to become women of value" Einstein.

Fucked if I can make head nor tail out of that last line.

Ocean1

5th December 2013, 07:09

Yes they do if a living leads to a better life.

So not only does somebody owe you a living it has to be a really really good one?

I will teach my kids: "Try not to become women of success, but rather try to become women of value" Einstein.

What is success if not the product of value?

Fucked if I can make head nor tail out of that last line.

Doesn't surprise me in the least. It means that when your standard of living is dependant on your own personal performance then there's nobody else to blame if it's not quite up to your expectations.

As oposed to the continual bitching from you about how it's nobody's fault they haven't got a job, that the economy actually needs people on the dole and any number of patently absurd notions that absolve any individual from any responsibility for his lack of performance.

mashman

5th December 2013, 07:51

So not only does somebody owe you a living it has to be a really really good one?

If you are going to limit an individuals standard of living by setting a ceiling on how much they can earn, then absolutely.

What is success if not the product of value?

Success is achievement, be it positive or negative, and that success may have absolutely no value at all, it could simply be learning to tie your shoelaces.

Doesn't surprise me in the least. It means that when your standard of living is dependant on your own personal performance then there's nobody else to blame if it's not quite up to your expatations.

As oposed to the continual bitching from you about how it's nobody's fault they haven't got a job, that the economy actually needs people on the dole and any number of patently absurd notions that absolve any individual from any responsibility for his lack of performance.

:killingme what utter horseshit.

Even more horseshit. The facts are simple, so you should be able to grasp them. Read up on Full Employment v's Hyperinflation (or any employment v inflationary articles) and then explain to me again how absurd the notion is. Til then, get yer fuckin glasses cleaned ya myopic fucknugget.

BoristheBiter

5th December 2013, 08:09

Success is achievement, be it positive or negative, and that success may have absolutely no value at all, it could simply be learning to tie your shoelaces.

.

So there is no value in being able to tie your own shoelace?

BoristheBiter

5th December 2013, 08:14

There's a quantifiable difference in performance across cultures in NZ. Same teachers. Same syllabus.

There's a quantifiable difference in performance between generations in NZ. Same measuring stick.

Common variables? Parents who have actually lived with the natural consequences of any lack of individual performance, at school and at work. It's a life-changing experience. Our children need that lesson more than any other.

In some cases. if you had a shit teacher you learned nothing or had no wanting to learn.

As they say them that can do, them that can't teach.

Ocean1

5th December 2013, 08:51

If you are going to limit an individuals standard of living by setting a ceiling on how much they can earn,

The only practical limit on what anyone's hard work can earn them is the exponential taxation of income.

then absolutely.

Oh cool. Let's all sit around in a circle and wait for someone else provide the lunch. You genuinely can't see a problem with that, can you?

Success is achievement, be it positive or negative, and that success may have absolutely no value at all, it could simply be learning to tie your shoelaces.

Yeah, see, when you rely on wee gems like "negative achievement is the definition of success" as the foundation for your concept of productivity then it's no wonder you come up with such uniquely profound drivel.

what utter horseshit.

Oh I know you don't agree that you should be responsible for your own success, you've said nothing else since you first arrived here, it's always someone else's fault.

Even more horseshit. The facts are simple, so you should be able to grasp them. Read up on Full Employment v's Hyperinflation (or any employment v inflationary articles) and then explain to me again how absurd the notion is. Til then, get yer fuckin glasses cleaned ya myopic fucknugget.

Yeah, yeah, someone else's fault again. You've found a relationship between inflation and employment and you automatically leap on the assumption that one causes the other. Prove it.

You simply can't admit that each of us is responsible for our own success, it would mean that your failures would be your fault, and that's just too much to bear.

Zedder

5th December 2013, 09:01

In some cases. if you had a shit teacher you learned nothing or had no wanting to learn.

As they say them that can do, them that can't teach.

Yeah, but that quote has been changed from Sir George Bernard Shaws original "He who can does, he who cannot teaches " and apparently is meant to refer to physical versus intellectual ability.

As far as shit teachers versus not wanting to learn etc, there's more to it like pupil to teacher ratios, funding, using remedial learning groups etc.

Banditbandit

5th December 2013, 09:05

Oh fuck off is it. Success isn't celebrated and failure isn't mentioned. If we were to be truthful we'd re-name the whole shebang the Indoctrination System, it's designed to turn out unthinking, compliant, PAYE ballot box fodder.

Once upon a time it was used to try to suppress the Maori language, now the wheel has turned and it's used to glorify anything that's *not* Anglo-Saxon in origin. The last thing that our take-it-in-turns political "elite" want is actual freethinkers trained to use their intelligence to the maximum.

Education has always been about turning out compliant unthinking workers who vote appropriately ... this was being said of the education system of the 1950-s and 60s ...

I still blame the teachers.

we had good ones that taught you because they were passionate about it, to others it was just a job and they didn't care as they got paid either way.

If teachers are required to give the kids compulsory testing every three weeks to see how much they have improved since the last test (three weeks ago) how much time do you think they spend actually teaching?

There's a quantifiable difference in performance across cultures in NZ. Same teachers. Same syllabus.

There's a quantifiable difference in performance between generations in NZ. Same measuring stick.

Common variables? Parents who have actually lived with the natural consequences of any lack of individual performance, at school and at work. It's a life-changing experience. Our children need that lesson more than any other.

Yes - parents need to value education before they wil make their children participate ..

But why do you think "Same Teachers Same curriculum" produces measurable differences between cultures and between generations. Surely same subject, different curriculum might produce better results for those who are left out? It migfht stop them feeling alienated for a start ... then they might choose to participate

So there is no value in being able to tie your own shoelace?

:killingme Not if you live in jandals ... (sorry, I could not resist that one - and yes, I do live in jandals when I'm not wearing motorcycle boots - which are not lace up either)

But seriously, you make a serious point ... the curricullum needs to fit the modern world - I was taught to write with a fountain pen - then along came biros etc and now I almosty never use a pen - I use a keyboard.

I am hopeless at arithmetic - 2 + 2 = 4 anything else I use a calculator ... I was told at school I woud never amount to much unless I coud add subtract multiple and divide .. well bugger me . I did amount to something and I have a calculator sitting on my desk - a spellchecker on my computer - all the things I was told at school have proven to be incorrect and I do very well thank you without all that I wa taught at school. (What I have learnt since high school is a whole different ballgame ...)

mashman

5th December 2013, 09:13

So there is no value in being able to tie your own shoelace?

What value do you get from typing your shoelaces?

The only practical limit on what anyone's hard work can earn them is the exponential taxation of income.

Bullshit. It's how much money is available and how much your employer/customer decides to pay. I might add it also depends on how much money they're printing too.

Oh cool. Let's all sit around in a circle and wait for someone else provide the lunch. You genuinely can't see a problem with that, can you?

Elucidate.

Yeah, see, when you rely on wee gems like "negative achievement is the definition of success" as the foundation for your concept of productivity then it's no wonder you come up with such uniquely profound drivel.

You have to fail before you achieve. What you take out of that failure is entirely up to you... but it has led to much success over the years.

Oh I know you don't agree that you should be responsible for your own success, you've said nothing else since you first arrived here, it's always someone else's fault.

I never said that we shouldn't be responsible for our own "success", neither did I say that it's always someone else's fault... but I will say that believing that your success is down to you is a fraudulent claim.

Yeah, yeah, someone else's fault again. You've found a relationship between inflation and employment and you automatically leap on the assumption that one causes the other. Prove it.

You simply can't admit that each of us is responsible for our own success, it would mean that your failures would be your fault, and that's just too much to bear.

I would love to, but the RBNZ removed a document that I had a linky to that said that very thing. I believe Winston001 saw it when I mailed it to him once upon a year ago.

I can admit that perfectly fine thanks... which makes one of us.

BoristheBiter

5th December 2013, 09:33

Yeah, but that quote has been changed from Sir George Bernard Shaws original "He who can does, he who cannot teaches " and apparently is meant to refer to physical versus intellectual ability.

As far as shit teachers versus not wanting to learn etc, there's more to it like pupil to teacher ratios, funding, using remedial learning groups etc.

while at school i was never in a class of under 30 until 5th form.
had remedial classes for those that needed help.

Funding might be an issue but it is more that you are not allowed to single someone out as different so they are all in the same class learning nothing together.

If teachers are required to give the kids compulsory testing every three weeks to see how much they have improved since the last test (three weeks ago) how much time do you think they spend actually teaching?

:killingme Not if you live in jandals ... (sorry, I could not resist that one - and yes, I do live in jandals when I'm not wearing motorcycle boots - which are not lace up either)

But seriously, you make a serious point ... the curricullum needs to fit the modern world - I was taught to write with a fountain pen - then along came biros etc and now I almosty never use a pen - I use a keyboard.

I am hopeless at arithmetic - 2 + 2 = 4 anything else I use a calculator ... I was told at school I woud never amount to much unless I coud add subtract multiple and divide .. well bugger me . I did amount to something and I have a calculator sitting on my desk - a spellchecker on my computer - all the things I was told at school have proven to be incorrect and I do very well thank you without all that I wa taught at school. (What I have learnt since high school is a whole different ballgame ...)

We did. the teachers would go through a unit, have a test on the units we had done and at the end of term have a test on that terms work.
Nothing new just teachers wanting to blame someone else for their shortcomings.

Totally agree, to a point.
when my my bro sat school c maths he wasn't allowed a calc and had to use tables for trig, three years later we could use a calc for all.
But there is not a day goes by that i don't use some formula of some sort, yes I use a calc, but i have to know what one to use.
Just the different jobs we choose to do.

What value do you get from typing your shoelaces?

None, but maybe you should put some value into spell checker.

SVboy

5th December 2013, 09:36

Funny how the teachers aren't lining up to take the "credit" for this result... when we do well you have to beat them off with a stick :rolleyes:

An example perhaps? Or just an ignorant cheap shot? Thought so....

SVboy

5th December 2013, 09:37

Excellent observation! :first:

and the sheep is back....

Zedder

5th December 2013, 09:58

while at school i was never in a class of under 30 until 5th form.
had remedial classes for those that needed help.

Funding might be an issue but it is more that you are not allowed to single someone out as different so they are all in the same class learning nothing together.

Without going more into the specifics of your school and you, I get what you're writing about.

Sometimes it just boils down to what "pushes your buttons". With me it was science, I didn't like much else but knew and was told it was a package deal.

Banditbandit

5th December 2013, 10:30

We did. the teachers would go through a unit, have a test on the units we had done and at the end of term have a test on that terms work.
Nothing new just teachers wanting to blame someone else for their shortcomings.

:killingme We did not have that when I went to school ... by the time that came in people of my age or older were complaining about the poor standards of people leaving school ...

See ... somethings never change ...

BoristheBiter

5th December 2013, 11:10

Banditbandit

5th December 2013, 11:26

the next generation is always dumber and blames the previous for the failings.:crazy:

So then .. is this a real issue (falling education standards) or a false one ???

BoristheBiter

5th December 2013, 11:45

So then .. is this a real issue (falling education standards) or a false one ???

I would say yes.

oldrider

5th December 2013, 12:15

and the sheep is back....

The trap was set and the rat walked straight on in ... as expected! Fuck wit! :corn:

Ocean1

5th December 2013, 12:16

I can admit that perfectly fine thanks...

I'm pleased that you can at least see that whatever education you may have had was a resounding failure.

Unfortunately, that's not a very good foundation from which to be debating economics.

Now fuck off and find someone else to blame for your spectacular and multitudinous deficiencies, everyone here donated at the office..

SVboy

5th December 2013, 12:17

The trap was set and the rat walked straight on in ... as expected! Fuck wit! :corn:

Get a life...oh sorry..you do...and this is it. And I'm the fuckwit?!!!

mashman

5th December 2013, 12:40

:killingme We did not have that when I went to school ... by the time that came in people of my age or older were complaining about the poor standards of people leaving school ...

See ... somethings never change ...

heh... and Boris backs that up too.

the next generation is always dumber and blames the previous for the failings

They're not always dumber, coz they can work out why the last generation failed them.

I'm pleased that you can at least see that whatever education you may have had was a resounding failure.

Unfortunately, that's not a very good foundation from which to be debating economics.

Now fuck off and find someone else to blame for your spectacular and multitudinous deficiencies, everyone here donated at the office..

It wasn't the education I required.

Why not?

Awwwww that's sweet. Fuck them very much from me too please.

Banditbandit

5th December 2013, 13:02

I would say yes.

The perfect demonstration ...

BoristheBiter

5th December 2013, 14:07

It wasn't the education I required.

Why not?

.

Because some monkeys can't be trained?

BoristheBiter

5th December 2013, 14:08

The perfect demonstration ...

Of fence sitting?

avgas

5th December 2013, 14:52

Don't think it's the government's fault alone. A percentage of the popluation (kids, parents, educators whatever) seem to think it's ok to take the easy educational options because maths and science is "too hard", then wonder why employment options are limited. It's a bloody sight more complex than blaming John Key's lot :wacko:
Many people in NZ think that Uni is a waste of time and money. So why would they want kids to have an education - entry into what.

Any slack jawed yokel can make good money in NZ being a fool.

The whole attitude towards education in NZ has to change.
People should have 3 lives in NZ, social, work and education. If they fail in one of those 3 - off to a respected boot camp.

mashman

5th December 2013, 14:58

Because some monkeys can't be trained?

ha ha... almost correct. All of the training in the world wouldn't have helped me because I didn't want training. Adults eh, so 2 dimensional.

avgas

5th December 2013, 15:01

In some cases. if you had a shit teacher you learned nothing or had no wanting to learn.
As they say them that can do, them that can't teach.
In many times of my life I had people teaching me that were shit or out to get me.
And I have had some nasty fucken teachers........ones that knocked me back YEARS in my education.

Doesn't mean I stopped getting educated, or stopped pursuing education. That is weak - fact of the matter is 1 teacher is not an impact on a childs life. A lazy parent is.

Shit happens, have a cry about it and move on. If you made all your life assumptions based on the last person who showed you it you would be a fucked individual and probably not riding a bike.

BoristheBiter

5th December 2013, 17:39

In many times of my life I had people teaching me that were shit or out to get me.
And I have had some nasty fucken teachers........ones that knocked me back YEARS in my education.

Doesn't mean I stopped getting educated, or stopped pursuing education. That is weak - fact of the matter is 1 teacher is not an impact on a childs life. A lazy parent is.

Shit happens, have a cry about it and move on. If you made all your life assumptions based on the last person who showed you it you would be a fucked individual and probably not riding a bike.

That's true, but if you had/have shit parents a good teacher makes all the difference.

I'm glad I learnt quickly how to spot the good ones or the ones that were wasting my time.

BoristheBiter

5th December 2013, 17:40

ha ha... almost correct. All of the training in the world wouldn't have helped me because I didn't want training. Adults eh, so 2 dimensional.

Kids aye, don't know whats good for them.

carbonhed

5th December 2013, 18:19

An example perhaps? Or just an ignorant cheap shot? Thought so....

I thought of referencing the Morning Report performance of the head of the principals ferderation and the edumacation institute both blaming a government who's been in power for 5 years for all the ills that have befallen us... but why bother with that when we've got a blinkered, aggressive, fuckwit right at hand? With dipshits like you at the helm one can only marvel at the resilience of the current generations ability to achieve anything at all... in spite of, not because of your efforts.

SVboy

5th December 2013, 19:27

I thought of referencing the Morning Report performance of the head of the principals ferderation and the edumacation institute both blaming a government who's been in power for 5 years for all the ills that have befallen us... but why bother with that when we've got a blinkered, aggressive, fuckwit right at hand? With dipshits like you at the helm one can only marvel at the resilience of the current generations ability to achieve anything at all... in spite of, not because of your efforts.

My we do have some anger issues dont we. I like that you put me at the helm, but you credit me with too much. Perhaps a bit of self reflection would reveal that any education would struggle with a cretin like you, no matter how good. Did you understand the Morning report or did all the big words make you angry and blame those nasty teachers that let you down.....

mansell

5th December 2013, 21:10

Fuck this- 5 pages of mindless rhetoric by people outside the sector (well most of you anyway). We've heard it all before: experts who have never been in a classroom for more than ten minutes dictacting a policy of constant change, people telling us we have it easy because we teach school (and have all those wonderful holidays) and everybody with their own "expert" opinion just because they once went to school. Just to explain things - teaching is my second career after a long time involved in industrial chemistry and at any time if I choose I could probably earn 20-30% more working less hours and with a lot less stress. The majority of us in the class room today are passionate about what we do but are constantly hamstrung by the need to prove we can do it. Yes I will admit there are a few shit teachers out there, but they are few and far between (they tend not to last in the profession). These results that everyone is concerned about are a snapshot of the achievement of our students and to me are more indicative of the social problems our society faces at the moment than anything at all to do with the people involved in eductaion at the chalk face.
End of rant

Oblivion

5th December 2013, 23:41

NCEA is fucking garbage.

..........

Carry on.

BoristheBiter

6th December 2013, 06:35

BoristheBiter

6th December 2013, 06:36

NCEA is fucking garbage.

..........

Carry on.

I agree with this message.

Zedder

6th December 2013, 07:56

I had a look at the process behind the Programme for International Student Assessment, which is where the rankings come from and at a cost of NZ$2 million.

A professor Svend Keiner who knows the system very well and is one of its biggest critics says the Rasch model used to crunch the numbers is the problem. It is only accurate when there is no instability in the data as happens depending on where participating students come from.

He says NZ should ignore the results and compare our countries education performance with similar countries like Australia.

Banditbandit

6th December 2013, 07:56

At school I could count on one hand the good teachers. yes most weren't bad but they weren't very good either.

Tell me - what knowledge/experience/wisom allows a school child to make judgements about educational professionals?

I get it that there were some that you liked and some that you did not like. Teachrs are not there to be liked, they are there to make students learn. Clearly, liking a teacher does help you learn ... but as a teacher, I don't care if students like me or not - I care if they pass or not.

So tell me, as a school child, on what did you base your judgemetns of educational professionals?

Ocean1

6th December 2013, 08:00

The majority of us in the class room today are passionate about what we do but are constantly hamstrung by the need to prove we can do it.

There is no such animal as an effective organisation that doesn't measure it's performance. The hysterical reaction from the industry to the introduction of any tool to measure learning is difficult to understand.

SVboy

6th December 2013, 08:10

There is no such animal as an effective organisation that doesn't measure it's performance. The hysterical reaction from the industry to the introduction of any tool to measure learning is difficult to understand.

What a bizarre comment. Of course we are assessed, audited and checked against national standards. Clearly you have no idea other that your own "hysterical reaction".

mashman

6th December 2013, 08:10

A professor Svend Keiner who knows the system very well and is one of its biggest critics says the Rasch model used to crunch the numbers is the problem. It is only accurate when there is no instability in the data as happens depending on where participating students come from.

Those in the know believe that the data is very good over here, well, for maths at any rate. Written and interpretive is nigh on impossible to get meaningful data for. There be changes on the way, just not sure when.

Banditbandit

6th December 2013, 08:12

There is no such animal as an effective organisation that doesn't measure it's performance. The hysterical reaction from the industry to the introduction of any tool to measure learning is difficult to understand.

Yes - the issue is not that teachers do not want perfromance to be measured - as we keep repeating, it's the suggested measurements that we don't like.

Think of it this way ...

ACC said statistics show motorcycles are dangerous and motorcycle accidents cost us too much money .. therefore we are going to put up ACC levies on biokes ...

What did we all say? Did we agree with their measurements? Hell No !!!

WHen you buy a motorcycle do you ask yourself: Is this a safe bike? Is it quiet and not disturbing to other road users? Is it small enough to stay easily whein the speed limit? Does it have to much power??

I know I want a bike that is mostly, none of those things - wrong measures.

So - swhould teachers be measured on pass rates ??? Not by themselves - too many other factors to take into account.

mansell

6th December 2013, 08:24

There is no such animal as an effective organisation that doesn't measure it's performance. The hysterical reaction from the industry to the introduction of any tool to measure learning is difficult to understand.

We are constantly measuring our performance, but it is not a one size fits all tool that everyone seems to think will work, there are too many variables in each individual student let alone the entire student body. The question I often consider is what makes effective teaching, passing grades or turning out people who can function well in today's society. I recall talking to a management graduate a few years ago and watching the confusion on his face when I explained the management systems of a normal school.
Another concern I have is that everyone is judging modern education on their experiences from their own schooling often years ago. This problem is not one than can be addressed by just testing students more frequently all that does is makes teachers teach to the test criteria and turn away from the opportunity to broaden the horizons of teenagers who have very little experience.
I know most people think that this problem can be solved by just focussing on the education sector but the reality is that it is much bigger than just us. For education to work well it must be valued by society and it pains me to say this (and i know a lot of you will disagree) but in my opinion the ability to kick a ball or sing well seems much more valued than the ability to learn. How many people in your circle of friends could name New Zealand's last Nobel Prize winner compared to the number that could name the first five for the All Blacks when they won the rugby world cup in 1987.
While I was typing this another interesting fact came to mind, during my time as a school student int the late 70s and early 80s only 1 in 20 of us headed of to further education, this figure has risen to about 1 in 5 so we must be achieving some form of success.

BoristheBiter

6th December 2013, 08:41

Tell me - what knowledge/experience/wisom allows a school child to make judgements about educational professionals?

I get it that there were some that you liked and some that you did not like. Teachrs are not there to be liked, they are there to make students learn. Clearly, liking a teacher does help you learn ... but as a teacher, I don't care if students like me or not - I care if they pass or not.

So tell me, as a school child, on what did you base your judgemetns of educational professionals?

As a child I didn't, just knew the teachers I liked and the ones I didn't.
As an adult, in the broadest use of the word, I can see what their failing were.

You say teachers are not there to be liked but to teach, well I say it is the same thing. We are talking high school not tertiary, where you, the student, are there because you have chosen to be.

Quote from my 5th form maths teacher to my parents at teacher/parent day " I can't teach him as he knows it better than I do". it wasn't hard as she only taught out of the text book. (she was head of department)

Zedder

6th December 2013, 08:48

Those in the know believe that the data is very good over here, well, for maths at any rate. Written and interpretive is nigh on impossible to get meaningful data for. There be changes on the way, just not sure when.

A quote from University of Cambridge statistics professor David Spegeilhalter after his investigation, "I will treat the scores and ranks with suspicion."

I also note Denmark has abandoned the use of PISA rankings.

Bring on those changes.

BoristheBiter

6th December 2013, 08:51

We are constantly measuring our performance, but it is not a one size fits all tool that everyone seems to think will work, there are too many variables in each individual student let alone the entire student body. The question I often consider is what makes effective teaching, passing grades or turning out people who can function well in today's society. I recall talking to a management graduate a few years ago and watching the confusion on his face when I explained the management systems of a normal school.
Another concern I have is that everyone is judging modern education on their experiences from their own schooling often years ago. This problem is not one than can be addressed by just testing students more frequently all that does is makes teachers teach to the test criteria and turn away from the opportunity to broaden the horizons of teenagers who have very little experience.
I know most people think that this problem can be solved by just focussing on the education sector but the reality is that it is much bigger than just us. For education to work well it must be valued by society and it pains me to say this (and i know a lot of you will disagree) but in my opinion the ability to kick a ball or sing well seems much more valued than the ability to learn. How many people in your circle of friends could name New Zealand's last Nobel Prize winner compared to the number that could name the first five for the All Blacks when they won the rugby world cup in 1987.
While I was typing this another interesting fact came to mind, during my time as a school student int the late 70s and early 80s only 1 in 20 of us headed of to further education, this figure has risen to about 1 in 5 so we must be achieving some form of success.

Maybe the teachers are not teaching the correct things?
Maybe it is the fact back then we had to pay for it and now you just get a student loan, or the fact that there are more people going for the same job so the more quals the better.
Maybe it was because most went and got blue collar jobs were most now want to sit in an office.

All I know is kids out of school are not being taught to the same level we were and teachers are the front line so you get the blame.

Banditbandit

6th December 2013, 08:53

As a child I didn't, just knew the teachers I liked and the ones I didn't.
As an adult, in the broadest use of the word, I can see what their failing were.

You say teachers are not there to be liked but to teach, well I say it is the same thing. We are talking high school not tertiary, where you, the student, are there because you have chosen to be.

Quote from my 5th form maths teacher to my parents at teacher/parent day " I can't teach him as he knows it better than I do". it wasn't hard as she only taught out of the text book. (she was head of department)

Yes - I get we are talking about high schools (and primary schools) - students have not chosen to be there and that makes it harder ...

I don't see that makes a difference - teachers are still there to teach, not to be liked .. yes, having stduents like you does make it weasier to teach them - but we can all make stsuetns liek us - it is harder to make them learn ..

My experience at high school was bad - and I refused to participate .. point blank refused ...

Should a teacher be judged on my failures??

Maybe the teachers are not teaching the correct things?
Maybe it is the fact back then we had to pay for it and now you just get a student loan, or the fact that there are more people going for the same job so the more quals the better.
Maybe it was because most went and got blue collar jobs were most now want to sit in an office.

All I know is kids out of school are not being taught to the same level we were and teachers are the front line so you get the blame.

Now who's mixing high school and tertiary ...

And did we have to pay for it? When I started in tertiary (mid 1970s) my fees were a week's net wages ... the rest was paid for by the Government ... It's still true that the Governmetn pays around 75% of the cost of tertiary education ...

And how do you know your last statement is true? What comparisons have you made with you and your colleagues' level of cognative and practical abilities at various stages of your life with those of the younger generation?

Ocean1

6th December 2013, 09:26

What a bizarre comment. Of course we are assessed, audited and checked against national standards. Clearly you have no idea other that your own "hysterical reaction".

Bizarre? It’s a statement of fact, accepted by management specialists and every industry on the planet, except yours.

And your reaction to the observation is exactly as I suggested was typical of many in your profession. It’s extraordinarily counterproductive behaviour, no matter what you perceive to be the merits of any given measurement system.

Ocean1

6th December 2013, 09:34

Yes - the issue is not that teachers do not want perfromance to be measured - as we keep repeating, it's the suggested measurements that we don't like.

Fine, I have no issue with better tools, as long as they do the job.

So - swhould teachers be measured on pass rates ??? Not by themselves - too many other factors to take into account.

WHo said anything about measuring teachers? Measure the kids, that's the critical factor in question. And until you get rational comparitive data on what the kid's learned you've got no chance of identifying where improvements can be made.

Ocean1

6th December 2013, 09:48

We are constantly measuring our performance, but it is not a one size fits all tool that everyone seems to think will work, there are too many variables in each individual student let alone the entire student body. The question I often consider is what makes effective teaching, passing grades or turning out people who can function well in today's society. I recall talking to a management graduate a few years ago and watching the confusion on his face when I explained the management systems of a normal school.
Another concern I have is that everyone is judging modern education on their experiences from their own schooling often years ago. This problem is not one than can be addressed by just testing students more frequently all that does is makes teachers teach to the test criteria and turn away from the opportunity to broaden the horizons of teenagers who have very little experience.
I know most people think that this problem can be solved by just focussing on the education sector but the reality is that it is much bigger than just us. For education to work well it must be valued by society and it pains me to say this (and i know a lot of you will disagree) but in my opinion the ability to kick a ball or sing well seems much more valued than the ability to learn. How many people in your circle of friends could name New Zealand's last Nobel Prize winner compared to the number that could name the first five for the All Blacks when they won the rugby world cup in 1987.
While I was typing this another interesting fact came to mind, during my time as a school student int the late 70s and early 80s only 1 in 20 of us headed of to further education, this figure has risen to about 1 in 5 so we must be achieving some form of success.

There's nothing there that represents a reason not to measure students knowledge. Yes they're complicate units, but it's not impossible to form a quantifiable statement of achievement that provides a common benchmark across any given age/area/whatever.

You’re right about NZ's culture under-recognising the importance of education, and I can sympathise with the lack of motivation that must cause amongst your kids. But put the blame for that where it belongs: Professional excellence doesn't pay much better than any one of a number of much easier life choices. When failing at school is seen in the same light as some immigrant cultures in NZ we might see the same results, eh?

Ah, the Uni thing. Without resorting to reference to the UK TV series putting modern kids into their grandparent's teaching institutions and methodology, their markedly lower achievement rates and their subsequent improvement in performance I can observe that much that's taught in university today was taught years before that in ages past. And much of the recently available syllabus isn’t what’s likely to provide skills of much value to society, although if the graduates can live on the revenue opportunities such studies provide I’m sure there’s more scope to pursue… pastimes (?) of a more personally fulfilling nature.

BoristheBiter

6th December 2013, 10:28

Yes - I get we are talking about high schools (and primary schools) - students have not chosen to be there and that makes it harder ...

I don't see that makes a difference - teachers are still there to teach, not to be liked .. yes, having stduents like you does make it weasier to teach them - but we can all make stsuetns liek us - it is harder to make them learn ..

My experience at high school was bad - and I refused to participate .. point blank refused ...

Should a teacher be judged on my failures??

If you had liked going there might things have been different?

Now who's mixing high school and tertiary ...

And did we have to pay for it? When I started in tertiary (mid 1970s) my fees were a week's net wages ... the rest was paid for by the Government ... It's still true that the Governmetn pays around 75% of the cost of tertiary education ...

And how do you know your last statement is true? What comparisons have you made with you and your colleagues' level of cognative and practical abilities at various stages of your life with those of the younger generation?

was an answer to mansell's question.

I look at the people i come into contact with, whether that be friends, family or work, and have noticed that basics are just not being taught and if a child is failing you have to pay for help instead of going to remedial classes.
Also they use the quote "the at at the learning stage and will pick it up later" that has been posted earlier.

Like you I hated every minute of high school and couldn't wait to leave and the crap teachers just reinforced it, but the good teachers, the ones that could teach without a book, made me keep going.

Banditbandit

6th December 2013, 10:30

WHo said anything about measuring teachers? Measure the kids, that's the critical factor in question. And until you get rational comparitive data on what the kid's learned you've got no chance of identifying where improvements can be made.

I get what you are saying - and of course you measure the students. However, to us, this sounds like a 'one size fits all " response.

Children develop at different rates and develop their learning in different areas at different times of their lives ... Can you see that the "comparative data" also needs to take into account trhe developmental stage each child has reached and the speed they are developing??

AS well, there are the family and scial circumstances to take into account. A child who's parents make sure they do their homework and who often help the child with homework will learn faster than parents who see no value in education and do not make the child do homework ...

Add to that factors like did the child eat before coming to school? Do they have warm clothing or are they shivering cold and not able to concentrate add to the number of factors that need to be taken into account (not even mentioning cultural factors - apart from valuing education or not) ...

Many of those factors are outside the teacher's control ... and how much responsiblity for a student's learning should teachers take?? Teachers are responsible for teaching .. by the time they are old enough students are responsible for learnign - there's a grey area with childfren when they are not that responsible for their learning ..

But from all of that - it is very hard to do comparative assessment of students .. and then using those results to make judgements on teachers ... in primary and seconday it's problematic ...

In tertiary we get evaluated al the time - and if our pass rates fall below 45% our funding gets cut ... but then we have the advantage of selecting our students ... and kickign them out if they don't perform ...

Schools don't have that luxury ...

BoristheBiter

6th December 2013, 10:31

So - swhould teachers be measured on pass rates ??? Not by themselves - too many other factors to take into account.

Everyone goes on about the police running the IPCA so does that mean non teachers shouldn't measure themselves?

Banditbandit

6th December 2013, 10:33

If you had liked going there might things have been different?

No - it was a largely political decision - surprise surpise .. I thought the system sucked .. so I refused to participate ...

was an answer to mansell's question.

I look at the people i come into contact with, whether that be friends, family or work, and have noticed that basics are just not being taught and if a child is failing you have to pay for help instead of going to remedial classes.
Also they use the quote "the at at the learning stage and will pick it up later" that has been posted earlier.

Yes - I think remedial classes are necessary - it was a political decision to cut them .. not an education decision ...

Like you I hated every minute of high school and couldn't wait to leave and the crap teachers just reinforced it, but the good teachers, the ones that could teach without a book, made me keep going.

Sex and drugs and rock and roll kept me going ... yes, we did that at school ...

Banditbandit

6th December 2013, 10:42

Everyone goes on about the police running the IPCA so does that mean non teachers shouldn't measure themselves?

Hmmm .. not sure I want to give a hard and fast answer to that - but I am inclined to say that is a different situation ...

For instance, the figures say that at any given time on our roads 10% of drivers are speeding - so ... we know how many cars/trucks/bikes there are in New Zealand - we can say that if 10% of drivers are speeding then arond 10% of the total number of cars/trucks/bikes out there should be the number of speeding tickets issued each year ... allocate that number on a per traffic duty basis ...

That's a hard and fast measure (and when we do that people scream "quota system" ) ... as are some of the others ..

Education is not that clear cut .. especially as you are dealing with a range of human beings and range of developmental issues and a range of cogntive and practical abilities.

But I have no problem with an external agency looking at quality teaching issues - for schools this is called ERO - and you will see their findingas in the news on a regular basis

For Tertiary this is NZQA and TEC ...

Bald Eagle

6th December 2013, 11:10

Ocean1

6th December 2013, 12:39

I get what you are saying - and of course you measure the students. However, yo us, this sounds like a 'one size fits all " response.

Children develop at different rates and develop their learning in different areas at different times of their lives ... Can you see that the "comparative data" also needs to take into account trhe developmental stage each child has reached and the speed they are developing?? But from all of that - it is very hard to do comparative assessment of students .. and then using those results to make judgements on teachers ... in primary and seconday it's problematic ...

No. You're putting the cart before the horse. First observe, then evaluate.

Before anything of value whatsoever can be gained from any analisys tool you need clean data. Test the kids. Make the results quantifiable, that means numbers, not opinions.

THEN you can attempt to attribute cause, and from that make changes that might reasonably be expected improve performance.

It's that immediate "Oh noes, we're being blamed as inept" response that sorta automatically causes the profession to be seen as intractable and self-centred. All of the potentially contributing factors you mention need to be introduced during analysis of the un-”corrected” results, not via fudge- factors applied beforehand.

But from all of that - it is very hard to do comparative assessment of students .. and then using those results to make judgements on teachers ... in primary and seconday it's problematic ...

In tertiary we get evaluated al the time - and if our pass rates fall below 45% our funding gets cut ... but then we have the advantage of selecting our students ... and kickign them out if they don't perform ...

Schools don't have that luxury ...

Bullshit. Comparing student achievement effectively via directly comparable examination has been the norm forever, until the last generation or so. If they’re all sitting the same exam it’s a piece of piss.

And there you go again: “using those results to make judgements on teachers”. Any parent is aware that the teacher is just one of a great many factors, why so defensive? The world outside of academia manages process improvement protocols without tantrums.

As for unwilling students, yep, and most parents would agree, it’d be nice to have a range of teaching methodologies/styles to choose from. But they see your problem from the other side: they’re a captive market for schools, their choices are limited. I, for example would rather that my kids were effectively disciplined by their school for poor behaviour… but that’s another kettle of red hearings.

Ocean1

6th December 2013, 12:47

Two gems from the NCEA mantra come to mind. 1 Fail has been converted to "Not yet achieved. 2.Percentages have been "replaced" with a mark out of 100.
No surprises in the decline then.

Sent from my LG-P768 using Tapatalk

Aye. I laughed at the first wave of politically correct policy that came wafting over from middle Britain. It was a joke. Shirly.

But fuck me, the damage it's eventually done is horrendous.

:laugh: I recall one recent South African import teacher at one of my daughter's parent/teacher meetings: "Your daughter lacks intestinal fortitude, she needs to try a great deal harder, without the histrionics". I laughed, and shook his hand...

SVboy

6th December 2013, 12:51

I get what you are saying - and of course you measure the students. However, yo us, this sounds like a 'one size fits all " response.

Children develop at different rates and develop their learning in different areas at different times of their lives ... Can you see that the "comparative data" also needs to take into account trhe developmental stage each child has reached and the speed they are developing??

AS well, there are the family and scial circumstances to take into account. A child who's parents make sure they do their homework and who often help the child with homework will learn faster than parents who see no value in education and do not make the child do homework ...

Add to that factors like did the child eat before coming to school? Do they have warm clothing or are they shivering cold and not able to concentrate add to the number of factors that need to be taken into account (not even mentioning cultural factors - apart from valuing education or not) ...

Many of those factors are outside the teacher's control ... and how much responsiblity for a student's learning should teachers take?? Teachers are responsible for teaching .. by the time they are old enough students are responsible for learnign - there's a grey area with childfren when they are not that responsible for their learning ..

But from all of that - it is very hard to do comparative assessment of students .. and then using those results to make judgements on teachers ... in primary and seconday it's problematic ...

In tertiary we get evaluated al the time - and if our pass rates fall below 45% our funding gets cut ... but then we have the advantage of selecting our students ... and kickign them out if they don't perform ...

Schools don't have that luxury ...

This sums up the challenges and differentiation schools face nicely. Ocean1-what do you think these "national standard" exams are trying to but completely failing to achieve. This approach has been tried and hugely discredited overseas-yet this government with its 'attack the teachers' agenda perserveres.

BoristheBiter

6th December 2013, 13:01

This sums up the challenges and differentiation schools face nicely. Ocean1-what do you think these "national standard" exams are trying to but completely failing to achieve. This approach has been tried and hugely discredited overseas-yet this government with its 'attack the teachers' agenda perserveres.

But he is right. why can't everyone sit the same exam? worked when I was at school, easy to see who is passing and who isn't, easy for parents to see if little johnny is passing of failing, easy to see what areas need to be worked on.

You are the coal face of teaching, you will be blamed for kids failing, suck it up or find a new profession, works in all walks of life so you are no different.

Banditbandit

6th December 2013, 13:40

Hmm .. I'm not sure we disagree - more like we are talking passed each other ...

No. You're putting the cart before the horse. First observe, then evaluate.

Before anything of value whatsoever can be gained from any analisys tool you need clean data. Test the kids. Make the results quantifiable, that means numbers, not opinions.

THEN you can attempt to attribute cause, and from that make changes that might reasonably be expected improve performance.

Yes - agree with all that ..

It's that immediate "Oh noes, we're being blamed as inept" response that sorta automatically causes the profession to be seen as intractable and self-centred. All of the potentially contributing factors you mention need to be introduced during analysis of the un-”corrected” results, not via fudge- factors applied beforehand.

OK ... it appears that the Governmment - i.e. Ms Parata and before her Ann Tolley - did blame the teachers ... and there's a fair bit of carry over of that into what the public think .... so many of us reactign to your words
because parata and co want to blame the teachers ..

Bullshit. Comparing student achievement effectively via directly comparable examination has been the norm forever, until the last generation or so. If they’re all sitting the same exam it’s a piece of piss.

Yeah - I agree there ... but when we went to school the common test was also a gatekeeping device .. half passed, half failed, and marks were scaled to make that happen. I would not like to see us go back to that ...

And there you go again: “using those results to make judgements on teachers”. Any parent is aware that the teacher is just one of a great many factors, why so defensive? The world outside of academia manages process improvement protocols without tantrums.

Do they? It doesn't seem like all parents are aware to me, and other teachers, at all - there's a "blame the teacher" culture out there for sure - maybe you are not part of it .. but it is there ... I've even had students who rarely came to class try to blame me for their failure ...

As for unwilling students, yep, and most parents would agree, it’d be nice to have a range of teaching methodologies/styles to choose from.

From my perspective I happen to agree with a lot of what you say .. I have dealt at tertiary level with the failings of the high schools - and I get very pissed off when tertiary education is expected to do things like numeracy and literacy courses for people whom the high schools have failed ... tertiary education should be just that - not remedial clases for adults ... but don't dump those failures on all teachers and on the education system ...

And yes, teachers should have a range of teaching methods and approaches - some of the bastards don't ...

But they see your problem from the other side: they’re a captive market for schools, their choices are limited. I, for example would rather that my kids were effectively disciplined by their school for poor behaviour… but that’s another kettle of red hearings.

Yeah .. red herring .. and not allowed to ... Personally, I think people should get 20 years of free education during their lives - the first 10 years are compulsory aged 5-15 .. then the other ten can be used at any stage during your life ... so you can leave school at 15 then return to education later on - or use the whole 20 up in one long stretch ...

That would remove the forced nature of education in the teenage years and we would only be teaching people who want to be there ...

SVboy

6th December 2013, 13:59

But he is right. why can't everyone sit the same exam? worked when I was at school, easy to see who is passing and who isn't, easy for parents to see if little johnny is passing of failing, easy to see what areas need to be worked on.

You are the coal face of teaching, you will be blamed for kids failing, suck it up or find a new profession, works in all walks of life so you are no different.

Because education will become market driven[as the govt wants] Schools will teach solely to the exam in order to boost their league table position. Schools that cant produce the results will be penalised with funding and 'flight'. Curriculum will narrow and poorer stratas of society will be further disadvantaged. The old system was a ranking/filtering system. Our society/the world has evolved and diversified too much for that to be relevent any more.

Banditbandit

6th December 2013, 14:05

Yes. Tyically neo-liberal tho' - mistaking an economic value for a use value ...

Bald Eagle

6th December 2013, 14:12

The other problem is attempting to 'blame' the teacher for little Johnnys failure when little Johnny may be as thick as a plank to start with. Yah cant make Einsteins out of idyits.

Sent from my LG-P768 using Tapatalk

slowpoke

6th December 2013, 14:28

Realistically it's all irrelevant.

From recent events it's obvious that a large proportion of the population is happy as a pig in poo that we raise a generation of tour guides and hospitality workers. Apparently skilled jobs via resource development are unwanted because the tourism industry is such a big employer and oil and gas development is fairly small....we'll conveniently ignore the fact that those few oil and gas workers contribute vastly more in tax $$$ via their higher wages.

http://www.careers.govt.nz/jobs-database/whats-happening-in-the-job-market/who-earns-what/

You could argue that our education system is therefore largely wasting huge amounts of money once you get past the "you got change for a twenny?" stage. Sad but true.

Ocean1

6th December 2013, 14:44

In tertiary we get evaluated al the time - and if our pass rates fall below 45% our funding gets cut ...

Hmmm. And that's as it should be, it's one step away from true free market control dynamics but it's a necessary control function.

but then we have the advantage of selecting our students ... and kickign them out if they don't perform ...

Aye. I guess the students are then of an age where, firstly they’ve chosen that path for themselves and secondly where failure is no longer someone else’s responsibility.

Ocean1

6th December 2013, 14:54

This sums up the challenges and differentiation schools face nicely.

"Differentiation" sounds like the sort of excuse trotted out earlier. Of course there's differences in how kids learn, I've heard nobody deny it.

Ocean1-what do you think these "national standard" exams are trying to but completely failing to achieve. This approach has been tried and hugely discredited overseas-yet this government with its 'attack the teachers' agenda perserveres.

I would hope that they're trying to measure students educational achievements. Using the same ruler.

I have no idea how successful they are in doing that today, but I'd suggest it's not as difficult as you're making it sound. And if that's the approach you suggest has been discredited then I can only suggest that yours is the only professional enterprise in the world where such a tool isn't seen as necessary, and that it seems likely that in fact education professionals are the ones doing the discrediting.

As for an attack on teachers; I haven’t been paying attention recently, but I haven't seen one. Perhaps you could supply an example.

Ocean1

6th December 2013, 15:10

Do they? It doesn't seem like all parents are aware to me, and other teachers, at all - there's a "blame the teacher" culture out there for sure - maybe you are not part of it .. but it is there ... I've even had students who rarely came to class try to blame me for their failure ...

Yes. If you’re not hearing criticism from parents about other factors perhaps it’s because they don’t believe they’re under your control. Certaily there’s always the mandatory fuckwit that will blame a good teacher for their kid’s lack of work ethic, but most impartial observers are fully aware that the teacher is but one factor.

In passing, I’m of the opinion, (communicated regularly to my kids) that they were there to learn, that was their responsibility, not the teachers. If the odd teacher wasn’t much good in relating the required lessons then it was up the them to find an alternative. Complete Saturdays in the library weren’t unheard of.

And yes, teachers should have a range of teaching methods and approaches - some of the bastards don't ...

I don’t expect one professional to specialise across his complete profession. I rather had complete alternative institutions in mind.

Yeah .. red herring .. and not allowed to ... Personally, I think people should get 20 years of free education during their lives - the first 10 years are compulsory aged 5-15 .. then the other ten can be used at any stage during your life ... so you can leave school at 15 then return to education later on - or use the whole 20 up in one long stretch ...

That would remove the forced nature of education in the teenage years and we would only be teaching people who want to be there ...

The most effective teachers I’ve known are those that could apply consequences to adverse behaviour within the rules. I agree that the rules should allow a far greater latitude and research is long overdue regarding the damage the lack of discipline does.

As for a free education, another red flounder. Not to mention a fictional one.

But I could live with something along those lines, if the cost could be maintained to something most taxpayers might consider reasonable.

And yes, teenagers are difficult. You know more than anyone how much disruption is caused by having their brain completely reformatted to “adult”. It’s something that’s been dealt with successfully by earlier generations however. How did they do it?

Ocean1

6th December 2013, 15:24

Because education will become market driven[as the govt wants] Schools will teach solely to the exam in order to boost their league table position.

Now how could they do that? Advanced notification of exam content isn't required is it?

Could it be that teachers might be required to teach what the client wants?

Because, contrary to your wee socialist speech, there, the parents are the defacto customer, with the government managing that market in order that some dearly held socialist concepts actually be retained: the product's available to anybody, no matter the cost.

That disconnect between your pay packet and your clients apprehension of your performance doesn't mean you can ignore what the client wants. And the client invariable wants their kids to gain knowledge, and to be able to demonstrate that in clear, unambiguous terms.

The old system was a ranking/filtering system. Our society/the world has evolved and diversified too much for that to be relevent any more.

Probably. It tended to qualify those who achieved. For the life of me I can’t see that as anything other than very relevant, to the point of being absolutely essential. Evolved, indeed.

Bean

6th December 2013, 15:36

National Standards is a red herring, students have always been assessed and this information was available to the professionals in the industry. The only difference now is, that this information is now available to the public. This make the sector want to asses more robustly –leading to a vast amount more assessment (not a good thing) inter school and national moderation (a good thing [though massively time consuming]) if anybody in managements has an ego issue it becomes competitive. Now we have to tell the child and their parents that they are ‘below’ but we are unable to put them in a below class – for it might affect their self-esteem, which would deeply offend the PC brigade who ironically work for the same group of people that demanded our students be labelled.
National Standards along with the lasted media gems beg the question, after its hit the news and there’s been a vast amount of finger pointing and talkback hypothesizing, what are we actually going to do about it? And by ‘we’ I mean every member of society. It’s not just the education sector that is failing NZ young people – look at our youth suicide rates, child abuse, youth crime etc! Families and communities are not what they were 20 years ago – of course it’s getting worse, did anybody think otherwise!

Banditbandit

6th December 2013, 15:48

Hmmm. And that's as it should be, it's one step away from true free market control dynamics but it's a necessary control function.

The only thing I query is how low that figure is - anything below 80% retention 80% pass rate and I want to know why ... (and in my institute I am in a position to demand answers ) Anything below 50% is so far below the unacceptbale line I can't see why it's the TEC standard ...

That means there are some pretty shonky courses out there ... by shonky I mean shonky because teachers are crap OR the standards are set to high ... OR they are taking idiots onto the course .. a total waste of taxpayers money .. and as a taxpayer I object ...

BoristheBiter

6th December 2013, 16:05

Because education will become market driven[as the govt wants] Schools will teach solely to the exam in order to boost their league table position. Schools that cant produce the results will be penalised with funding and 'flight'. Curriculum will narrow and poorer stratas of society will be further disadvantaged. The old system was a ranking/filtering system. Our society/the world has evolved and diversified too much for that to be relevent any more.

I say bullshit but that's your opinion.

Curriculum, testing and assessments should be the same for every public school.
major exams should be pass or fail. (no scaling)
Everyone that leaves school should have the same qualification (subject depending)

You say we've moved on, maybe we should move back as this new system clearly isn't working.
I know you are just defending your profession but you must admit it's not working.

Ocean1

6th December 2013, 16:06

The only thing I query is how low that figure is - anything below 80% retention 80% pass rate and I want to know why ... (and in my institute I am in a position to demand answers ) Anything below 50% is so far below the unacceptbale line I can't see why it's the TEC standard ...

That means there are some pretty shonky courses out there ... by shonky I mean shonky because teachers are crap OR the standards are set to high ... OR they are taking idiots onto the course .. a total waste of taxpayers money .. and as a taxpayer I object ...

Or there's a number of courses instituted for the sole purpose of accessing funding, with little or no delivery mechanism.

Which describes a lot of Mcdiplomas.

I know of one where the total cost of delivery was a laptop and a CD.

BoristheBiter

6th December 2013, 16:07

That means there are some pretty shonky courses out there ... by shonky I mean shonky because teachers are crap OR the standards are set to high ... OR they are taking idiots onto the course .. a total waste of taxpayers money .. and as a taxpayer I object ...

Sunday golf was one that i could never understand how that got through.
And what would be a pass? even par?

mashman

6th December 2013, 17:20

A quote from University of Cambridge statistics professor David Spegeilhalter after his investigation, "I will treat the scores and ranks with suspicion."

I also note Denmark has abandoned the use of PISA rankings.

Bring on those changes.

heh... I can empathise. I raised my "concerns" over the methods being used and their possible problems (with a statistically "decorated" man, good smart funny man), and whilst acknowledged easily dismissed... and reading between the lines, it really only matters that as long as you pass parents/MoE some form of mark that makes more sense than the last one, then the new one should be implemented... it matters not how good your methodology/formula are that calculated it, it just has to "look" better results wise. So I agree, kinda, with Dave, but I've yet to see how else you could produce results that were true and honest enough i.e. taking into account the variable that BB etc... have highlighted. It is mission impossible, but it is excepted and tis one of the reasons I laugh at PRP when it's touted as a reason for teachers to teach. I've had beer.

Looks like Denmark may well have figured out that, ideally, you need to match the student to the education if you want a "happy" student. As BB says above, we're all ready to learn at different stages. Took me approx 37 years :yes:, unfortunately.

Hell yeah.

avgas

6th December 2013, 17:39

That's true, but if you had/have shit parents a good teacher makes all the difference.

I'm glad I learnt quickly how to spot the good ones or the ones that were wasting my time.
Nah was a good life lesson.
I learnt "Yes Sir, No Sir, 3 Bags full Sir" well before I had my first job.

Sometimes you just have to suck up the shit and take it for a while. That's life.

Bad Boss, Bad Teacher......same shit different day - but if its only temporary and you can see the other side, who cares?

avgas

6th December 2013, 17:45

it really only matters that as long as you pass parents/MoE some form of mark that makes more sense than the last one
It's all relative. I have a wad of "Merit" certificates from school which are effectively toilet paper right now. Fucking useless.

But back then - those little doodacky's were my gateway to dad letting me get a bike.

I like Pass / Fail - so for all the bad things NCEA has - atleast it is only polarised that way (with fail = not achieved).
ABCDEF.....all fucking useless.

You know where to find students who got straight A's at school and university.......at Starbucks......serving you a Cappuccino.

mashman

6th December 2013, 17:50

No. You're putting the cart before the horse. First observe, then evaluate.

Before anything of value whatsoever can be gained from any analisys tool you need clean data. Test the kids. Make the results quantifiable, that means numbers, not opinions.

THEN you can attempt to attribute cause, and from that make changes that might reasonably be expected improve performance.

It's that immediate "Oh noes, we're being blamed as inept" response that sorta automatically causes the profession to be seen as intractable and self-centred. All of the potentially contributing factors you mention need to be introduced during analysis of the un-”corrected” results, not via fudge- factors applied beforehand.

and by fuck was I disappointed to read such pish. Maybe you should go to more of their meetings to find out. My experience was the opposite.[/QUOTE]

Clean data? Who decides the criteria for clean data? and what guarantees do you have that that data is clean? Flaw introduced at square 1?

My immediate reaction to teachers concerns is not, WTF are they crying about... you must know some really negative White fuckers.

mashman

6th December 2013, 17:55

It's all relative. I have a wad of "Merit" certificates from school which are effectively toilet paper right now. Fucking useless.

But back then - those little doodacky's were my gateway to dad letting me get a bike.

I like Pass / Fail - so for all the bad things NCEA has - atleast it is only polarised that way (with fail = not achieved).
ABCDEF.....all fucking useless.

You know where to find students who got straight A's at school and university.......at Starbucks......serving you a Cappuccino.

ha ha ha ha haaaaaa... although that's just as well, as you may not get the double decaf soy free fat burger latte mochaccino espresso that you ordered if it's a normal run of the mill dumb cunt at the till. Aye, pass/fail is/was good enough for me.

BoristheBiter

6th December 2013, 18:36

and by fuck was I disappointed to read such pish. Maybe you should go to more of their meetings to find out. My experience was the opposite.

Clean data? Who decides the criteria for clean data? and what guarantees do you have that that data is clean? Flaw introduced at square 1?

My immediate reaction to teachers concerns is not, WTF are they crying about... you must know some really negative White fuckers.

No but I know some brown ones, does that count?

BoristheBiter

6th December 2013, 18:40

It's all relative. I have a wad of "Merit" certificates from school which are effectively toilet paper right now. Fucking useless.

But back then - those little doodacky's were my gateway to dad letting me get a bike.

I like Pass / Fail - so for all the bad things NCEA has - atleast it is only polarised that way (with fail = not achieved).
ABCDEF.....all fucking useless.

You know where to find students who got straight A's at school and university.......at Starbucks......serving you a Cappuccino.

One of my best mates (at school) was so fucking intelligent he went off and got degrees like i got detention (a lot by the way) and now he cleans planes at AirNZ. saw him the other day and he is as happy as larry.

And most at Starbucks are IT people......free wifi.

mashman

6th December 2013, 18:44

No but I know some brown ones, does that count?

Maybe......

Zedder

6th December 2013, 18:45

It's all relative. I have a wad of "Merit" certificates from school which are effectively toilet paper right now. Fucking useless.

But back then - those little doodacky's were my gateway to dad letting me get a bike.

I like Pass / Fail - so for all the bad things NCEA has - atleast it is only polarised that way (with fail = not achieved).
ABCDEF.....all fucking useless.

You know where to find students who got straight A's at school and university.......at Starbucks......serving you a Cappuccino.

Heh, the University of Otago started a research project in 2011 to find out what happened to 14,000 graduates.

The first of 3 results will be out next year iirc.

Ocean1

6th December 2013, 19:03

Clean data? Who decides the criteria for clean data? and what guarantees do you have that that data is clean?

Someone who understands what answers are required to quantify students educational attainments. Explicitly nobody who thinks the results need to be adjusted to compensate for anything whatsoever.

There. You've got it covered. It ain't difficult, ask questions requiring answers students should have learned from work covered by their syllabus. Not all of it, but enough to represent exam results with 95% confidence.

My immediate reaction to teachers concerns is not, WTF are they crying about... you must know some really negative White fuckers.

Nor mine. Until they demonstrate that they don't understand the need for measuring any process.

And you're possibly the most negative white fucker I've ever had the misfortune to come across.

mashman

6th December 2013, 19:22

Someone who understands what answers are required to quantify students educational attainments. Explicitly nobody who thinks the results need to be adjusted to compensate for anything whatsoever.

There. You've got it covered. It ain't difficult, ask questions requiring answers students should have learned from work covered by their syllabus. Not all of it, but enough to represent exam results with 95% confidence.

Nor mine. Until they demonstrate that they don't understand the need for measuring any process.

And you're possibly the most negative white fucker I've ever had the misfortune to come across.

I was more pointing towards, the formula being used is "flawed", side of things. GIGO.

I agree in regards to maffs, even if that does have its own accepted "issues" i.e. margin for error... but Reading and Writing at 95%? I ain't convinced.

Measuring process? Doesn't it depend on whether you're cleaning your data without the outlying data that crashes the program or at the very least really slows it down due to the billions of extra calculations required to compute the result and error margin. Why are we measuring again?

Oh irony, I love thee more than most... your seeing me as negative is all down to how you translate me. Am I passing the buck and blaming someone else :rolleyes:

Ocean1

6th December 2013, 19:49

I was more pointing towards, the formula being used is "flawed", side of things. GIGO.

Where do you see a formula in here?:
ask questions requiring answers students should have learned from work covered by their syllabus.

I agree in regards to maffs, even if that does have its own accepted "issues" i.e. margin for error... but Reading and Writing at 95%?

95% isn't the expected result. It's the measure of how reliable the exam results are.

And it's entirely possible to construct comprehension tests from which quantifiable data can reliably be taken.

mashman

6th December 2013, 19:53

Where do you see a formula in here?

And it's entirely possible to construct comprehension tests from which quantifiable data can reliably be taken.

there.

95% isn't the expected result. It's the measure of how reliable the exam results are.

I understand and meant that very thing.

Ocean1

6th December 2013, 20:26

there.

That's not a formula, it's just a simple statement. There's no need to "interpret" answers to fit some template, it certainly wasn't required of non-absolute subject exams I sat, and I had no reason to argue with the results.

I understand and meant that very thing.

You simply make the sample (No of questions) large enough to compensate for discrepancies in marking.

mashman

6th December 2013, 20:48

That's not a formula, it's just a simple statement. There's no need to "interpret" answers to fit some template, it certainly wasn't required of non-absolute subject exams I sat, and I had no reason to argue with the results.

You simply make the sample (No of questions) large enough to compensate for discrepancies in marking.

There's always a formula. If there were no template, then everyone would get 100% :D

Why not just dump the exams entirely. What do they prove to anyone?

Ocean1

6th December 2013, 21:11

There's always a formula. If there were no template, then everyone would get 100% :D

Wrong. The answers to a set of questions isn't a formula. The marking of those answers doesn't require a formula. The only people requiring a formula are those wanting to alter the results to something other than an accurate assessment of a students knowledge.

Why not just dump the exams entirely. What do they prove to anyone?

Why not drive your car with your eyes closed?

And they prove how much of the syllabus a student has learned. At least well constructed exams do. Pretty obvious really.

avgas

7th December 2013, 01:52

Heh, the University of Otago started a research project in 2011 to find out what happened to 14,000 graduates.
The first of 3 results will be out next year iirc.
I very much doubt they would tell you that their "Honors" students went on to get useless jobs that didn't require degrees, while the run of the mill students are now at senior level in the work force.
But that is pretty much what I am seeing (worldwide).

avgas

7th December 2013, 01:54

Why not just dump the exams entirely. What do they prove to anyone?
Because kids need some form of pressure.
They need to be taught that life is not all roses and kittens, and sometimes shit just jumps out in front of you and if you didn't plan for it - you're fucked.

Another lovely life lesson.

mashman

7th December 2013, 07:01

mashman

7th December 2013, 07:03

Because kids need some form of pressure.
They need to be taught that life is not all roses and kittens, and sometimes shit just jumps out in front of you and if you didn't plan for it - you're fucked.

Another lovely life lesson.

That's what stressed parents are for. There's no place for that shit in the education system. No sirree baaarb.

Ocean1

7th December 2013, 08:03

If you want a measure within a set of data. You must come up with a formula to quantify and qualify that measure innit. That takes questions and analysis and black magic.

Yeah, the formula is adding up the correct answers. That's it. "Johnny got 80 of 100 answers correct" is all the analysis that's required

Eyes closed? coz I wasn't saying that cars should be crashed, but perhaps exams as a measure have had their day. Perhaps we should just ask the teacher if the student is ready.

Nonetheless if you don't know where you're steering then you won't get where you want to go. Just as if you don't know how well your student is learning you won't get them educated. And people have tried making exams redundant for quite q while now, the result being one of those negative achievements that you like to consider a success. Fact: you can't control what you don't measure. Any teacher that has a problem with that by definition doesn't know if his student is ready or not, so why would you bother asking him?

We all learn at different times.

Is that why you behave like a 12 year old?

You can quite easily dumbify a population should you choose using the education system.

Yes. That's been nicely demonstrated over the last generation or so by puissance politically correct education policy that insists that all pigs equal and fucks with exam results in order to "prove" that. Time to do it right again.

You can learn nothing and still pass exams ya know.

Now you're just taking the piss aincha?

Although, on reflection I suppose that's quite possible given current exams.

Teacher should know the student best after all.

The rest of the world doesn't give a flying fuck how well your teacher knew you. They often want to know how much you learned at school, and the ones paying for that want it from a completely impartial and accurate source.

mashman

7th December 2013, 09:12

Yeah, the formula is adding up the correct answers. That's it. "Johnny got 80 of 100 answers correct" is all the analysis that's required

That's not a very good measure really is it. Is he ready being a better question imho.

Nonetheless if you don't know where you're steering then you won't get where you want to go. Just as if you don't know how well your student is learning you won't get them educated. And people have tried making exams redundant for quite q while now, the result being one of those negative achievements that you like to consider a success. Fact: you can't control what you don't measure. Any teacher that has a problem with that by definition doesn't know if his student is ready or not, so why would you bother asking him?

Fair enough. If you "abolish" exams and take down that entire revenue stream. You could then use that revenue, and workforce, stream to bolster the front-line. After all, a test is good enough to validate knowledge, why does it need to be proven and comparable on a national scale by sitting exams too? What are we controlling? Culling the educational heard on the basis of how hard you tried at school? We need a new measure don't we?

Is that why you behave like a 12 year old?

In some ways that makes me mature for my age.

Yes. That's been nicely demonstrated over the last generation or so by puissance politically correct education policy that insists that all pigs equal and fucks with exam results in order to "prove" that. Time to do it right again.

Right again being?

Now you're just taking the piss aincha?

Although, on reflection I suppose that's quite possible given current exams.

You only learn what you allow yourself to be taught. That's an eons old approach to learning.

The rest of the world doesn't give a flying fuck how well your teacher knew you. They often want to know how much you learned at school, and the ones paying for that want it from a completely impartial and accurate source.

Fuck the rest of the world. What happens at school isn't their business, the relationship between teacher and student is all that really matters. Innit?

Ocean1

7th December 2013, 10:07

That's not a very good measure really is it. Is he ready being a better question imho.

Your opinion isn’t worth a pair of fetid dingo’s kidneys. The objective is to measure how much of the syllabus the kid’s learned. The correct way to do that is to set exams asking questions relating to the syllabus content.

“Is he ready” is neither quantifiable or of any qualitative value whatsoever.

Fair enough. If you "abolish" exams and take down that entire revenue stream. You could then use that revenue, and workforce, stream to bolster the front-line.

So you concede that exams are necessary but we orta arsehole ‘em anyway and use the twopence ha’penny saved to try harder to achieve an objective you now can’t see.

You ripper.

After all, a test is good enough to validate knowledge, why does it need to be proven and comparable on a national scale by sitting exams too?

An exam is a test. And it doesn’t have to be comparable on a national scale. But if the syllabus is used nationally and you’re using the same test procedure then the results are going to be comparable. So, yes if you scored fuck all there’s nowhere to hide and everyone is going to laugh at you. Life’s tough.

We need a new measure don't we?

Yes. We’ve already established that. We need a measure of how much of the syllabus the student has learned. Anything else is bullshit.

In some ways that makes me mature for my age.

So you’re 9 but bright for your weight?

Right again being?

A measure of how much of the syllabus the student has learned. Anything else is bullshit.

You only learn what you allow yourself to be taught. That's an eons old approach to learning.

So that’s how you got where you are today, you restrained your natural ability to learn shit.

Again: you ripper.

Fuck the rest of the world. What happens at school isn't their business, the relationship between teacher and student is all that really matters. Innit?

Well yeah, of course, if you want nothing at all from the rest of the world then you can fuck around at school all you want. And you’ll have the exam results to prove the rest of the world can get fucked.

And the relationship between a teacher and his student isn’t an objective. It’s a factor in his ability to teach his student to the syllabus, which IS the objective.

Now fuck off and do your homework, it was due 25 years ago.

Bean

7th December 2013, 10:23

They need to be taught that life is not all roses and kittens.

Bullshit - they already know that!

avgas

7th December 2013, 10:34

That's what stressed parents are for. There's no place for that shit in the education system. No sirree baaarb.
Why not? You can't mold metal without heat - same thing is about learning. 90% of the things we have to learn have not interest to us......because we a too stoopid to know better. Therefore pressure is required to force us to learn it so we understand after the fact.

I would have ditched english and all those fancy courses.......and for the rest of my life had thought that wine only comes in casks..........or that Plato was a breakfast cereal.
Thankfully some moron thought it good for me to learn these things - and forced me to be tested on them.....otherwise I could have ended up some slack-jaw-yokel+mathematician hybrid.

Do you want those kind of consequences on the world?
Hillbilly scientists?
Accountant Horticulturists?

Imagine the horrible consequences if we could learn whatever we wanted. I mean if art students are good indication of a subject that lets people learn whatever they want.......look at those fuckers - keep getting my coffee wrong. They should have study a little math so they understood "proportions".

Zedder

7th December 2013, 10:42

I very much doubt they would tell you that their "Honors" students went on to get useless jobs that didn't require degrees, while the run of the mill students are now at senior level in the work force.
But that is pretty much what I am seeing (worldwide).

Hell no, that would be like getting the cops to do research into whether speeding is safe.

It's more along the lines of what influence university has had on graduates lives. To my knowledge, it's never been done before.

avgas

7th December 2013, 10:43

Bullshit - they already know that!
Many don't. Many have loving caring parents who tell them bullshit that they can be anything they want, study anything they want - and its ok mummy and daddy will fix their lives later.

Exams are a universal "Fuck you" to that whole idea. A wake up call if you will.

There are other ways to do this - but most of them hurt more.

I had lots of these life exams as well as the academic one. Always remember to discharge a transformer was a good one. I failed that one the first time - should have studied more, fucking hurt.

A test telling me I got 46 percent in electromagnetism would have been less painful and driven the same message home.

Zedder

7th December 2013, 11:05

Many don't. Many have loving caring parents who tell them bullshit that they can be anything they want, study anything they want - and its ok mummy and daddy will fix their lives later.

Exams are a universal "Fuck you" to that whole idea. A wake up call if you will.

There are other ways to do this - but most of them hurt more.

I had lots of these life exams as well as the academic one. Always remember to discharge a transformer was a good one. I failed that one the first time - should have studied more, fucking hurt.

A test telling me I got 46 percent in electromagnetism would have been less painful and driven the same message home.

There's quite a bit of unsupported info in your posts. How do you know about all the graduates worldwide and others who don't know life's not all roses?

mashman

7th December 2013, 11:05

Your opinion isn’t worth a pair of fetid dingo’s kidneys. The objective is to measure how much of the syllabus the kid’s learned. The correct way to do that is to set exams asking questions relating to the syllabus content.

“Is he ready” is neither quantifiable or of any qualitative value whatsoever.

Nor yours. The objective should be student development... which should be age independent.

Nor are exams. They test memory and highlight what? That some students are better than others. WOW.

So you concede that exams are necessary but we orta arsehole ‘em anyway and use the twopence ha’penny saved to try harder to achieve an objective you now can’t see.

You ripper.

No. The objective is right in front of the teacher.

An exam is a test. And it doesn’t have to be comparable on a national scale. But if the syllabus is used nationally and you’re using the same test procedure then the results are going to be comparable. So, yes if you scored fuck all there’s nowhere to hide and everyone is going to laugh at you. Life’s tough.

I know what an exam is tyvm and I see no reason to waste money finding out who's doing better than who when it serves no significant purpose. So students are judged on their marks eh. Hardly surprising your generation did fuck all.

Yes. We’ve already established that. We need a measure of how much of the syllabus the student has learned. Anything else is bullshit.

A measure of how much of the syllabus the student has learned. Anything else is bullshit.

Why do we need the measure?

So you’re 9 but bright for your weight?

Sure, why not.

So that’s how you got where you are today, you restrained your natural ability to learn shit.

Again: you ripper.

Well, I choose to learn that which I deem necessary.

Cheers bro.

Well yeah, of course, if you want nothing at all from the rest of the world then you can fuck around at school all you want. And you’ll have the exam results to prove the rest of the world can get fucked.

And the relationship between a teacher and his student isn’t an objective. It’s a factor in his ability to teach his student to the syllabus, which IS the objective.

Now fuck off and do your homework, it was due 25 years ago.

K?

You're right. The student should know that they're just a little robot.

You'll be waiting longer than that before you get my homework, sir.

ooooo, bacon.

mashman

7th December 2013, 11:37

Why not? You can't mold metal without heat - same thing is about learning. 90% of the things we have to learn have not interest to us......because we a too stoopid to know better. Therefore pressure is required to force us to learn it so we understand after the fact.

I would have ditched english and all those fancy courses.......and for the rest of my life had thought that wine only comes in casks..........or that Plato was a breakfast cereal.
Thankfully some moron thought it good for me to learn these things - and forced me to be tested on them.....otherwise I could have ended up some slack-jaw-yokel+mathematician hybrid.

Do you want those kind of consequences on the world?
Hillbilly scientists?
Accountant Horticulturists?

Imagine the horrible consequences if we could learn whatever we wanted. I mean if art students are good indication of a subject that lets people learn whatever they want.......look at those fuckers - keep getting my coffee wrong. They should have study a little math so they understood "proportions".

I don't see the ditching of exams as a sky is falling thing.

Perhaps, instead of whingin about your coffee, you should, now that you're in the land of the free, design a cup with lines around the inside that display how much of the ingredient is to be poured in. Even better, get in touch with the coffee seller of choice and sell them the idea: "Get your personal <insert coffee seller of choices name> cup and get the perfect coffee everytime." Everytime sounds great with an american accent. Woman catches a little drip of foam with her tongue and licks her lips... fade to cleavage, I mean black.

Yeah, readin riting and rithmetic for all. Then a day of sport for boys and Home Ec for the girls.

BoristheBiter

7th December 2013, 11:40

Nor yours. The objective should be student development... which should be age independent.

Nor are exams. They test memory and highlight what? That some students are better than others. WOW.

ooooo, bacon.

You are wrong on so many levels.
An exam is used to see if you can a) move onto the next syllabus and b) if you are capable of preforming the job you have applied for.

mashman

7th December 2013, 11:56

You are wrong on so many levels.
An exam is used to see if you can a) move onto the next syllabus and b) if you are capable of preforming the job you have applied for.

Bully for you. I see it differently. a) if they're ready and their work proves so, then just put them in the next class. b) that's just a little bit condescending. Not unexpected, but a public display of it? O.M.G.

BoristheBiter

7th December 2013, 12:17

Bully for you. I see it differently.

Because you are a moron.

Bean

7th December 2013, 13:03

Many have loving caring parents .....

God I wish that was true :(

I ride my bike, in part, to blow away the filth and frustration that you can feel after spending your time working with young kids, health workers, case workers, lawyers, parents (noun - not verb). It often feels, as a teacher, that you are the only person in some children's lives, that actually gives a shit!! We feed them, provide uniform, care for them, make them feel safe and happy, AND teach. I even get littlies dropping to sleep, so I wrap them in a blanket and leave them be. I don’t wake them up for their lesson or standardised test so some shirt and tie can tell me I’m doing my job properly.

Don’t belittle the kids these days – I wouldn’t want to be them.

I do understand that in 10 years, my kids potential employers will require meaningful information about their attitude and aptitude, …. I have no answers to that, I certainly don’t think exams are the be all end all.

avgas

7th December 2013, 13:20

There's quite a bit of unsupported info in your posts. How do you know about all the graduates worldwide and others who don't know life's not all roses?
If you prepare for the worst, the best will pleasantly surprise you......and the worst is expected.
Life Lesson #342

Break things down to the lowest denomination. Chances are if you find one lower, others exist.
Life Lesson #237

I have met people whom a single exam has proven they are qualified (or not) for something. Myself included.

avgas

7th December 2013, 13:48

God I wish that was true :(

I ride my bike, in part, to blow away the filth and frustration that you can feel after spending your time working with young kids, health workers, case workers, lawyers, parents (noun - not verb). It often feels, as a teacher, that you are the only person in some children's lives, that actually gives a shit!! We feed them, provide uniform, care for them, make them feel safe and happy, AND teach. I even get littlies dropping to sleep, so I wrap them in a blanket and leave them be. I don’t wake them up for their lesson or standardised test so some shirt and tie can tell me I’m doing my job properly.

Don’t belittle the kids these days – I wouldn’t want to be them.

I do understand that in 10 years, my kids potential employers will require meaningful information about their attitude and aptitude, …. I have no answers to that, I certainly don’t think exams are the be all end all.
I envy you.
How do you know if your doing you job properly?

How would you know if someone was good at math or science or tiddlywinks?

Fact is that for everything bad about tests - they do make things simple - you pass or fail. If you fail you just need to try harder. Its not the end of the world. But its a good litmus test to see if they are doing well at something.

As for employers needing it - nope they don't directly need it - they need the result. I wasn't an engineer because of my school marks.......just that I ticked enough boxes to eventually get it. Did this subject in form 1.....this one in form 7......got a degree......got my pratical tickets.....got apprenticeships......then one day I looked back and when - Whoa! How did I get here - but there was a record telling me how.
I had no idea of the destination. I just did one test in front of another until I saw something forming on the other end. If I failed a test I tried harder.

Will my employer ever look at what my marks were? Nope - but if I was someone with no academic achievements would I be employed they way I am....probably not.

Tests have never been the problem, they are just tools. The application of learning is the problem. Can't blame a leaky house on the hammer.

Bean

7th December 2013, 13:59

If you fail you just need to try harder.

You have missed my point with this reply.

Try harder to stay awake?
Try harder to not feel hungry?
Try harder to warm up?
Try harder to believe you can do it, after being told you are a $%^# useless %^* ?
Try harder not to lean against the bruises on your back?
It would also help if an adult in the house would wake up in time to get the child to school!

Its not that hard to teach children the necessary curriculum if they come to school ready to learn!!! And assess them using standard measures... but isn't this thread about kids that are failing??

BoristheBiter

7th December 2013, 15:51

You have missed my point with this reply.

Try harder to stay awake?
Try harder to not feel hungry?
Try harder to warm up?
Try harder to believe you can do it, after being told you are a $%^# useless %^* ?
Try harder not to lean against the bruises on your back?
It would also help if an adult in the house would wake up in time to get the child to school!

Its not that hard to teach children the necessary curriculum if they come to school ready to learn!!! And assess them using standard measures... but isn't this thread about kids that are failing??

But what about the kids that are failing without those problems?
And should we just sit back and tolerate this?
Have you reported this to the cops, SW, etc?

Bean

7th December 2013, 18:07

But what about the kids that are failing without those problems?

That has, is, and always will be, the million dollar question. Our education system is designed for the masses and failure is inevitable in an imperfect sector (we didn’t fail from 1st place after all). It is my belief that our increased failure is largely a manifestation of the breakdown of communities, families and values that have been taken for granted, coinciding with the popularity of independence, selfishness and material possessions.

And should we just sit back and tolerate this?

No.

Zedder

7th December 2013, 18:17

If you prepare for the worst, the best will pleasantly surprise you......and the worst is expected.
Life Lesson #342

Break things down to the lowest denomination. Chances are if you find one lower, others exist.
Life Lesson #237

I have met people whom a single exam has proven they are qualified (or not) for something. Myself included.

Enough of the pseudo zen master crap, the last line was semi sufficient.

BoristheBiter

7th December 2013, 18:19

That has, is, and always will be, the million dollar question. Our education system is designed for the masses and failure is inevitable in an imperfect sector (we didn’t fail from 1st place after all). It is my belief that our increased failure is largely a manifestation of the breakdown of communities, families and values that have been taken for granted, coinciding with the popularity of independence, selfishness and material possessions.

No.

No we didn't fall from first, but we have fallen, a long way.

More a fault of successive governments fucking around with something that wasn't broke.

Bean

7th December 2013, 18:42

More a fault of successive governments fucking around with something that wasn't broke.

Maybe... tho the media has greater influence over culture and attitude than the government.

oldrider

7th December 2013, 19:43

Its not that hard to teach children the necessary curriculum if they come to school ready to learn!!! And assess them using standard measures... but isn't this thread about kids that are failing??

The necessary (Read compulsory) curriculum? .... maybe that is the source of the problem right there? :rolleyes:

The best teachers in the world would make little difference to the student quality outcome if the curriculum was inappropriate! :no:

Who sets the curriculum and who checks and approves it? :shifty: (Worlds best quality computer still means garbage in is garbage out!) :facepalm:

Bean

7th December 2013, 20:39

oldrider, the point is about 10kms that way -->
You missed it...completely..utterly...not even close. Happy hunting :msn-wink:

oldrider

7th December 2013, 20:48

I only asked a question ... how can that miss the point? :rolleyes:

Banditbandit

9th December 2013, 08:20

Wrong. The answers to a set of questions isn't a formula. The marking of those answers doesn't require a formula. The only people requiring a formula are those wanting to alter the results to something other than an accurate assessment of a students knowledge.

And they prove how much of the syllabus a student has learned. At least well constructed exams do. Pretty obvious really.

The objective is to measure how much of the syllabus the kid’s learned. The correct way to do that is to set exams asking questions relating to the syllabus content.

You have a totally functionalist view of education. In that respect you are talking about training, not education.

I very much doubt they would tell you that their "Honors" students went on to get useless jobs that didn't require degrees, while the run of the mill students are now at senior level in the work force.
But that is pretty much what I am seeing (worldwide).

Most teachers will tell you that the best students fail. There are many reasons for that but also that is why the top performing students end up in dead end jobs while the "run of the mill" students or the drop outs end up at senior level in the workforce.

To be a top student is to accept the functional approach to education and do what you are told - Top students are well trained, like Pavlov's dogs ... the workforce only needs so many of them ...

To really get anywhere in this world you have to be able to think - school and university fails to teach those aspects and will do so as long as people like Ocean1 demand a functuional approach to education.

Because kids need some form of pressure.
They need to be taught that life is not all roses and kittens, and sometimes shit just jumps out in front of you and if you didn't plan for it - you're fucked.

Another lovely life lesson.

Crap - examinations do not do that. All they teach is how to pass exams - which once a person has left school and education will never have to be done ever again.

Why teach people a useless skill like how to pass examinations?

There are much better ways to assess people's skills and abilities.

The ability to pass examinations might you will get a job at Starbucks ... along with the rsst of Pavlov's dogs ... it will not get you a senior job in the workforce ...

BoristheBiter

9th December 2013, 11:57

Crap - examinations do not do that. All they teach is how to pass exams - which once a person has left school and education will never have to be done ever again.

Why teach people a useless skill like how to pass examinations?

There are much better ways to assess people's skills and abilities.

The ability to pass examinations might you will get a job at Starbucks ... along with the rsst of Pavlov's dogs ... it will not get you a senior job in the workforce ...

Agree with you there. We only employ tradesman and not all are created equal.
Just because they passed doesn't mean they are any good.

MSTRS

9th December 2013, 13:17

The perennial problem...
http://scholasticadministrator.typepad.com/.a/6a00e54f8c25c98834017c317442ea970b-500wi

BoristheBiter

9th December 2013, 14:01

The perennial problem...

He evidently wants someone that can climb trees. One question rules out all the ones that can't .
Can't see a problem with that.

As we are discussing only humans that post is irrelevant.

Ocean1

9th December 2013, 15:16

You have a totally functionalist view of education.

Yes.

We tend to call people with a dysfunctional view of education idiots.

In that respect you are talking about training, not education.

You might have noticed that the word “education” features heavily in my discussion. You can go right ahead and assume that’s because education is the topic I’m talking about. You could if tell I was talking about “training” because I’d be using the word “training” instead.

Most teachers will tell you that the best students fail. There are many reasons for that but also that is why the top performing students end up in dead end jobs while the "run of the mill" students or the drop outs end up at senior level in the workforce.

Got some numbers to back that wee gem up, dude?

Like how many of the country’s top earners dropped out of kindy, that sort of thing?

To be a top student is to accept the functional approach to education and do what you are told - Top students are well trained, like Pavlov's dogs ... the workforce only needs so many of them ...

To really get anywhere in this world you have to be able to think - school and university fails to teach those aspects and will do so as long as people like Ocean1 demand a functuional approach to education.

Balderdash. If schools and universities fail to teach their students it’s because both teachers and students fail to recognise the purpose of their daily visits to classrooms across the country.

A top student is one that’s been taught how to learn, and can prove that by demonstrating that he’s learned the material presented as the various subjects of the curriculum.

Your contention that it’s all too complicated and that the parents, taxpayers and government don’t understand is the real root of the problem. If you listened to your clients for just a minute you’d have long, long since recognised that what they expect of you is that you teach their kids to the syllabus. Not some fuzzy in-house notion of how well they are getting on considering their demographic, ethnicity, sex, the value of their ride and the number and species of parents they happen to have.

It’s really really simple: Teach the kids an understanding of, say arithmetic. Test the kids to see how well it stuck. Use the results to improve the kids learning and focus your delivery. Include the parents in that exercise. Rinse and repeat.

Crap - examinations do not do that. All they teach is how to pass exams - which once a person has left school and education will never have to be done ever again.

Why teach people a useless skill like how to pass examinations?

There are much better ways to assess people's skills and abilities.

The ability to pass examinations might you will get a job at Starbucks ... along with the rsst of Pavlov's dogs ... it will not get you a senior job in the workforce ...

Yeah. I’m waiting for that research about the overwhelmingly overrepresented millionaire dropouts.

In the meantime: Bollox, the only profession that doesn’t have to deal with the stresses and performance requirements of achieving regular targets throughout their professional lives is yours. That’s part of the “education” deal, see: Teach them that achievement is important.

You’re failing, and you don’t even admit that your primary task is in fact to increase knowledge let alone look to see if you’re actually achieving that.

mashman

9th December 2013, 15:23

He evidently wants someone that can climb trees. One question rules out all the ones that can't .
Can't see a problem with that.

As we are discussing only humans that post is irrelevant.

The bird can fly.

"Everybody is a genius. But, if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it’ll spend its whole life believing that it is stupid." – Albert Einstein.

mashman

9th December 2013, 15:28

Yes.

We tend to call people with a dysfunctional view of education idiots.

...

:corn:.....................

mansell

9th December 2013, 15:52

In the meantime: Bollox, the only profession that doesn’t have to deal with the stresses and performance requirements of achieving regular targets throughout their professional lives is yours. That’s part of the “education” deal, see: Teach them that achievement is important.

You’re failing, and you don’t even admit that your primary task is in fact to increase knowledge let alone look to see if you’re actually achieving that.

I think there is a bit of a misguided veiw here, we have to deal with all this shit and jump through hoops to demonstrate this, it's part and parcel of the package we deal with. The problem is not the professionalism of the teaching staff it's the lack of value placed on education in society. All you people out there who think they can do a better job - here's a challenge for you, go to university for three years (minimum) get and undergraduate degree, do a year at teachers' college (again a minimum) do two years supervised teaching to become fully registered and show us you can do a better job. Otheriwse my advice to you is do your part - don't allow your 13 year old kids to go out each weekend and blow their still developing brains on a mixture of whatever drugs they take, don't place the blame for their behaviour on us and most of all support the fact that in today's society you need to be educated (or lucky) to get anywhere

MSTRS

9th December 2013, 16:03

He evidently wants someone that can climb trees. One question rules out all the ones that can't .
Can't see a problem with that.

As we are discussing only humans that post is irrelevant.

Since we ARE discussing humans, who all have different abilities, the intent of the cartoon is patently obvious to even a cretin.

So - what does that make you?

BoristheBiter

9th December 2013, 17:41

The bird can fly.

"Everybody is a genius. But, if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it’ll spend its whole life believing that it is stupid." – Albert Einstein.

No shit Sherlock. some days you even impress me with your observation skills.

Ocean1

9th December 2013, 17:42

:corn:.....................

Have a pointy hat.

Go sit over there and stop annoying the adults.

Idiot.

mashman

9th December 2013, 17:54

No shit Sherlock. some days you even impress me with your observation skills.

To be fair you're only conscious some days.

Have a pointy hat.

Go sit over there and stop annoying the adults.

Idiot.

Sorry. Your definition of idiot does not fit. Keep your pointy hat, as you must be used to wearing it with distinction by now. I see very few adults in here. A few petulant adolescents whole believe that they made it to adulthood maybe, but not adults.

BoristheBiter

9th December 2013, 18:09

To be fair you're only conscious some days.
.

And you never are, whats your point?

BoristheBiter

9th December 2013, 18:16

Since we ARE discussing humans, who all have different abilities, the intent of the cartoon is patently obvious to even a cretin.

So - what does that make you?

:thud:

All humans have the same ability's, some might be better than others but still then same.

yes the the intent of the cartoon is obvious just not to the discussion at hand, only a cretin would think otherwise.

Ocean1

9th December 2013, 18:33

I think there is a bit of a misguided veiw here, we have to deal with all this shit and jump through hoops to demonstrate this, it's part and parcel of the package we deal with. The problem is not the professionalism of the teaching staff it's the lack of value placed on education in society. All you people out there who think they can do a better job - here's a challenge for you, go to university for three years (minimum) get and undergraduate degree, do a year at teachers' college (again a minimum) do two years supervised teaching to become fully registered and show us you can do a better job. Otheriwse my advice to you is do your part - don't allow your 13 year old kids to go out each weekend and blow their still developing brains on a mixture of whatever drugs they take, don't place the blame for their behaviour on us and most of all support the fact that in today's society you need to be educated (or lucky) to get anywhere

I sort of agree with most of that. And I've no doubt that most of the hoops you have to negotiate either aren't doing what they were designed to do or are otherwise based on faulty premises. Indeed the whole industry has been a policy football for a long time, which doesn't confer a great deal of confidence in the resulting guidelines and controls.

Also... if a common denominator amongst a group of failing professionals is the qualifications that enabled them to gain entry to that profession then the qualifications themselves are suspect. There's a problem that keeps behavioural anthropologists awake at nights. They find surgeons, for example ignoring evidence that certain procedures are sub-optimal because their contemporaries continually reinforce the concept that it's a good idea. Police ignore best practice investigatory methods because their professional culture doesn't agree with them.

I have no idea what dodgy dogma pervades academia, no idea at all. But to say a profession as a group knows best simply isn't very astute, particularly when what independent data there is demonstrated that perhaps that's not the case. Every profession can benefit from external expertise, especially one so distant from it's market.

I don't see too much blaming of teachers going on, in spite of the general bleating going on about the lack of results. And I can't find too much evidence that parents now are too much different in what they want for their kids from previous generations. What is different is the lack of any advantage higher education and professional qualifications give. In short, what's the point of working that hard? Really?

When you've fixed that you'll see success return to education, and, as a result; to the economy.

Ocean1

9th December 2013, 18:37

Your definition of idiot does not fit. Keep your pointy hat, as you must be used to wearing it with distinction by now. I see very few adults in here. A few petulant adolescents whole believe that they made it to adulthood maybe, but not adults.

You know when your teacher told you that you should try harder?

He was right, your lack of comprehension demonstrates that you didn't listen to him either.

MSTRS

9th December 2013, 18:42

The discussion at hand is the failing to maintain NZ's place in world rankings for education.
The measure of success or otherwise is exam results, n'est pas?
The old system of 'one size fits all' (SC and UE for example) was what that cartoon was getting at, right? Deemed to be a failure by NZ educationalists and changed to NCEA.
So now we have a system where each pupil's learning is tailored to the individual. Near as damn it, they are taught the same curriculum but at a pace/level that suits each pupil.
Except the world says it's not working. Either. Even if it is. Maybe. No-one can agree on that.

mashman

9th December 2013, 18:55

You know when your teacher told you that you should try harder?

He was right, your lack of comprehension demonstrates that you didn't listen to him either.

They didn't ask me to try harder.

Of course I listened to him. He was worth listening to.

mansell

9th December 2013, 18:59

I sort of agree with most of that. And I've no doubt that most of the hoops you have to negotiate either aren't doing what they were designed to do or are otherwise based on faulty premises. Indeed the whole industry has been a policy football for a long time, which doesn't confer a great deal of confidence in the resulting guidelines and controls.

Also... if a common denominator amongst a group of failing professionals is the qualifications that enabled them to gain entry to that profession then the qualifications themselves are suspect. There's a problem that keeps behavioural anthropologists awake at nights. They find surgeons, for example ignoring evidence that certain procedures are sub-optimal because their contemporaries continually reinforce the concept that it's a good idea. Police ignore best practice investigatory methods because their professional culture doesn't agree with them.

I have no idea what dodgy dogma pervades academia, no idea at all. But to say a profession as a group knows best simply isn't very astute, particularly when what independent data there is demonstrated that perhaps that's not the case. Every profession can benefit from external expertise, especially one so distant from it's market.

I don't see too much blaming of teachers going on, in spite of the general bleating going on about the lack of results. And I can't find too much evidence that parents now are too much different in what they want for their kids from previous generations. What is different is the lack of any advantage higher education and professional qualifications give. In short, what's the point of working that hard? Really?

When you've fixed that you'll see success return to education, and, as a result; to the economy.

Some good points there, but as I see it the majority of people who place any emphasis on these results, which incidently are a one off test aimed at about 5% of our students, think that the sector and therefore the teachers are at fault. The problem I see with external expertise is all the experts I have dealt with since entering teaching have very little idea of the complexity faced when dealing with over 100 individuals a day. Personally I would like to see this data ignored and let us consolidate the multitude of changes brought about by experts (that have never been in a classroom) followed by an attitudinal shift by politicians to stop using the students futures as a political football and actually spend some of my hard earned tax dollars to ensure we once again have a world class education system, not a rip off of the failing american one. Hopefully one day this society will begin to show real respect for people who succeed in their academic fields and then maybe we will not have the problems we face daily when trying to inspire the future citizens of this country.
As for the lack of higher education not being advantageous I don't believe this, it opens doors and allows people to make a greater range of choices.

SVboy

9th December 2013, 19:09

mansell

9th December 2013, 19:31

I find this quite astute. Certainly some stratas of society value education and often model for their offspring the "rewards" good qualifications could possibly bring.

In General the students from these backgrounds tend to be the ones that are easier to teach as they have learnt a respect for their education. Strangely enough there is also a good number of students from what can be described as a disadvantaged background who also share these beliefs.

SVboy

9th December 2013, 20:09

In General the students from these backgrounds tend to be the ones that are easier to teach as they have learnt a respect for their education. Strangely enough there is also a good number of students from what can be described as a disadvantaged background who also share these beliefs.

Yes to your first point. Sadly, in my experience, not so much to the second one. What I have experienced is that [self]motivated students from less affluent backgrounds tend to do very well, both at [secondary] school and beyond. They tend to have a very real perception of the world and how they can survive and prosper. Usually a key factor in this is that education is valued in the family home.

mansell

9th December 2013, 20:43

Yes to your first point. Sadly, in my experience, not so much to the second one. What I have experienced is that [self]motivated students from less affluent backgrounds tend to do very well, both at [secondary] school and beyond. They tend to have a very real perception of the world and how they can survive and prosper. Usually a key factor in this is that education is valued in the family home.

I think that your last sentence is the answer to it all, my wife and I are both teachers and were both raised in working class homes but our parents valued education and supported us throughout our schooling. Maybe one day everyone will get that support rather than the "all teachers are shit an what do you need to go to school for" crap we get everyday, then I think we'll climb in the PISA rankings

PrincessBandit

10th December 2013, 07:35

All I know is kids out of school are not being taught to the same level we were and teachers are the front line so you get the blame.

Holy crap batman! I see a weird correlation between that and ACC: Motorcyclists = Easy Target

It's always easiest to take the path of least resistance - yeah, let's blame the teachers. I would love to see any one of you non-teachers who have been drawn to the feeding frenzy survive two periods in a secondary school classroom. (Can only comment on high school teaching, and specifically low decile - in case that is of any import to you - as that's my educational sector).

I was sitting outside one of the DP's offices the other day waiting to get some paperwork signed off and saw a student from one of my year 9 music classes. I asked her why she was hanging around the Deans' offices and she said she'd been kicked out of class again. When I showed surprise she laughed and replied "oh, it's because I don't talk back to you, Miss". When you face classes of 30+ students who you are supposed to be able to offer differentiated learning pathways for with the variety of personalities (not to mention the broadest possible spectrum of levels of intrinsic motivation from completely self-motivated through to 'fuck you I only want to do what I want from your subject') it is challenging to say the least. I teach music so my students are, theoretically, all in front of me because they want to be. (Music is no longer a core subject, even at year 9). Having said that, I still have a high proportion who have been dumped in my classes due to either timetable clashes for that student and there's nowhere else to put them, or they chose music only to discover that it's actually not all playing guitars every lesson and therefore immediately zone out.
Those of us in the teaching profession who do have a passion for our students and subjects have it far harder than the ones who are there simply to collect their pay each fortnight. The burn out rate is very high in teaching - ya gotta be able to stand the heat to remain in the kitchen...(or, sadly, no longer care because you can't afford to any more. It's not always an option to simply leave even if your heart's no longer in the job).

Banditbandit

10th December 2013, 07:56

Yes.

We tend to call people with a dysfunctional view of education idiots.

I'm terribly sorry, but the education ssytem has clearly failed you and you are now taking it out on teachers. This is demonsterated by your complete lack of understanding of the "functionalist" approach to education.

When you've fixed that you'll see success return to education, and, as a result; to the economy.

See ... right here ... functionalist approach to education.

In the meantime: Bollox, the only profession that doesn’t have to deal with the stresses and performance requirements of achieving regular targets throughout their professional lives is yours.

That's complete bollox - primary and secondary schools are subject to regular ERO visits

To maintain Teacher Registration a teacher has to achieve regular targets - if someone doesn't maintain registration then they don't keep their jobs ..

In tertiary we get to achieve our targets with TEC or we loose our funding ... and we have annual each performance reviews ...

You do not know what you are talking about ..

You’re failing, and you don’t even admit that your primary task is in fact to increase knowledge let alone look to see if you’re actually achieving that.

That's such a broad sweeping statement - give me the basis on which you tell me that I am failing as a teacher ...

I fail to see why I should waste my time engaging with someone who clearly has no idea what they are talking about - as demonstrated by your posts.

mashman

10th December 2013, 08:01

Some good points there, but as I see it the majority of people who place any emphasis on these results, which incidently are a one off test aimed at about 5% of our students, think that the sector and therefore the teachers are at fault. The problem I see with external expertise is all the experts I have dealt with since entering teaching have very little idea of the complexity faced when dealing with over 100 individuals a day. Personally I would like to see this data ignored and let us consolidate the multitude of changes brought about by experts (that have never been in a classroom) followed by an attitudinal shift by politicians to stop using the students futures as a political football and actually spend some of my hard earned tax dollars to ensure we once again have a world class education system, not a rip off of the failing american one. Hopefully one day this society will begin to show real respect for people who succeed in their academic fields and then maybe we will not have the problems we face daily when trying to inspire the future citizens of this country.
As for the lack of higher education not being advantageous I don't believe this, it opens doors and allows people to make a greater range of choices.

I find this quite astute. Certainly some stratas of society value education and often model for their offspring the "rewards" good qualifications could possibly bring.

Holy crap batman! I see a weird correlation between that and ACC: Motorcyclists = Easy Target

It's always easiest to take the path of least resistance - yeah, let's blame the teachers. I would love to see any one of you non-teachers who have been drawn to the feeding frenzy survive two periods in a secondary school classroom. (Can only comment on high school teaching, and specifically low decile - in case that is of any import to you - as that's my educational sector).

I was sitting outside one of the DP's offices the other day waiting to get some paperwork signed off and saw a student from one of my year 9 music classes. I asked her why she was hanging around the Deans' offices and she said she'd been kicked out of class again. When I showed surprise she laughed and replied "oh, it's because I don't talk back to you, Miss". When you face classes of 30+ students who you are supposed to be able to offer differentiated learning pathways for with the variety of personalities (not to mention the broadest possible spectrum of levels of intrinsic motivation from completely self-motivated through to 'fuck you I only want to do what I want from your subject') it is challenging to say the least. I teach music so my students are, theoretically, all in front of me because they want to be. (Music is no longer a core subject, even at year 9). Having said that, I still have a high proportion who have been dumped in my classes due to either timetable clashes for that student and there's nowhere else to put them, or they chose music only to discover that it's actually not all playing guitars every lesson and therefore immediately zone out.
Those of us in the teaching profession who do have a passion for our students and subjects have it far harder than the ones who are there simply to collect their pay each fortnight. The burn out rate is very high in teaching - ya gotta be able to stand the heat to remain in the kitchen...(or, sadly, no longer care because you can't afford to any more. It's not always an option to simply leave even if your heart's no longer in the job).

What would be the single most effective tool you could add to your classroom today? Mini bar? a non-lethal weapons selection? Another teacher? A mute button? technology?

mansell

10th December 2013, 08:16

What would be the single most effective tool you could add to your classroom today? Mini bar? a non-lethal weapons selection? Another teacher? A mute button? technology?

Resourcing to enable us to cope with the changes. The reality is teaching is such a multi-variable profession that there is no single tool that will fix everything despite what our government (and a large proportion of society) seem to think.

SVboy

10th December 2013, 08:20

What would be the single most effective tool you could add to your classroom today? Mini bar? a non-lethal weapons selection? Another teacher? A mute button? technology?

A compulsary licence with qualifications and strict criteria that prospective parents must meet and achieve before being allowed to have children!
Failing that-usually higher teacher to student ratios help.

mashman

10th December 2013, 08:33

Resourcing to enable us to cope with the changes. The reality is teaching is such a multi-variable profession that there is no single tool that will fix everything despite what our government (and a large proportion of society) seem to think.

A compulsary licence with qualifications and strict criteria that prospective parents must meet and achieve before being allowed to have children!
Failing that-usually higher teacher to student ratios help.

Have you ever asked them, as a group, if they like school? and maybe what they'd do to change it, or indeed would prefer to do?

Zedder

10th December 2013, 08:34

A compulsary licence with qualifications and strict criteria that prospective parents must meet and achieve before being allowed to have children!
Failing that-usually higher teacher to student ratios help.

Probably the best post in this thread. The compulsory licence for parents might sort out crime as well.

Banditbandit

10th December 2013, 08:45

All humans have the same ability's, some might be better than others but still then same.

https://fbcdn-sphotos-a-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/1473045_10201903497281808_2087308119_n.jpg

BoristheBiter

10th December 2013, 09:29

avgas

10th December 2013, 09:48

The perennial problem...
IMAGE
Interesting concept. I wonder if NZ should embrace all languages and stop teaching English and Maori. That way we could have a fair education system.......but no one could speak to each other.

Don't want Math - no worries its gone. You can get ripped off by the next one who did learn it. (Beanstalks come to mind).

Science is for amateurs - you can learn all lifes lessons in P.E.

Social studies should be ignored. Who needs to learn about failed civilizations when you can make cupcakes in Home Ec. Interestingly enough Home Ec does not teach you about Power Bills and Rent/Mortgages......so Home Ec graduates can expect an illustrious life as a stay home parent (possibly unemployed). But who cares if you cook a mean quiche.

Or we could teach everyone some absolute basics of every topic, get a national average of intelligence and then leave it up to them what they want to learn.

As for testing students at high-school......I have changed my mind......I think we should remove all but one set of exams. We can call it University Entrance.
It proves if your good enough to get into something or finish anything.
If you fail - off to the coal mines.

This could decrease unemployment and improve the cost to product coal. Thus creating an interesting new underclass. Much more interesting than the one we currently have.

BoristheBiter

10th December 2013, 12:08

The old system of 'one size fits all' (SC and UE for example) was what that cartoon was getting at, right? Deemed to be a failure by NZ educationalists and changed to NCEA.

You might be so but that depicts is a physical test between species not an academic one.

mansell

10th December 2013, 12:30

Can you back up your claims of only aimed at 5% of the students?

I don't know the exact figures but we were involved with this in 2009 and the sample base was of about 30 students, this is the first time in 14 years of teaching that a school I was at was asked to contribute. I am sure you could find the actual figure somewhere on there webpage but it doesn't look at the entire student body of New Zealand and is still only a single assessment run on a single day. This is not bad sampling theory but I would also like to see standard errors and if there is any removal of bias.

oldrider

10th December 2013, 12:31

1+2 = 3

Until a child tells you what they are thinking, we can't even begin to imagine how their mind is working....

Little Zachary was doing very badly in math..
His parents had tried everything...tutors, mentors, flash cards, special learning centers.
In short, everything they could think of to help his math.

Finally, in a last ditch effort, they took Zachary down and enrolled him In the local Catholic school.
After the first day, little Zachary came home with a very serious look on his face.
He didn't even kiss his mother hello.
Instead, he went straight to his room and started studying.

Books and papers were spread out all over the room and little Zachary was hard at work.
His mother was amazed.
She called him down to dinner.

To her shock, the minute he was done, he marched back to his room without a word, and in no time, he was back hitting the books as hard as before.

This went on for some time, day after day, while the mother tried to understand what made all the difference.

Finally, little Zachary brought home his report Card.
He quietly laid it on the table, went up to his room and hit the books.
With great trepidation, His Mom looked at it and to her great surprise, Little Zachary got an 'A' in math.

She could no longer hold her curiosity.. She went to his room and said, 'Son, what was it?
Was it the nuns?'
Little Zachary looked at her and shook his head, no.. 'Well, then,' she replied, Was it the books, the discipline, the structure, the uniforms?

WHAT WAS IT?'

Little Zachary looked at her and said, 'Well, on the first day of school when I saw that guy nailed to the plus sign, I knew they weren't fooling around.'

BoristheBiter

10th December 2013, 14:50

I don't know the exact figures but we were involved with this in 2009 and the sample base was of about 30 students, this is the first time in 14 years of teaching that a school I was at was asked to contribute. I am sure you could find the actual figure somewhere on there webpage but it doesn't look at the entire student body of New Zealand and is still only a single assessment run on a single day. This is not bad sampling theory but I would also like to see standard errors and if there is any removal of bias.

Oh man I don't know where to start on this,

The sample group is below the margin of error.
no age was given, no standard age test was given.
So basically what it says is the 30 students that where the sample base are dumb.

But yes the theory was right just extremely badly implemented to have no value at all so to quote it like you did is just a little off.

mansell

10th December 2013, 16:15

Oh man I don't know where to start on this,

The sample group is below the margin of error.
no age was given, no standard age test was given.
So basically what it says is the 30 students that where the sample base are dumb.

But yes the theory was right just extremely badly implemented to have no value at all so to quote it like you did is just a little off.

30 kids from one school, they do use more than one, what I was trying to say is that this is a snapshot taken on one day and used to represent the total student population which is valid in terms of sample theory but with out the exact number or the standard error of the test it makes a one of data point pretty much irrelevant. What is important though is the debate this has brought about which needs to be more robust and not just focussed on what happens in a classroom. Trust me this data came as a shock to most of us and as a profession we will be focussing on making improvements. In my opinion, largely based on what I have read and seen throughout my time teaching the system in New Zealand is working well but is under funded. Teachers as a whole are trained to a good quality and the practises within schools are working so I am a little annoyed that everyone seems to be jumping on this figure. Incidently in another OECD release NZ was ranked first equal in the quality of education.

PrincessBandit

11th December 2013, 08:34

What would be the single most effective tool you could add to your classroom today? Mini bar? a non-lethal weapons selection? Another teacher? A mute button? technology?

All of the above; especially the last three!

The technology available today is very impressive. I went on an iPad PD course during the term 3 holidays (see, so devoted to my job I actually do professional development in my holidays so as to not take time away from the classroom :facepalm:) and was amazed at what there is that can be used to make things more relevant and fun to do in class. Sadly most of it is dependent on students having some form of compatible software on their smart devices - the vast majority of our kids don't have these :no:

BoristheBiter

11th December 2013, 08:42

30 kids from one school, they do use more than one, what I was trying to say is that this is a snapshot taken on one day and used to represent the total student population which is valid in terms of sample theory but with out the exact number or the standard error of the test it makes a one of data point pretty much irrelevant. What is important though is the debate this has brought about which needs to be more robust and not just focussed on what happens in a classroom. Trust me this data came as a shock to most of us and as a profession we will be focussing on making improvements. In my opinion, largely based on what I have read and seen throughout my time teaching the system in New Zealand is working well but is under funded. Teachers as a whole are trained to a good quality and the practises within schools are working so I am a little annoyed that everyone seems to be jumping on this figure. Incidently in another OECD release NZ was ranked first equal in the quality of education.

Some good points.

I can only go off what i have seen and that is the kids leaving school are not at the same level I was when leaving. (our year had around the 85% pass for 5 subjects or more at SC.)

Whether that is due to under funding, bad teachers, bad kids, bad parents, bad coffee or harder tests who knows.
You are probably in a better position than most and the best you can come up with is the poor kids fail because they're poor, the parents don't care and tests don't work as they are only good for 5% of the students.

the one thing I whole heartedly disagree with is your comment on not just focusing on the classroom. This is the only place where you ( the teachers) have any influence. It should all be focused at what happens in the classroom as that is what the teachers are paid for.
Yes there maybe outside influences but teaching the students to an acceptable level is your job.

BoristheBiter

11th December 2013, 08:44

mansell

11th December 2013, 08:57

Some good points.

I can only go off what i have seen and that is the kids leaving school are not at the same level I was when leaving. (our year had around the 85% pass for 5 subjects or more at SC.)

Whether that is due to under funding, bad teachers, bad kids, bad parents, bad coffee or harder tests who knows.
You are probably in a better position than most and the best you can come up with is the poor kids fail because they're poor, the parents don't care and tests don't work as they are only good for 5% of the students.

the one thing I whole heartedly disagree with is your comment on not just focusing on the classroom. This is the only place where you ( the teachers) have any influence. It should all be focused at what happens in the classroom as that is what the teachers are paid for.
Yes there maybe outside influences but teaching the students to an acceptable level is your job.

The classroom is my focus, I was talking about society as a whole not just what I do in the hour a day the students are in front of me. If you read any educational theory the influence of the teacher is only a small (although important) part of the overall attitude and attainment of the students. There are so many more influences on their lifes that we don't have any input into that really need to be addressed. After all my students are people too.
Your comment about an 85% pass rate in S.C. is interested as this was a norm referenced assessment tool and 50% of the students sitting the exam were going to fail, which would lead me to the conclusion that your high school was one of the better ones if you can compare schools, which is something I personally hate to do. I have taught in big decile one schools up there in Auckland and there were huge social issues in every aspect of the school which meant that the learning that is supposed to happen in the classroom was often overshadowed by outside influences.
Believe me when I say that NZ Teachers are trained to a very high standard and the majority of us work incredibly hard to raise student achievement.

mashman

11th December 2013, 09:51

All of the above; especially the last three!

The technology available today is very impressive. I went on an iPad PD course during the term 3 holidays (see, so devoted to my job I actually do professional development in my holidays so as to not take time away from the classroom :facepalm:) and was amazed at what there is that can be used to make things more relevant and fun to do in class. Sadly most of it is dependent on students having some form of compatible software on their smart devices - the vast majority of our kids don't have these :no:

My wife was having a discussion about my daughter not being accepted into a particular class because her parents (my und missus me) would not buy her a device to take to school. Next year they are having 1 maybe 2 classes in a year that will have access to "pads"... even though not every student in that year will have access to them. The devices are to be insured by the parents and are to be kept on school premises overnight. It'll be interesting to see how it pans out, but I'm gonna fight for the right to not buy handheld devices just because the school want to experiment... as I believe that MoE should have sprung for the devices if they had wanted to test tech applications out. My eldest daughter ain't too impressed by my decision, I told her to get a job and buy her own ;)

I'm not overly thrilled at the idea of too much tech in the classroom. Care to expand upon what you found useful?

BoristheBiter

11th December 2013, 10:49

avgas

11th December 2013, 13:43

My wife was having a discussion about my daughter not being accepted into a particular class because her parents (my und missus me) would not buy her a device to take to school. Next year they are having 1 maybe 2 classes in a year that will have access to "pads"... even though not every student in that year will have access to them. The devices are to be insured by the parents and are to be kept on school premises overnight. It'll be interesting to see how it pans out, but I'm gonna fight for the right to not buy handheld devices just because the school want to experiment... as I believe that MoE should have sprung for the devices if they had wanted to test tech applications out. My eldest daughter ain't too impressed by my decision, I told her to get a job and buy her own ;)
I'm not overly thrilled at the idea of too much tech in the classroom. Care to expand upon what you found useful?
I dunno - I used to think like this.....but then something clicked.
I have a library - I kid you not a fucking library of books. I had a room dedicated to crap like school computers, books, portfolios.....

The average school student is collecting this crap and hording it.

As much as I had Apple - getting my son an ipad is a fucking godsend when I think of the mountains of shit he would have got if he didn't have it. It doesn't replace a bike or a ball. But fuck me could you imagine consolidating a DVD collection or a book collection.

So I put the "take a device to school thing" with the same grain as buying your kids a computer or a encyclopedia Britannica. Times have moved on......if kids can now have shit consolidating to 1kg of electronics. I am all for it. At its worst at-least it will fix their back problems.

Though in saying that - there needs to a budget limit - possibly even a government plan to sort that our. WINZ sponsored tablets? Sure if it makes kids as quick as the first world. But right now schools waste money on having computers and libraries......not even companies do that these days. Its all BYOD and wikipedia.

PrincessBandit

11th December 2013, 14:35

I'm not overly thrilled at the idea of too much tech in the classroom. Care to expand upon what you found useful?

It seemed to be largely along the lines of being able to set quizzes or do surveys, setting up collaborative electronic "pinboard" type things that students could contribute to. The idea being that with a piece of software that acts as an appletv, wirelessly transmitting what's on your iPad to your classroom projector, you can all hook up the devices (wirelessly, of course) so as to show each person's (teacher's included) monitor onto the projector and everyone can view each other's work simultaneously.
There was more to it than that, but the most basic gist of it was the ease of information sharing as well as stuff like the surveys/voting stuff being able to be done anonymously etc.
A number of websites also can be accessed with students all being able to be directed to specific exercises etc. that are answered online (again, using the appletv substitute - damn, I'm trying to remember what the app was called ) the teacher can immediately see who is doing what on their devices thereby monitoring who has completed stuff, or where various students are at in the exercises.
I feel I haven't explained that very well, but we are encouraged to increase our use of IT in the classroom as a way of making education more relevant and "authentic" (the educational word-of-the-year) to students. We still have a library etc. but educators obviously feel that IT is the way of the future so pushing to have it at the forefront of how we teach makes it more meaningful to todays kids rather than the old fashioned methods of research and note taking. :(

mashman

11th December 2013, 17:22

It seemed to be largely along the lines of being able to set quizzes or do surveys, setting up collaborative electronic "pinboard" type things that students could contribute to. The idea being that with a piece of software that acts as an appletv, wirelessly transmitting what's on your iPad to your classroom projector, you can all hook up the devices (wirelessly, of course) so as to show each person's (teacher's included) monitor onto the projector and everyone can view each other's work simultaneously.
There was more to it than that, but the most basic gist of it was the ease of information sharing as well as stuff like the surveys/voting stuff being able to be done anonymously etc.
A number of websites also can be accessed with students all being able to be directed to specific exercises etc. that are answered online (again, using the appletv substitute - damn, I'm trying to remember what the app was called ) the teacher can immediately see who is doing what on their devices thereby monitoring who has completed stuff, or where various students are at in the exercises.
I feel I haven't explained that very well, but we are encouraged to increase our use of IT in the classroom as a way of making education more relevant and "authentic" (the educational word-of-the-year) to students. We still have a library etc. but educators obviously feel that IT is the way of the future so pushing to have it at the forefront of how we teach makes it more meaningful to todays kids rather than the old fashioned methods of research and note taking. :(

You painted a lovely picture :). I'm aware of how good this sort of technology is and what it could become. Was just curious about what you were being shown. Sounds cool.

You could have fun with your spy software :shifty:

mashman

11th December 2013, 17:43

I dunno - I used to think like this.....but then something clicked.
I have a library - I kid you not a fucking library of books. I had a room dedicated to crap like school computers, books, portfolios.....

The average school student is collecting this crap and hording it.

As much as I had Apple - getting my son an ipad is a fucking godsend when I think of the mountains of shit he would have got if he didn't have it. It doesn't replace a bike or a ball. But fuck me could you imagine consolidating a DVD collection or a book collection.

So I put the "take a device to school thing" with the same grain as buying your kids a computer or a encyclopedia Britannica. Times have moved on......if kids can now have shit consolidating to 1kg of electronics. I am all for it. At its worst at-least it will fix their back problems.

Though in saying that - there needs to a budget limit - possibly even a government plan to sort that our. WINZ sponsored tablets? Sure if it makes kids as quick as the first world. But right now schools waste money on having computers and libraries......not even companies do that these days. Its all BYOD and wikipedia.

My folks had an encyclopedia set. Zen von for ze children. I should really look into getting some. I do love the idea of technology in the classroom, but I think it's still a bit young as they're always making older ones obselete. I'd rather schools weren't caught in that trap... or parents for that matter.