Pushing back against the surge of misinformation online, California will now require all K-12 students to learn media literacy skills -- such as recognizing fake news and thinking critically about what they encounter on the internet.
Recognizing fake news now a required subject in California schools::undefined
it would be much better if you taught generic critical thinking
That’s pretty much what you get from an English (or history) class in HS. Can you extract information from a text, can you synthesize information from multiple sources, can you interpret what the text means and support your interpretation based on evidence, can you understand motivations and perspectives of characters, and recognize information from unreliable narrators, etc.
Sometimes when a problem becomes immediate enough, teaching the general case isn’t enough. Not sure whether we’ve reached that point, but there’s a lot of general teaching that people complain isn’t specific enough. “Why don’t they teach how to do taxes?”-- because they teach math and following directions, and it theoretically shouldn’t be more complicated than that.
how is math not general? How is understanding characters from a book not general?
The general math and reading skills I learned stopped at 8th grade(or earlier in the case of English)
I didn’t need to write a 10 page paper on 3D trig for general math. Nor how to transpose a matrix.
I didn’t need to learn about, well actually in English I didn’t learn anything, we just kept doing the same imagery fan theorizing from 8th grade to graduation.
I didn’t need to write a 10 page paper on 3D trig for general math. Nor how to transpose a matrix.
I don’t think that’s what most people learn in terms of math. If you’re not going to college you probably don’t need trig or calc, but a basic understanding of algebra and geometry is useful IMO.
we just kept doing the same imagery fan theorizing from 8th grade to graduation.
Sounds like a problem with a shitty school or poor teachers, rather than a defect of English lit education in general. All the stuff I mentioned above is written into Common Core standards.
All the stuff I mentioned above is written into Common Core standards.
A significant share of people finish common core curriculum long before graduating. That’s why AP, IB, and other advanced courses exist.
As for English, I don’t think so, I just think there’s only so much to cover. I got a 35 on act reading, and many of my classmates were similar. How’re you going to teach them basic reading better?
I meant Common Core in terms of English, like the basing your interpretations of a text on evidence, etc. Catching students up in basic reading skills is a real problem, but I don’t think that’s an issue with how the curriculum is designed, but rather a problem with the basic economic functions of the country, where parents don’t have time to meaningfully interact with their kids because of job pressures. Starting kids on literacy young is hugely important, but a parent with 3 jobs isn’t going to have time to read to their kids every night.
So there’s pressure on the school to get kids up to grade level without economic support, and there’s pressure on the parents to help their kids without having any time to deal with it… turns out stagnating wages in favor of the millionaire class for 50 years wasn’t the solution after all.
Is it not also a problem to wastes years of millions of students lives on education of specifics far beyond what they need or want, merely to fill time because they want everyone in highschool until 17 or 18?
I’m not quite understanding your point. Should we stop educating most kids at 14 or 15? Then the prospects for them are starting full time work a few years earlier or something?
Once I got to college and took real critical thinking classes in philosophy I was shocked at how pathetic the English classes were where we imitated the tools and concepts we would learn and apply in college. I think that people who study English do not learn critical thinking well enough in most cases and are better at teaching composition and the reading of fictional stories.
That’s pretty much what you get from an English (or history) class in HS. Can you extract information from a text, can you synthesize information from multiple sources, can you interpret what the text means and support your interpretation based on evidence, can you understand motivations and perspectives of characters, and recognize information from unreliable narrators, etc.
Sometimes when a problem becomes immediate enough, teaching the general case isn’t enough. Not sure whether we’ve reached that point, but there’s a lot of general teaching that people complain isn’t specific enough. “Why don’t they teach how to do taxes?”-- because they teach math and following directions, and it theoretically shouldn’t be more complicated than that.
Except education is not general, it is hyperfocused on topics that lead into higher education.
I can agree with that to a certain extent, but how is math not general? How is understanding characters from a book not general?
The general math and reading skills I learned stopped at 8th grade(or earlier in the case of English)
I didn’t need to write a 10 page paper on 3D trig for general math. Nor how to transpose a matrix.
I didn’t need to learn about, well actually in English I didn’t learn anything, we just kept doing the same imagery fan theorizing from 8th grade to graduation.
I don’t think that’s what most people learn in terms of math. If you’re not going to college you probably don’t need trig or calc, but a basic understanding of algebra and geometry is useful IMO.
Sounds like a problem with a shitty school or poor teachers, rather than a defect of English lit education in general. All the stuff I mentioned above is written into Common Core standards.
A significant share of people finish common core curriculum long before graduating. That’s why AP, IB, and other advanced courses exist.
As for English, I don’t think so, I just think there’s only so much to cover. I got a 35 on act reading, and many of my classmates were similar. How’re you going to teach them basic reading better?
I meant Common Core in terms of English, like the basing your interpretations of a text on evidence, etc. Catching students up in basic reading skills is a real problem, but I don’t think that’s an issue with how the curriculum is designed, but rather a problem with the basic economic functions of the country, where parents don’t have time to meaningfully interact with their kids because of job pressures. Starting kids on literacy young is hugely important, but a parent with 3 jobs isn’t going to have time to read to their kids every night.
So there’s pressure on the school to get kids up to grade level without economic support, and there’s pressure on the parents to help their kids without having any time to deal with it… turns out stagnating wages in favor of the millionaire class for 50 years wasn’t the solution after all.
Is it not also a problem to wastes years of millions of students lives on education of specifics far beyond what they need or want, merely to fill time because they want everyone in highschool until 17 or 18?
I’m not quite understanding your point. Should we stop educating most kids at 14 or 15? Then the prospects for them are starting full time work a few years earlier or something?
Once I got to college and took real critical thinking classes in philosophy I was shocked at how pathetic the English classes were where we imitated the tools and concepts we would learn and apply in college. I think that people who study English do not learn critical thinking well enough in most cases and are better at teaching composition and the reading of fictional stories.