May 28 2007
First tests, now homework…
Yep… Apparently, the Bush administration is to blame for homework.
Yep… Didn’t exist before ole W. took office.
No Child Left Behind has to shoulder some of the blame here. No Child Left Behind and standardized testing not only turns your child into a slave to her test-scores, but they can even affect your property values: a school with low test-scores brings down the neighborhood property values. That means that whatever your approach to your kids, the chances are that the other parents in your neighborhood are busting their asses to get their kids great test scores, drilling them, sending them to tutors, helping them with assignments that they were meant to complete themselves. If you don’t do the same, your kids will suffer by comparison.
The authors report on an elementary school in North Carolina where at least twenty standardized test books have to be replaced after their use because the stressed out elementary school kids working to them have vomited on them.
Pardon my french, but are you fucking kidding me?
When the fuck did schoolkids become such whiney little shitheads that something like a textbook could cause them to vomit? Holy shit, if schools are changing because of shit like this, they deserve to be six feet under a fucking avalanche.
Of course Mr. “I’m against all kinds of authority except money when it’s buying my books” Cory Doctorow who everyone keeps calling brilliant for some reason is all for abolishing homework because some anti-homework advocates have said it cuts into play and family time.
No shit? I mean hell, Cory, what the fuck did you do when you were in school? Oh right, you overcame all of that and no one else can because no one is as fucking strong as you are.
GOD I hate this touchy feely education bullshit. We have to throw more money at education, make classes smaller, abolish tests, abolish homework, teach sexuality to kindergartners, and all the while reading scores aren’t moving, math scores are non-existent, and for some reason girls still don’t bother trying to get into computer science type fields.
One thing Mr. “Smarter than the rest of the room” Doctorow didn’t take into account, or at least didn’t mention is his fellatio of this book is that education budgets were lower when I went to school, tests were harder and scores were much higher, graduation rates were higher, classes were bigger, and homework was much more demanding.
Somehow generation after generation of student went through that system and not only survived, but thrived. In fact, Mr. Professor of DRM Sucktitude is my wife’s age. My wife, who went through a system tougher than the one I went to, somehow managed to graduate Junior High, High School, earn a bachelor’s degree, and at the end of this year a Graduate degree. And no, she didn’t do it by memorization. She’s had multiple internships and externships, clinical hours, practical experience, and so on, and all of this related to her education.
That same system, including homework, that Doctorow says the pussified little shits of today just can’t compete in.
Cory Doctorow is full of shit. So are the authors of this book, and so is anyone who thinks the reason kids aren’t succeeding in school has anything to do with the work being too difficult. Maybe he should do more than teach some bullshit class on DRM and write alien and time travel books at a liberal California school loaded with slackers and potheads and familiarize himself with the educational system in this country like my wife, the teacher and graduate student has.
A wise man once said one should not comment on that which you know nothing about.
In other words, shut the fuck up Cory and stick to what you know about, whatever the fuck that is.
Source: Boing Boing; where the fuck else?
Technorati Tags: cory doctorow, know-nothing, homework, boing boing, fucking morons
May 29th, 2007 at 7:58 am
[...] it’s all the homework Technorati Tags: dyslexia, [...]
May 29th, 2007 at 9:29 am
Quick point on this one, Vinny, before a wicked busy work-week picks up steam.
There was a quick first grade “open house” with Esme’s math teacher at the beginning of the school year. He explained his philosophy of homework to the parents. I remember this vividly. In short, he told us, our kids have plenty of time to learn to hate math, so he’s not going to get them started now. They’ll learn lots of math during school. And they’ll get homework. But, at first grade, he felt that if the homework made it from his class to backpacks to lockers then home then to the backpack again back to the locker and back to his class, regardless of the answers on the paper, that was a great accomplishment at seven years old.
This year, in fourth grade, Esme is in “gifted” math. She voluntarily joined the school’s “Math Olympiad,” where she was finished third overall after several months of before-school math competitions, the highest-placing fourth grader. Now, her gifted math homework can be lights-out tough and frustrating for her, but she’s learning a lot, and she doesn’t back away from the challenge.
In other words, there’s something to be said for balance. Without having read the book entirely, it seems that they’re not arguing against homework altogether, but about a reasonable — and effective — amount that doesn’t prevent kids from doing anything else every night.
If students are getting anywhere from three to six hours of work to bring home with them, then perhaps some thought SHOULD be given. Personally, I’m not at all averse to putting in some extra work at home, as long as I know it’s short term, recognizing that it’s not a sustained business model. I’ll get fried. Why should we expect less of our kids?
May 29th, 2007 at 10:08 am
You may interpret it that way, but that’s nowhere near what they’re saying. They’re dismissing homework entirely as busy work and non-productive and talking all about how it damages family life, blah blah blah. I went to their site and it’s all the same propaganda.
Excessive busy work for homework is a bad thing, but homework in and of itself is not a problem. If it’s taking a kid 3 hours to do a few math problems, for example, that’s an indication that either they’re not learning enough in school, the work is too hard for them, or that something else needs to be dealt with.
That is, of course, if a parent pays attention, which is a whole other angle altogether.
In the end, homework is not a bad thing, and it’s certainly dumb to argue that because it makes them prioritize their night accordingly it’s therefore a bad thing. Since you mentioned what you expect from your life, well, don’t you re-prioritize your night based on what you have to do?
Why should we expect less of our kids?
May 29th, 2007 at 8:03 pm
Maybe I’m just spoiled. For example: I remember rote memorization of spelling vocabulary and 12×12 math tables. My kids are being taught PATTERNS. So even if they don’t recognize a word, they at least know that it follows a similar pattern to other words they’ve learned before. Also seems to shorten the homework cycle since pattern recognition is a quicker, smarter way to tackle problems.
And, at least so far, I haven’t found any issues balancing extra-curricular activities with academics for either of the daughters.
Mostly trying to play Devil’s Advocate, here, without much heart behind my arguments. Alas.