Dumb Kids

[SoulKiss]

Originally Posted by kitkat

not very fair to make sweeping statements about kids being thick. my daughter has just sat her standard grades (scottish gsce) and worked hard and hopes to have done well. Most of her friends are in the same position. Easy to say how it was much easier in the good old days lets not put down the kids that are trying

Only problem with Standard Grades in Scotland is that they are of a lower standard than the old O-levels

I know this because they were just coming in when I did my O-levels and a good few people who were borderline for good O-Level Maths passes also sat the Standard Grades, or in some cases, only Standard Grades

Being kids at the time (and as such cruel) the people doing Standard Grade only were labelled as the Thicky Class.

Now that O-levels have gone and only the Standard Grades exist, I wouldn't want to put money on the difficulty of the Standard Grades having been increased to match the old O-levels

Oh and I got 9 O-levels in a single year (8 subjects, Maths and Arithmetic, while taught in the same class has separate exams - I got 98% in my Arithmetic one (tho marked unofficially from a copy of my answers to the exam paper by my teacher at 100%, guess someone in the exam board didnt like me :P)

One of the schools on the list is here in S'bury. Friend used to teach there. She despaired - getting parents interested in their child's education was impossible. At a parents evening the staff would all be sat around waiting for any parent - even one - to turn up.

Originally Posted by SoulKiss

Only problem with Standard Grades in Scotland is that they are of a lower standard than the old O-levels

I know this because they were just coming in when I did my O-levels and a good few people who were borderline for good O-Level Maths passes also sat the Standard Grades, or in some cases, only Standard Grades

Being kids at the time (and as such cruel) the people doing Standard Grade only were labelled as the Thicky Class.

Now that O-levels have gone and only the Standard Grades exist, I wouldn't want to put money on the difficulty of the Standard Grades having been increased to match the old O-levels

Oh and I got 9 O-levels in a single year (8 subjects, Maths and Arithmetic, while taught in the same class has separate exams - I got 98% in my Arithmetic one (tho marked unofficially from a copy of my answers to the exam paper by my teacher at 100%, guess someone in the exam board didnt like me :P)

they do 3 different levels of standard grade - credit (1 or 2) general (3 or 4) and foundation (5 or 6). It seems like a really stupid way of doing things. coz my daughter is fairly bright she had to do 2 exams for each of her 8 subjects. When we were looking into moving down south all the schools told her she would need to go to school to do gcses as she has sat her exams a year early in Scotland. She managed to get college to test her and she came out with level 2 (which apparently means equivalent of 5 gcses at levels a-c) therefore college have accepted her. she starts in september aged 15. Its rather annoying that they imply scottish education is of a lower standard, when it clearly is not. but I wont get onto the scotland/england argument now lol

Originally Posted by Ed

Oh here we go again. It's no use blaming the schools. I bet that if you looked at the schools concerned, they have kids from places where nobody would really want to live, social problems and so on. Government looking for a scapegoat for a failure of policy generally. So let thenm close the schools - where are these kids going to go then? And how will they deal with thousands of redundant teachers? And even more angry parents?

After 11 years, isn't this an admission of failure?

I'm torn here. I went to an absolutely awful school in the middle of an area where nobody wanted to go. I now struggle with advanced maths due to the 'experiement' the school decided to do for my year which ruined anyone who didn't have access to private tutors chances of learning. When I asked how to work out fractions my teacher actually picked up a calculator and said use this button here.

But... The kids were also crap - more people went inside then finished Uni (3 to about 15 or 20 out of 150 kids in the year) and at nearly 32 I have multiple ex classmates that have 18 year old kids.

So it was from both sides. But 3 of us made it through uni and out of the other side (I'm sorry to sat that since leaving the country I've gone snobbish and hate going back to where I grew up as it's like a dmob zone) so it *was* possible even with the drawbacks - you just had to care and work against the school (not all the teachers, but definately against the school).

The attitudes seems to be that learning is uncool and almost everyone is, as far as I can see, more concerned with looking cool now than getting their head down working a bit for a few years (or even the few months upto the exams) and leaving school with good grades. Then, those who want to learn can be off put by the amount you're expected to learn, sometimes crap teaching and the d!cks in the classroom who are disrupting the lesson trying to be 'cool'.

Alex

I had a crap teacher for maths, that never turned up or even taught me so is it any wonder I didn't pass? I was in some classes at school were the kids didn't care what happened, and you could tell the teacher couldn't be bothered.

I am not a fan of the education system, like others I have managed to get through it and out the otherside with something.

Not everyone is acamdemic either so we should look at ways to help those I like the more pratical approach to things.

My year was the first year to move the grade system so hight school was year 7 ect, first year to do sats as well. So I was part of another government experiment that has gone wrong sigh.

Can such just put Brown down? He is so out of depth you can see it he should never have been put in office.

[dizzyblonde]

How bright a child is or how academic(whatever way you want to put it) starts from the beginning of life.

A friend of mine( who didn't own a tv and has a very intelligent daughter) said to me when my son was born, ''try and teach him as much as you can before he is four''
The reason he said this was, that anything you can cram in before school makes school a whole load easier. A child picks up the majority of their learning capacity from birth to school, feeding, walking, talking, writing...etc.

By the time my son went to nursery at 2 and half he knew all the colours, could count to ten, write his name, do basic stuff that by the time he got to school, was well advanced compared to the majority of kids. He can even speak German, as my gran has been teaching him in small amounts since he was three.
Every time i go to parents evenings the teachers say he will never have any problems academically. I am very proud of the fact that I gave so much input when he was small, as now he is benefitting from it. He has an interest in learning.

Beats putting a toddler in front of the TV for hours on end and getting to school and finding it difficult because your brain isn't geared up for learning.
I'm so glad i took my friends advice.

It doesn't help that we live in a society where people openly accept and admit to being dim.

I believe the launch of Big Brother was the fundamental point where television made 'celebrities' of idiots, and invited scrutiny in to their every move. Making idols of people who laugh at their own ignorance and creating swarms of these so called 'celebrities' just flooded the media with a barrage of belief that education doesn't matter.

Even the broadsheet newspapers have succumbed to the dumbing-down shift evident in the media. The BBC 'most read' section is awash with 'frog born with 6 legs', 'Cheryl Cole eats kebab'; futile, mundane drivel. The demand for this form of media is outstanding, just look in your local newsagents at the hundreds of various magazines feeding this travesty. Once filled with science, craft and specialist interest magazines, these are now pushed to the back for weekly self-confessed fictional trash.

It's a small wonder children don't want to be seen as clever, one look at any childrens TV and you'll note how sterotyped each role is. You have your dumb-but-beautiful girls driving around in swish cars and then your "geeks" who talk about science and get pushed around. The boys are equally divided in to a hierarchical structure of the 'jocks' and 'geeks'. No prizes for guessing who gets bullied, and who gets the girl.

If people do struggle with subjects they rightly should be embarrassed, and should aspire to learning the skills they lack. Education is fundamental; the children entering school now will be running the WORLD when you're too old to make a stand or a difference.

As for all these "celibrities", may I remind you of Andy Warhol's comment on the subject:

"One day everybody will be famous for fifteen minutes"

G2D - Very good point, well made. Mind if I pinch that for a presentation I'm doing in school at the moment?

Alex

[SoulKiss]

When I was a kid my parents did all sorts of things with/for me with regards to learning.

Before I even went to primary school I had an old Golden Virginia tobacco tin that was full of "letter" cards, to teach me my letters, I can still remember the smell of that tin and the bits of card.

At the age of 8 I was reading up to 3 books at the same time, no, not actually open at the same time, but I would have a book at home, one at one aunts and another at anothers and keep the stories separate.

I had read The Lord of the Rings by 10 and have re-read it about once a year ever since, each time getting something new from it.

The similarly encouraged me with Maths/Arithmetic.

If I had had a useless teacher they would have know and complained about it, but then my parents knew most of my teachers through school events etc, I believe my Mother STILL gets a christmas card from my Primary 7 teacher.

Education is NOT just the job of the schools.

But I guess that what has happened in recent times is that 2 working parent families the parents dont have the time to spend with the kids, and now, its undereducated parents that have the kids and dont know what they should be doing/dont know the subjects to help their kids.