Handwriting, spelling, grammar, and multiplication tables are skills from the past

[Embassy]

 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2013/jun/15/schools-teaching-curriculum-education-google :svengo:

[trulycrabby]

"...use of the internet and collaboration?" Sounds like what we do every day in homeschool. I disagree that grammar, times tables, etc... are no longer relevant; they are the foundation for greater learning.

 

I do think this article has merit, and we must become lifetime learners to adapt to a constantly changing world.

 

Thank you for posting this article!

[kiwik]

it is all very well saying you could find out about something in five minutes but if you weren't able to make the connection between your current need an an historic event how would you know what to google. I also find it to be a waste of time reading page after page of stuff which probably could have been expressed in 100 words if the author were able to assume all readers had a good grasp of grammar and a good vocabulary (or if the author had). Then there is the problem of being told something completely different than the writer intended and having to work it out for myself. Besides whether we like it or not we are a product of our culture and history. We are not isolated beings independant of everything that has happened. And not everything can be done in groups. Groups can be great but often they result in mediocrity and time wasting.

[silver]

Don't research papers provide what the author was hoping for (when he derides tests)? Most high school English and History classes require some sort of research paper at some point. I would also say grammar/spelling is important for effective communication. Sure, there's spell check, but you need to get relatively close to the correct spelling for it to guess what word you meant to use.

 

And if everyone is just taught how to look up what they need to know (or how to build the resources that hold the information), but no one is taught specific knowledge, who is going to be writing the books and websites for everyone else to use?

[Courtney_Ostaff]

The author is the "unschooling" guru of the professional education world. Heaven forbid we require memorization! I can't remember where I read it, but I remember reading that the early Greeks were suspicious of writing things down, because they felt that people wouldn't "own" their memory, and have it available when they needed it. I'd love to see a debate between Willingham and Mitra!

[Violet Crown]

I'm always suspicious of teachers with explanations of why they don't need to teach.

[Tress]

I'm always suspicious of teachers with explanations of why they don't need to teach.

 

Why????? Don't you know that without teaching handwriting, spelling, grammar and multiplication tables, they will have soooooo much more time to teach social skills!

 

:D Joking, I totally agree with you!

[Tracy]

Aside from the face value of these skills, learning those skills also teaches you how to think. That is the real value of spelling, grammar, math, etc.

[kiwik]

Besides maths, grammar, history etc are fun.

[Violet Crown]

Here's a corrective to the idea that memorization is bad, googling is good:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-22971225

 

So schools in the US and UK have been assigning a recent Nancy Willard poem as William Blake. The internet says it's by Blake. But a school librarian knew it wasn't, because nobody who had immersed themselves in Blake and memorized any of his work could possibly mistake it for Blake.

[*Michelle*]

One of the teachers who works with me said to her class of nine-year-olds: "There is something called electromagnetic radiation that we can't see, can you figure out what it is?" The children huddle around a few computers, talking, running around and looking for clues. In about 40 minutes, they figure out the basics of electromagnetism and start relating it to mobile signals.

 

Just what we need. An entire generation of people who think they're experts after reading about something on the internet.

[Peplophoros]

Just what we need. An entire generation of people who think they're experts after reading about something on the internet.

 

 

Yes. Sometimes I wonder if I'm the only one who knows that 75% of the "information" on the internet is crap. Yes, we live in a digital age, but most of the research being done (at least in my field) is still available only in print. The internet is not peer-reviewed. The internet is not quality-controlled. My students truly don't want to understand this and turn in badly researched papers because of it. The internet is a great research tool--to help find BOOKS and ARTICLES, most of which are not (yet) online.