I will never forget the excitement of the start of a new school year. The very familiar (to this day) and distinctive aroma of the disinfectant used by the township at Kuser and other area schools back during my years in that wonderful grammar school. We were taught the "3 R's" with a vengeance. Reading, writing and arithmetic were taught by teachers who knew how to impregnate our young brains. I have very fond memories of learning to print, then write in cursive and how to string an intelligent sentence and compound that sentence into an intelligent composition. Only since succeeding generations took over our schools did we begin to hear that keeping a slower student back to repeat a school year was bad for his or her "self esteem." And now along comes "Common Core" with what appears to me to be a different approach to the task of education young students. I am hearing educational "experts" opining that mnemonics are ineffective. In my personal experience even after 70 years of my 81 years, memorization was a key to my ability to comprehend grammar, math, and other critical subjects; going way back to my primary years when I memorized the alphabet, the times tables, the basic rules of good grammar and probably many more subjects that I didn't mention.
Only recently did I learn that some schools are eliminating cursive writing and its very necessary companion, Penmanship from their studies. BAD IDEA! (That is my opinion and mine alone.) No one appreciates the digital age more than I. It has led me on an incredibly fascinating journey of knowledge and enrichment. However in my not too savvy brain, I don't think using tablets and computers should replace the manual and mental dexterity required to write AND READ cursive. History? I'm hearing stories that our U.S. history books contain an abundance of revisionist history.
Only recently did I learn that some schools are eliminating cursive writing and its very necessary companion, Penmanship from their studies. BAD IDEA! (That is my opinion and mine alone.) No one appreciates the digital age more than I. It has led me on an incredibly fascinating journey of knowledge and enrichment. However in my not too savvy brain, I don't think using tablets and computers should replace the manual and mental dexterity required to write AND READ cursive. History? I'm hearing stories that our U.S. history books contain an abundance of revisionist history.
SPEAKING OF SCHOOLS AND EDUCATION, I WILL BE PRESENTING AN ON SCREEN PRESENTATION TOMORROW EVENING FROM 7 P.M. THE PRESENTATION IS ENTITLED, "HAMILTON SCHOOLS; THE WAY THEY WERE." THE PROGRAM IS COMPLETELY FREE TO ALL AREA RESIDENTS WHO ARE WITHIN TRAVEL DISTANCE OF THE HAMILTON LIBRARY. THE MEETING WILL BE HELD IN ROOM NUMBER 3, LOWER LEVEL.
Tommy
ReplyDeletetotally agree with you. Kids are not studying U.S. history.English is taking a back seat to foreign languages. We skip math because its too hard. Meanwhile countries like China,Russia,India are passing us by. why? Because of "social promotions". Our educational system is going down the tubes and you can thank the teachers unions for that and the stupid politicians ,primarily one party. We may become a 3rd world country if we're not careful. We might become " RAP" civilization.
Germany and Japan's educational system is way above ours. They teach and write with passion and desire.
Lee
When my kid was taking a "foreign languages course" turns out the only language was spanish. Worse, the teacher was low marginal in English. In Newark I had to wait for the janitor to translate my questions since the principal spoke no (AS IN NO), English. They had no pictures of Washington or Lincoln but of depictions of Puerto Rican leaders.
ReplyDeleteEd Millerick
Thanks,Lee and Ed. It's nice to see that I'm not the only one who is apprehensive about modern education. If they succeed in omitting Penmanship and cursive writing, this generation will not be able to read anything that is hand written! Computers and spell checkers are fine, but nothing beats knowing how to read and write the King's English in a recognizable hand.
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