The school system of education is redundant

It's not uncommon for young adults to do some, or all of their college course work via computer. But these students already have developed discipline toward learning. Online courses, to an extent are self paced. There are weekly assignments but, there is no time limit on student"s accessing information in a given week. Still, there are books to read and papers written to be graded by an actual teacher. Computer technology is used for home schooling young children to a very limited degree. Most of their lessons are pencil and paper with a parent guiding them. Children are not left on their own. They have not yet developed discipline toward learning or even staying focused to complete tasks independently; that comes with time and maturity. A parent guides the child along with his/her lessons, and provides explanations or reteaches where needed. Using computers exclusively for school aged children does not address different learning styles of children; visual, auditory, or tactile; nor does it solve the issue when a student does not understand a concept. A teacher helps in this way by explaining it in a different way, or taking a different approach. A child working in a group also contributes to learning. Sometimes another child can better explain than a teacher; they use the same vocabulary and the back and forth discussion helps. --"The courses would be divided in 10 minute units on each topic. Each topic would have revision questions to test if the student understands the subject properly before progressing. The courses would be divided in 10 minute units on each topic. Each topic would have revision questions to test if the student understands the subject properly before progressing. The revision tests would occur daily and not on a term basis as is currently practiced. "--- Let's look at your 10 minute unit proposal; what are we teaching? How to add two numbers together, or why the European explorers came to the Americas? One can maybe be taught in a 10 minute session but, the other can't. If we test a child every 10 minutes on a single concept, would that not be tedious and slow? When a child does not understand, does he just repeat the lesson it until the kid figures out which multiple answer question is right? That's process of elimination, not learning. Teachers use various types of assessments throughout each lesson to see if children are progressing, if it's found they are not grasping certain concepts, the teacher changes the method of teaching. These are not papers that are graded, but applied tools. Term grades are a summation of all test and quizzes given throughout a term. --"A graph of their progress would show where they were in relation to other students."-- In grammar school, students aren"t graded in relation to other students in the class. They are assessed individually on how they personally progress through various units of study. The state or federal government"s standardized tests measure whether students are performing above or below a set mean. They then look at the scores of a whole class to assess teacher effectiveness; then do the same at a whole school level. How students perform in relation to one another is relative, and frankly not fair to students. You can't compare a single student against others who excels or falls behind. --"The current methods of teaching are too slow, costly and ineffective --. My son is struggling to learn using the current system. He keeps missing information and has to constantly have private tuition to keep up with the class. This is all unnecessary."-- I am hearing two contradictory things; teaching methods are slow and your son can't keep up. I will not make comment on your son. I don"t know him, nor have any knowledge on how he learns. Teachers have prescribed pacing guides for most subjects. If the class grasps concepts quickly, the teacher moves on. If time runs out, they still have to move on. Teachers hate pacing; most often the complaint is not enough time is allotted to teach complex concepts. Again, a teacher assesses students before a unit to see what they already know, and then builds from there and continues assessments throughout to ascertain learning. Costly? Average dollars spent per student in the US is around $ 6,700, excluding overheads such as operations, maintenance, bussing and food services. I do not think anyone can get full time day care annually for that price, and this includes books, materials, computers and the licensing of software. Teacher effectiveness is measured regularly at the school and state level. If our current education system is so ineffective, how has anyone progressed past their ABCs? --"Videos can be designed to have as much detail as you want" Some teachers are lazy and don't teach in an appropriate manner" -- Tell me this. Name one TV program that you watched last night. Now state 10 things you remember about the show, including all the names of the characters? No cheating by using Tevo. Watching videos is a passive activity. No matter how detailed they are, much of the information is forgotten shortly after. That's why concepts are taught, reviewed and practiced, for understanding and retention. Lazy teachers; I hardly know how to respond. Lazy people can't become teachers. They prepare lesson plans, with additional plans to accommodate students that require a different approach, correct papers, put together materials, turn their plans into the principle or head teacher for review and approval. They get in class to teach, assess learning, all while maintaining order. Then, they have to find time to take more college courses to keep their licenses, while taking care of their families. It's not a 40 hour work week as some people seem to think. What is appropriate teaching? Please enlighten me. --"Teachers can show favouritism to certain students and give them better marks. The computer system is completely neutral and doesn't favour any students over others. "-- Believing that teachers favor some students with better marks is absurd. They have to prove on what basis or scale they are grading students. ---"The classroom situation has many distractions which interrupt concentration."--- When was the last time you were in school? Classrooms are hubs for activity, discussions and small group learning. Other than times when students are writing essays, taking, test or quizzes; students are not sitting at their desks for extended periods of time. What kinds of distraction do you mean? --"The computer system would save billions of dollars in education costs and would be far more productive. Some private tuition could be still available in subjects that require verbal responses. Sport and social activities would be still available using this system. Art, craft, woodwork, metalwork, technical drawing would be some exceptions that still require teachers."---- Let's pretend we have computer based learning in place as you proposed. How much would you be willing to pay for the various learning modules? Most likely you'd be charged by a subscription method for each subject, and extra for on line books. Who or what would be correcting essays? We know Spell Check is glitchy when it comes to their, there and they're in proper context. Grammar Check is even worse. Computers can't judge essay content. Private tutoring, how much more for that? Social activities and sports still have to be paid for with taxes, and the hands on classes like art and so forth would still require a physical buildings that would need to be maintained; also bussing for students to these classes. Do you really think you'd be saving money? --"It would not be necessary to go to school in my model. The student could learn from a home computer."---- While you and your spouse are at work, would you trust your child to sit home alone in front of a computer and stay on task with lessons? Video games anyone?