From: paj@uk.co.gec-mrc (Paul Johnson)
Newsgroups: sci.math
Subject: Re: What can we have for an educational system?
Date: 11 Nov 92 09:21:57 GMT
Reply-To: paj@uk.co.gec-mrc (Paul Johnson)
Organization: GEC-Marconi Research Centre, Great Baddow, UK

My S.O. teaches physics and maths to `A' level in the English state
school system.  I don't know exactly how that translates to the US
system, but `A' levels are what you need to get into University here.
Students typically take three, exceptional students may do four.

In article <BALDWIN.92Nov8172729@csservera.scs.usna.navy.mil> baldwin@csservera.scs.usna.navy.mil (J.D. Baldwin) writes:

[Proposing a course of action to fix the US education system]

>1.  Abolish the education major, or at least its role in the teacher
>    certification process.  Math should be taught by people who have
>    studied math.  More about this below.

My SO (Roxane) has commented that most of what she learned at Teacher
Training College was pretty useless.  The set of social skills needed
to stay on top of a rebellious class was not on the curriculum.

>2.  [Much comment deleted]
>       In any case, a system full of teachers competent in their
>    fields, even if they are blindly groping their way toward the
>    correct way to teach their material, is bound to be better than
>    what we have now, which is a system replete with idiots, with
>    a solid grasp on the current WRONG way to teach it.

Roxane is a very competent physicist who is also working towards an
Open University degree (this impresses the hell out of the kids).
While this level of commitment may be unusual, I get the impression
that teachers who are incompetent in their main subject are also a
rarity.

However, there is an acute shortage of teachers in the sciences.
Every job Roxane has applied for, she has been offered.  (BTW, in the
UK teaching establishment they have this silly system where you are
offered the job at the interview, and must decide right then whether
to accept, but I digress).  This leads to PE and history teachers
having to do the sciences as a sideline.

> [...] We merely wish non-falsehoods to be
>taught, so that there is less to unlearn at later stages.  How many of
>us were mislead in school by being told that astronauts float
>"weightless" in space because the earth doesn't exert a gravitational
>force on them? [...]

I have helped Roxane with the preparation of work material for her
classes.  In the 8th or 9th grade, when things like space and rockets
are handled for the first time, the top set might be able to handle
the concept of gravity being balanced by centrifugal force in an
orbit.  The middle might be able to recite this without really
understanding it, and it will go straight over the heads of the bottom
set.

>(And all of this is quite aside from the fact that the truly
>outstanding student would have the needed expertise at hand when he
>began to outstrip the curriculum and pursue independent study.  But
>that's another post.)

Roxane once had one of these students.  However the parents wanted her
(the student) to be "normal and happy" i.e. not a genius.  Roxane gave
her as much help as possible (lending `A' level text books for
instance) but once this girl had outstriped Roxane's knowledge she was
on here own.  The parents don't always know best.

Paul.

-- 
Paul Johnson (paj@gec-mrc.co.uk).	    | Tel: +44 245 73331 ext 3245
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