No offense, but I'm glad you didn't teach my kids with that attitude. Higher order thinking skills, including advanced math (and the pythagorean theorem is not advanced math. It is junior high.) is important for everyone.

 

What LBBC coach is trying to say is that we are trying to prepare everyone for college, when the majority are not headed for college. We need to prepare students for all levels of work, some will head to college, some to vocational school, some straight into the workforce or the military. The students who need the advanced math or science classes will take those classes, for the others give them the classes they need to prepare for the business world, construction, welding, plumbing or a variety where you do not need college. You still give them classes that can give them the higher order skills, but related to what they are going to do in life, not everyone is headed to college.

I am totally and completely depressed by the posts in this entire thread.

 

Be specific, please. My original point was that education is better and more readily available to the masses than what everyone thinks.

 

Also, the Yale grad, the lawyers, the pilot, the Coast Guard and National Guard members that I mentioned are real life graduates of a high school in a small rural county. I actually feel rather uplifted by their stories, most of which I have posted links to at one time or another.

 

It is depressing that more are not taking advantage of the offer if that is what is bothering you.

Hey, while we're at it, let's include the special ed population in the regular classroom, and have them read and disect Romeo and Juliet and Julius Caesar, even though they can barely read on a first grade level. I love KERA.

No offense, but I'm glad you didn't teach my kids with that attitude. Higher order thinking skills, including advanced math (and the pythagorean theorem is not advanced math. It is junior high.) is important for everyone.

 

I agree with LBBC on several points, learning the pythagorean theorem may become important for some, however, all children are not going to be able to learn this. Also before they begin such advanced math, they should be taught basic accounting like balancing a checkbook, I've argued this forever. It is sad that our kids in high school cannot balance checkbooks. Don't even get me started on half of the populaton of high schools cannot name the bordering states or counties that they live in.

Seems that I recall at least one of my kids taking some sort of Life Skills class that was sort of a uni-sex version of Home EC. In addition to the usual basic cooking and washing skills, they were taught such things as balancing a check book, budgeting, shopping, etc.

 

Apparently didn't sink in on the one son though.

Hey, while we're at it, let's include the special ed population in the regular classroom, and have them read and disect Romeo and Juliet and Julius Caesar, even though they can barely read on a first grade level. I love KERA.

 

You mean IDEA

I agree with LBBC on several points, learning the pythagorean theorem may become important for some, however, all children are not going to be able to learn this. Also before they begin such advanced math, they should be taught basic accounting like balancing a checkbook, I've argued this forever. It is sad that our kids in high school cannot balance checkbooks. Don't even get me started on half of the populaton of high schools cannot name the bordering states or counties that they live in.

 

 

How about the ones who work as cashiers and can't make change?:irked:

If your total is $4.96 and you give them a 5 dollar bill and a penny, it absolutely blows their mind.

 

 

Sad indeed.

Do any of you ever watch those sections of TV shows when they ask the people on the streets questions like "who is the govenor" or "who is the VP"? They'll miss it by a mile and everyone laughs. It's actually fairly terrifying at how little most people know about anything that goes on in this country. Ask your co-workers which party either presidential candidate belongs to and see how many tell you "I don't know". I read somewhere that the average American citizen could not pass the test to become a naturalized American citizen!!!

 

As far as the change thing goes, I'll share a story. We were at Wal-Mart and the cashier, a young teenage girl, was talking to a friend as she rang up the customer in front of us. She claimed she skipped 46 days of school her senior year and passed. The customer's total came to something like $46.51. She asked the cashier if she could write a check for $20 over so she would have some cash. The girl said NO, because she could not figure how much that would bring the total to right off the top of her head. THIS is what the system is having to deal with. Nitwits to start with blowing off school and being turned loose on us as qualified/educated HS graduates.

Do any of you ever watch those sections of TV shows when they ask the people on the streets questions like "who is the govenor" or "who is the VP"? They'll miss it by a mile and everyone laughs. It's actually fairly terrifying at how little most people know about anything that goes on in this country. Ask your co-workers which party either presidential candidate belongs to and see how many tell you "I don't know". I read somewhere that the average American citizen could not pass the test to become a naturalized American citizen!!!

 

As far as the change thing goes, I'll share a story. We were at Wal-Mart and the cashier, a young teenage girl, was talking to a friend as she rang up the customer in front of us. She claimed she skipped 46 days of school her senior year and passed. The customer's total came to something like $46.51. She asked the cashier if she could write a check for $20 over so she would have some cash. The girl said NO, because she could not figure how much that would bring the total to right off the top of her head. THIS is what the system is having to deal with. Nitwits to start with blowing off school and being turned loose on us as qualified/educated HS graduates.

 

And they're VOTING!!!:creepy:

No offense, but I'm glad you didn't teach my kids with that attitude. Higher order thinking skills, including advanced math (and the pythagorean theorem is not advanced math. It is junior high.) is important for everyone.

 

I would hazard a guess the reason that the United States cannot produced scientist and engineers to our capability, or at least on par with other countries, is due to the fact that we don't value those concepts. By the time these students graduate, they have no choice but to pursue careers that don't involve math.

 

A Nobel Science Winner is from my school district.

I wasn't taught these concepts and he was before my time.

So, I would hazard a guess that when he was in the 6th grade he wasn't being taught regtangular and triangular numbers.

And he is one that was involved in discovering DNA.

No offense, but I'm glad you didn't teach my kids with that attitude. Higher order thinking skills, including advanced math (and the pythagorean theorem is not advanced math. It is junior high.) is important for everyone.

 

You would love for me to teach your child as I am passionate about teaching them things they need in life.

What LBBC coach is trying to say is that we are trying to prepare everyone for college, when the majority are not headed for college. We need to prepare students for all levels of work, some will head to college, some to vocational school, some straight into the workforce or the military. The students who need the advanced math or science classes will take those classes, for the others give them the classes they need to prepare for the business world, construction, welding, plumbing or a variety where you do not need college. You still give them classes that can give them the higher order skills, but related to what they are going to do in life, not everyone is headed to college.

 

EXACTLY!

 

For the sake of us feeling good about ourselves, we have tried to make kids come out of cookie cutters and kids are not all the same type of cookie.

 

There are young ladies and gentleman who leave HS every day who are not prepared for LIFE because they spent many hours of school learning things that they will NEVER USE IN LIFE!!!!!! and not learning things that they NEED to learn for life.

 

Financial literacy is a topic that is severely undervalued and undertaught in our school districts, yet day in and day out, more and more people find themselves in horrible financial trouble because they did not know what they are doing.

And they're VOTING!!!:creepy:

 

 

AAARRRGGGGHHHHH!!!!!! I didn't even think about the hand that they have in deciding OUR future!!!!!:scared: :eek: :scared:

 

(My blood actually just ran cold a little! Thanks a bunch, Shamrock fan!)

Do any of you ever watch those sections of TV shows when they ask the people on the streets questions like "who is the govenor" or "who is the VP"? They'll miss it by a mile and everyone laughs. It's actually fairly terrifying at how little most people know about anything that goes on in this country. Ask your co-workers which party either presidential candidate belongs to and see how many tell you "I don't know". I read somewhere that the average American citizen could not pass the test to become a naturalized American citizen!!!

 

As far as the change thing goes, I'll share a story. We were at Wal-Mart and the cashier, a young teenage girl, was talking to a friend as she rang up the customer in front of us. She claimed she skipped 46 days of school her senior year and passed. The customer's total came to something like $46.51. She asked the cashier if she could write a check for $20 over so she would have some cash. The girl said NO, because she could not figure how much that would bring the total to right off the top of her head. THIS is what the system is having to deal with. Nitwits to start with blowing off school and being turned loose on us as qualified/educated HS graduates.

 

In HS they would not be teaching her subtration and addition.

What LBBC coach is trying to say is that we are trying to prepare everyone for college, when the majority are not headed for college. We need to prepare students for all levels of work, some will head to college, some to vocational school, some straight into the workforce or the military. The students who need the advanced math or science classes will take those classes, for the others give them the classes they need to prepare for the business world, construction, welding, plumbing or a variety where you do not need college. You still give them classes that can give them the higher order skills, but related to what they are going to do in life, not everyone is headed to college.

 

A GREAT, GREAT class for teaching Geometry would be a math class at the vocational schools that handle geometry as it relates to construction.