"We've invented adolescence, and stretched it out too far" says psychologist

[Jon Miller]

Originally posted by Koyaanisqatsi

Evidence. Not just my own.

Expand thy mind.

Scientific studies. Nothing to do with expanding my mind.

I know you read what I did in school. The rest of my education before college was similiar (I skipped 7th also). I did not have much structure.

I basically wasted my time, which I regret. If there had been more opportunities, I might have taken them, but I wasn't self motivated to do much besides read that was educational.

While it there are scientific studies which show that kids spend their time watching TV/etc instead of self motivated learning, I can also tell you that the intelligent kids in my class did similarly.

The financial aspect is crucial, you can't be an adult in today's society without it. How does my 'system', which is just the current one expanded/compressed a bit, going to create less socially developed and indpendent people. Actually, I beleive it will do a better job, as the young adults won't be kept as kids until they are 18 and older. Rather, they will be treated as kids when they are kids, and will be expected to behave as adults (and hence behave as adults) when they are so (14ish). The problem, and the reason why kids have issues with social development and indepedence, is because they are foced to be kids (Forced to play/etc) when they should be adults (and have responsibility). Independence in intimately tied to responsibility.

The issue with financing 1-12 education is that it is local. If it was made federal the issue woudl go away.

Kids are kids, they need structure. Adults are expected to create it for themselves, they can learn this by selecting classes and doing things outside of school, as well as by being independent at age 14. My system will create much more independent people of age 18 then the systems of the last 50 years. It won't be an issue.

Koyaan, what you say hasn't worked for 50 years, by the people who have tried it. I have watched it not work. Why do you keep trying to hold it up as the answer? This book I think has identified the problem, we should work towards that solution, not try solutions which have already failed.

We don't have the teachers to have anything but classes. I know, it would be better to have a teacher per student and then we could do something similar to your desires. But we don't, so we need classes.

Actually, reading on I don't think you are worth replying to anymore. Are you being purposefully obtuse?

JM

[Koyaanisqatsi]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
Scientific studies.

Oh? Show me a study that says that kids who are given self-directed learning goals perform worse than those who are given read/write/regurgitate.

I know you read what I did in school. The rest of my education before college was similiar (I skipped 7th also). I did not have much structure.

I basically wasted my time, which I regret. If there had been more opportunities, I might have taken them, but I wasn't self motivated to do much besides read that was educational.

While it there are scientific studies which show that kids spend their time watching TV/etc instead of self motivated learning, I can also tell you that the intelligent kids in my class did similarly.

You are missing the key point here, which I have said several times: give them goals to meet. If they don't, then give them consequences. This is a parenting issue, not one for organized education. If you had had goals you were expected to meet, then continued to just watch TV, then you would have been punished for it. The key, though, is to allow children the latitude to decide when they want to meet those goals, not to regiment their daily lives so much that they never have to think for themselves.

The financial aspect is crucial, you can't be an adult in today's society without it. How does my 'system', which is just the current one expanded/compressed a bit, going to create less socially developed and indpendent people.

Because they'll have spent all their time in directed classrooms instead of learning how to interact with people in an unstructured environment and follow their own will.

Rather, they will be treated as kids when they are kids, and will be expected to behave as adults (and hence behave as adults) when they are so (14ish).

So what, they have a kind of educational B'nai Mitzvah? What makes you think that will work? The fact that it doesn't is why childhood has been artificially extended for so long...

The problem, and the reason why kids have issues with social development and indepedence, is because they are foced to be kids (Forced to play/etc) when they should be adults (and have responsibility). Independence in intimately tied to responsibility.

Quite true. See above, 'goals' and 'consequences'.

The issue with financing 1-12 education is that it is local. If it was made federal the issue woudl go away.

Yeah, because federal social programs are always so over-budgeted.

Kids are kids, they need structure. Adults are expected to create it for themselves, they can learn this by selecting classes and doing things outside of school, as well as by being independent at age 14. My system will create much more independent people of age 18 then the systems of the last 50 years. It won't be an issue.

How do you expect them to learn to create their own structure when they are never given the opportunity to learn how to do so?

Koyaan, what you say hasn't worked for 50 years, by the people who have tried it. I have watched it not work. Why do you keep trying to hold it up as the answer? This book I think has identified the problem, we should work towards that solution, not try solutions which have already failed.

Actually, it does work. See recent studies on the outcomes of Montessori schools for evidence...

We don't have the teachers to have anything but classes. I know, it would be better to have a teacher per student and then we could do something similar to your desires. But we don't, so we need classes.

Luckily, you don't need as many teachers when parents are the ones setting the goals and seeing that they get accomplished. Is this something that can be realistically expected of all parents? Not right now, but it would take far less of a social change than what you're talking about.

Actually, reading on I don't think you are worth replying to anymore. Are you being purposefully obtuse?

No, it's just a natural talent.

[Jon Miller]

How is it a big social change to have school in the summer?

My issue with you is your refusal to see the crucial place of financial indepedence.

JM

[Koyaanisqatsi]

Well, it is a major change to just have school in the summer. Have you paid attention to the community resistance the idea has been met with any time it's proposed? It's seen as a change in the way of life...parents look back on the summers of their school years as some of the few times of real freedom in their lives. They don't want to deny that to their children. Then you also have the lost chances for integration with the 'real world' in all those crappy summer jobs people get. And if they don't have a crappy summer job they often had athletics, academic programs, stuff they actually chose to do rather than having somebody tell them they had to do it. All that goes away when you take out summer vacations.

But you're not just proposing that. You're also proposing increasing the number of hours/day at school. This may be convenient for parents that don't want to pay for an afternoon babysitter, but it will be seen as a removal of freedom (which it is) by parents that don't want their children controlled by the schools (this is not a small percentage, by the way.)

And then you're proposing turning kids out into the full-time workforce at 14. How is that not a small change again?

As for financial independence, yes, I have already said it is an important part of being a functioning adult in our society. But it is not the only requirement. Social, intellectual, spiritual functionality and independence are also required. When you take the attitude that behaving as an adult is just a matter of flipping a switch, going from living of somebody else's labor to living off your own, you're ignoring all of the other things that go into a complete human being. Maybe it's a key milestone, but really, it should be the final milestone, not the only one. Compressing the academic growth of a child may get them the skills they need to enter the workforce earlier, but it really degrades their ability to function as a complete human being. If you then say that they have to be financially independent when they don't have the skills to function in all aspects of independent life, they're not going to succeed.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Wycoff


This is where we disagree. I think that 14 is too young, even with an accelerated education. 16 is the youngest that I would go, and even then I'm a bit leery.

A guy I was supposed to go to junior high school with (7th grade) didn't show up.

There was much sucking of teeth among the educators, but there was no convincing the young man to come back to school from the job he had as an aprentice as a mechanic.

I never heard of him again, until he surfaced as a successful member of the community and he was elected as an MLA in the legislature.

People who think 14 is too young have little to go on other than preconceived ideas, and they certainly have little to no experience with rural communities where it is extremely common to have young adolescents operating heavy machinery at various times and people 'grow up' a lot faster.

[aneeshm]

@ Jon Miller

I agree with you in that children need structure. But I believe they need to be told what to do, and then left alone to do it. Our insistence on crippling their growth by spoonfeeding them by telling them how to do everything is what should be stopped.

And TBH, I don't like the idea of doing away with summer vacations. I would, however, not object to making school a bigger part of life during the times when it is active - but for that to happen, it has to be perceived as something which is not a burden to be reluctantly borne, as it is now.

[Kuciwalker]

Summer vacation is such an important part of our culture that I'd never want to see it go.

[aneeshm]

I'd say the entire system needs to be completely reworked. It's totally screwed up, unnatural, and in general a complete misfit with our times.

Let me describe how an alternate system functioned. I'm not suggesting that that we should try to simply implement as it is today - that would be foolish - but that we can draw many lessons from the way it functioned.

The Wikipedia article on the Indian education system called the Gurukul is woefully inadequate, so I'll have to fill in the details.



I'll refrain from using Indian terminology here, so as to make it easier to understand, and I'll try to present it without letting the context intrude.

Education began at the age of five, when the child was taught how to read and write - given a knowledge of the alphabet. Childhood lasted till the age of usually either eight or nine, and after that, the child went off to study to a Gurukul, or a "Teacher's house".

It was basically a teacher and his family and his pupils living in a place like a retreat, where they could study without interruption from city or community life. All the pupils - whether rich or poor, of high or low status - lived together in that house, along with the teacher's family. The teacher would treat the pupils as his own sons, and they would accord him the same respect as they gave their own fathers. The older pupils were expected to treat the younger ones as their brothers.

While in the Gurukul, they learnt two things.

The first was the skills necessary for living in the real world. You would learn how to do everything needed in those times, because it was the students who would run the entire place. They would chop firewood, maintain the premises, and all other things like that. The burden of such work was not significant, because there were many hands to share the work. But this was simply practical training, not the main thrust.

The real training would be the formal academic training given to them by the teacher during their hours of learning. They would learn whatever was the standard of that time - the sciences of that time, for instance, and professional skills.

Different Gurus taught different skills, so for instance, a king may prefer a Guru skilled in imparting martial training. A trader may prefer another, skilled in economics. And of course, the scholar may want to send his son to an abstract theoretician. This, of course, is because the son was expected to take up the profession of his father.

The second thing they learnt, or rather, underwent, was the transition from childhood to adulthood. They were not infantalised, with an arbitrarily decided cut-off point for adulthood, before which they would deemed to be children. As they grew older, they naturally assumed more responsibility, with no sudden jumps, so that by the time the education period came to an end, they had been transformed from children to adults without any "angsty" period of adolescence in between.

The economic needs of the Guru were taken care of by the pupils, by the work they learnt how to do, and by the Guru's fee they gave at the end of their training, called the Guru-Dakshina. So it was possible for a Guru to take on an exceptionally skilled but poor pupil who would be asked to pay his Guru-Dakshina in some form different form, such as by working for the Guru at his retreat for some time, or by paying later.




This holds many lessons for us today, IMO.

[Patroklos]

Teens and early-twenty somethings don't work at menial jobs because they're told by their parents, their peers, their media, and their political leadership that they're too good to do that type of work. That stuff's to be left to the peasant class of illegal immigrants. Our precious youth shouldn't have to lower themselves to working at Wendy's...

Exactly. Which is ridiculous.

[OzzyKP]

Interesting aneeshm.

For my part I disagree with Jon's views of schooling. He is right to say kids need more responsibility, but it needs to be real responsibility not just more school. Modern school is artificial and unnatural.

People don't need to be taught how to learn. We begin life as naturally inquisitive. We want to learn everything we can. But it is schooling that stamps that curiosity out of us. We become regimented and bored. We become frustrated and "angsty". The failed modern model of schools is half the problem with this creation of adolescence. Intensifying them wouldn't make things better.

But I highly recommend people pick up The Case Against Adolescence: http://www.amazon.com/Case-Against-A...2342064&sr=8-1

[Jon Miller]

I am not saying that having more schooling in a day is the best thing. It might not be.

I am saying that it wouldn't be worse then what we have now. You guys are all jumping on me for a system we have now? I am saying it wouldn't be that bad, because it isn't that bad now, but I have been getting jumped on? I am not even suggesting more classes during the day, I am just wanting the kids to be somewhere under adult supervision... since their parents aren't home (which isn't natural).

The summer school, and classes until evening, are two seperate and distinct proposals. It is the summer school that is the more important proposal, but everyone focuses on my more time in school during the day proposal. Fine, ignore it, it isn't needed. I am just trying to get rid of another source of problems, but maybe I am already suggesting enough change.

And you know what Koyaan? People think they like the responsibility free late teens and early 20s. They remember it as a great time. Then doesn't make it healthy and doesn't mean that they were happier for it. In fact, the book the original post references says otherwise. I am pointing out that the responsibility free summers in grade school are one of the sources of this problem.

JM

[Cort Haus]

Aneesh - thanks for posting the Paul Graham article - it was interesting.

[OzzyKP]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
I am not saying that having more schooling in a day is the best thing. It might not be.

I am saying that it wouldn't be worse then what we have now. You guys are all jumping on me for a system we have now? I am saying it wouldn't be that bad, because it isn't that bad now, but I have been getting jumped on? I am not even suggesting more classes during the day, I am just wanting the kids to be somewhere under adult supervision... since their parents aren't home (which isn't natural).

The summer school, and classes until evening, are two seperate and distinct proposals. It is the summer school that is the more important proposal, but everyone focuses on my more time in school during the day proposal. Fine, ignore it, it isn't needed. I am just trying to get rid of another source of problems, but maybe I am already suggesting enough change.

And you know what Koyaan? People think they like the responsibility free late teens and early 20s. They remember it as a great time. Then doesn't make it healthy and doesn't mean that they were happier for it. In fact, the book the original post references says otherwise. I am pointing out that the responsibility free summers in grade school are one of the sources of this problem.

JM

I don't necessarily mind having school in the summer. Especially if it means you finish school sooner. So yea, I agree with you there.

I just took issue with the idea that kids need more structure and more adults watching over them and all that. School needs to have much less structure than it does now. Make it more natural and free-form.

[Asher]

School needs to have much less structure than it does now. Make it more natural and free-form.

Is this a joke? If you don't want school, don't go. How's that for freeform.

[Koyaanisqatsi]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
I am saying that it wouldn't be worse then what we have now. You guys are all jumping on me for a system we have now? I am saying it wouldn't be that bad, because it isn't that bad now

Er, yes, yes it is.

The summer school, and classes until evening, are two seperate and distinct proposals. It is the summer school that is the more important proposal, but everyone focuses on my more time in school during the day proposal. Fine, ignore it, it isn't needed. I am just trying to get rid of another source of problems, but maybe I am already suggesting enough change.

Ok, year-round schooling only. I already said this wasn't inherently bad, just that it would be bad if it was implemented by simply extending current methods.

And you know what Koyaan? People think they like the responsibility free late teens and early 20s. They remember it as a great time. Then doesn't make it healthy and doesn't mean that they were happier for it. In fact, the book the original post references says otherwise. I am pointing out that the responsibility free summers in grade school are one of the sources of this problem.

Show me where I said responsibility-free time was good. You seem fixated on this idea that unstructured time automatically means 'free to do whatever the hell you want'. No, it doesn't. It can, in which case too much of it can be harmful. I'm sorry you feel like you lost a couple of years to drinking and video games, but you have to admit that was a result of your decisions. Shouldn't we be trying to teach kids how to make decisions before they are put into situation where there are serious, long-term, irreversible consequences to the decisions they make?