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

[Koyaanisqatsi]

Originally posted by 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.

I daresay there could be a middle ground in there somewhere...

[Pekka]

No, they're both answering different questions, so there is no middle ground.

And when I talk about freedom, you don't just step in and try to compromise. Who are you? The Taliban? Well guess what, you can limit your own freedom as much as you want, but don't try to do it on me, since I have furios anger for those who try and I will prison rape them.

[Wycoff]

Originally posted by notyoueither


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.

Good for him. I'm sure that that means every single 14 year old is capable of being a mature adult.

Your anecdotal evidence and life experience makes you confident that 14 year olds are generally capable and responsible enough to be legally independant. Mine tells me that they aren't. Where do we go from here?

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.

I grew up in the Appalachians. Rural enough for you? Kids (including me) helped out around the farms, sometiimes running heavy machinery and sometimes driving farm trucks. They didn't run the farms, and they damn sure didn't own the farms. At the end of the day, they went home to mom and dad. I'm not saying that 14 year olds are babies. I'm saying that they still have a lot of growing to do and, by and large, not ready for fully adult responsibility.

[Wycoff]

One interesting thing that has yet to be mentioned here is that the English common law system traditionally held 21 to be the age of majority, not 18.

Modern adolescence may be a construct, but it seems that Anglo-Saxon culture has long recognized that teens (especially early teens) are still developing people who are not fully adult.

[OzzyKP]

Ever wonder where the age of 21 came from? It was the age at which men were physically big and mature enough to wear a suit of armor into battle. It said nothing about their mental maturity or intelligence or competence, just their ability to fight with a suit of armor on. It has absolutely no relevance for today.

[Wycoff]

Originally posted by OzzyKP
Ever wonder where the age of 21 came from? It was the age at which men were physically big and mature enough to wear a suit of armor into battle. It said nothing about their mental maturity or intelligence or competence, just their ability to fight with a suit of armor on.

Because being intellectually mature would be of absolutely no use to a warrior, of course.

EDIT: The point is that intellectual maturity almost certainly played a role in that 21 as majority age tradition. It stands to reason that people without benefit of modern technology would assume that someone who has yet to finish developing physically might also still be developing mentally. Afterall, that's still a controversial issue today. You claim that the brain is finished developing in the early teen years. Others claim that its not finished until the early twenties.

[Jon Miller]

You are at your height intellectually in your late teens/early 20s.

JM

[Wycoff]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
You are at your height intellectually in your late teens/early 20s.

JM

Isn't it more like your late 20s early 30s?

[Jon Miller]

Nope. Great geniuses in mathematics/etc do their greatest work before the age of 26. Often starting in their teens.

JM

[Wycoff]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
Nope. Great geniuses in mathematics/etc do their greatest work before the age of 26. Often starting in their teens.

JM

A quck scan of physicists histories made it seem like their best work started at 25-26. Einstein, Bohr, Heisenberg, etc.

[Jon Miller]

Look at mathematicians.

JM

[Colonâ„¢]

nm

[Odin]

Originally posted by 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

IMO the main problem with the current educational system is that it is all about stuffing facts down kids throats when we should be teaching critical thinking and researching things. Our education system suppresses critical though and creates a population of obedient consumerist sheep and makes kids resent school. I remember reading that smart kids actually have a higher then average drop-out rate, THAT'S how F-ed up our education system is.

Another, as I said above, is our one-size-fits-all style of educating kids that ignores personality and learning style differences, the "one size" invariably being rote memorization and obedience. Some kids may learn best by rote memorization, but the majority don't.

[Odin]

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 am definitely for year-long schooling. Summer Vacation is a relic of when most kids were farm kids had to help with the harvest.

[Odin]

Originally posted by Wycoff


Isn't it more like your late 20s early 30s?

I agree. Your raw brain power may PLATEAU at 18, but during the period of time between you are 18 and when the effects of age become noticeable a person becomes more KNOWLEDGEABLE in the meantime.