Global 'train wreck' coming

[Snail]

during 15 years after school, i've constantly been on a journey of learning. Physics, Maths, history etc.. I enjoy learning about them now. School bored me. I would be bored all year, only to revise the night before an exam. And that was 15 years ago. My 3 b's at a-level used to be considered good, now prob. below average. Exams have gotten too easy, even more useless than before. Focusing on paper exams is another example of government taking the easy option.

[DominicJ]

I do think British people have become lazy and complaining, and I've seen several colleagues - I'm going to say it again, particularly younger ones - roll their eyes at being asked to do anything beyond the call of duty (and sometimes even things within the call of duty).

I've done 34 hours so far this week...
Will I get overtime?
Will I bollocks.

But, I started on a 1 year contract, 5 years ago, my department manager moves heaven and earth on a regular basis to keep me.

I lost my job a few months back. The only benefits i can claim is jsa. By week 5, i was already 'santioned', not my fault. Imo i was tricked into it. Claiming jsa is a nightmare,

But thats exactly my [s]fault[/s] Point, "welfare" is useless for the worker who loses his job, either you spend a great deal of effort learning which hoops you need to jump through, and remain on welfare forever, or you are a worker, who begs and borrows from friends and family to cover short term unemployment.

[Keela]

LB3.... please don't get going on exams. You are perhaps not qualified to make judgements on the merits or otherwise.

Educators only.

This is tongue in cheek, right?

[Ludwig]

LB3.... please don't get going on exams. You are perhaps not qualified to make judgements on the merits or otherwise.

Educators only.

That's a very patronising comment!

It could be argued that exams are merely a test of short term information storage and regurgitation; do not prove understanding, application or creative / critical real world process.

I completely, completely disagree.

I have forgotten most of the physics equations that I learned for "O" Level, but the process of applying my mind to understanding them in the first place was invaluable.

The importance of learning isn't just in the facts you learn. I agree that you forget a lot of them. On the other hand, you do retain a sense of the essence of subjects, and in particular the knowledge of where to look for forgotten details.

But over and above this, learning teaches how to learn. If I hadn't given myself headaches trying to understand pendulums and pulleys and electric circuits and the past historic tense and German adjective endings, I'd never have learned the discipline of sustained mental effort.

As a bench mark for teachers efficiency they may have a place.

But they merely stress out students, make learning into a competative
blood sport and displace true deep learning.

You can't learn without an incentive.

When I was doing "O" Level German, our lazy teacher was reluctant to give us weekly vocabulary tests. ("I don't want to insult your integrity.") But we wore him down and insisted on them. So sure, we were a bunch of girly swots, but we wanted to learn and we understood that we needed the incentive of potential humiliation (low marks) to spur us to do the work.

To say exams make learning a "blood sport" is, frankly, a little hysterical!

As an educator I can honestly say how sickening it is to write a side or two of constructive feedback on a student assignment, only to have the student focus on the grade, rather than read the feedback and take their studies forward.

But the problem is that this leads to the idea that "all work is good, just in different ways". That leaves students with little incentive to improve, since in this relativistic scheme their work is perfectly good as it is.

I realise that in general, less able students respond less well to the pressure of competition. That is, I accept, a problem. But the only alternative seems to be a system where the very idea of measurable improvement is taboo.

It is simply a fact of human nature that you need pressure to achieve. I realise that some students don't do themselves justice because of exam nerves, but to abandon exams because of that is to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

In every education system throughout history, exams have been used, because there is no alternative to them that does the same job. They're not perfect, but we should not reject the good for want of the perfect.

I have even had students 'be happy' with a grade because it is just enough to get them through... rather than look at how they can improve. Sad.

So how would things be any different if there were no grades? How would any improvement be measured?

[Ludwig]

But thats exactly my [s]fault[/s] Point, "welfare" is useless for the worker who loses his job, either you spend a great deal of effort learning which hoops you need to jump through, and remain on welfare forever,

Forever??? What a bunch of crap you spout, Dom!

or you are a worker, who begs and borrows from friends and family to cover short term unemployment.

Has it ever even occurred to you that not everyone has friends and family with the spare cash to support them?

[frank_begbie]

It suited the government of the time to let unemployment run riot and they got around the figures going through the roof by encouraging people to go on the sick.
And they paid for it all with revenues from Nationalised company sell offs and North Sea oil.

They didn't let unemployment run riot, they closed down loss making industries, which were paid for by going to the IMF for a loan, and invested in newer profit making industries which then employed those who had been made unemployed. North Sea oil was invested in the reinvention of British Industry. It could have been "invested" in subsidising British workers in unprofitable industries for a while. But when we joined Europe those jobs would have gone as it's illegal to subsidise jobs in the EU and our "investment" would have been for nothing.

You must be living in a world of your own.

What industries did they invest in?

Ship building?
Mining?
Car building?

In case you hadn't noticed we don't make anything now, we just work for foreign companies that have more of a long term view of things, instead of a quick buck attitude.

[Snail]

You can't learn without an incentive.

When I was doing "O" Level German, our lazy teacher was reluctant to give us weekly vocabulary tests. ("I don't want to insult your integrity.") But we wore him down and insisted on them. So sure, we were a bunch of girly swots, but we wanted to learn and we understood that we needed the incentive of potential humiliation (low marks) to spur us to do the work.

During gcse level, i had a maths teacher who organised his class so the best amd worst pupils were sat at the front. He then did weekly exams, and would rearrange class depending on these results. So, at the beginning of the year I was near the back, an average student. I steadly improved my marks and ended up claiming and remaining in the front seat, right beside the worst student. Everybody enjoyed his class, and enjoyed his weekly exams. Exams and competition aren't bad in themselves, if they're done in an innovative and continuous way.

[DominicJ]

Forever??? What a bunch of crap you spout, Dom!

The short term unemployed are far outweighed by the long term unemployed.
The number of adults who have never worked is shocking, not to mention NEETS. I know people my age who left school and went on the dole, they literaly havent worked since.

Has it ever even occurred to you that not everyone has friends and family with the spare cash to support them?

Yes, it has, until recently I counted myself amongst them

I have even had students 'be happy' with a grade because it is just enough to get them through... rather than look at how they can improve. Sad.

The alternative being HOW do you improve without being told what you are doing wrong?
Am I an accountant because I have a head for numbers, or because a maths teacher gave me weekly tests for three years, clearly marking what I had done right (ie learnt) and what I had done wrong (ie not learnt).

I agree closed book exams are stupid if you consider them representations of the real world, but what else do you do?

Some people fall apart in exams? I fall apart in interviews, shall employers stop interviewing potential staff?

[DominicJ]

In case you hadn't noticed we don't make anything now, we just work for foreign companies that have more of a long term view of things, instead of a quick buck attitude.

The UK is the world 5th(?) biggest manufacturer.
You've never heard of UK manufactuers because they're small companies that employ a few dozen people and reside on none descript industrial estates.

They dont have big unions or big entertainments budgets to win them big government subsidies.

[UndercoverElephant]

In case you hadn't noticed we don't make anything now, we just work for foreign companies that have more of a long term view of things, instead of a quick buck attitude.

The UK is the world 5th(?) biggest manufacturer.
You've never heard of UK manufactuers because they're small companies that employ a few dozen people and reside on none descript industrial estates.

They dont have big unions or big entertainments budgets to win them big government subsidies.

According to the above assessment, this is relatively good news for our balance of payments problem, but not much use for our unemployment problem.

It is also the case that many of the industries involved (aerospace, formula 1 racing, etc...) may themselves not have very bright medium and long-term futures. If the UK wants a future in manufacturing, then we ought to be the world experts on the production of coastal wind and wave power. We have a lot of wind and a lot of coast.

[Ludwig]

During gcse level, i had a maths teacher who organised his class so the best amd worst pupils were sat at the front. He then did weekly exams, and would rearrange class depending on these results. So, at the beginning of the year I was near the back, an average student. I steadly improved my marks and ended up claiming and remaining in the front seat, right beside the worst student. Everybody enjoyed his class, and enjoyed his weekly exams. Exams and competition aren't bad in themselves, if they're done in an innovative and continuous way.

I guess nobody likes to be "average", so people would either work to get nearer the front or else aquire status by doing nothing!

Warning - drifting off-topic... -

One of my maths teachers encouraged a very competitive atmosphere among the pupils: he encouraged anyone who wanted to, to work ahead in the textbook. The result was that by the end of the year, there was a group of clever and competitive pupils who were so far ahead of the rest of us that there was no chance we could catch up.

In that class, I got the worst maths results of my entire time at school. In every year before and since, I was towards the top of the class. In that year I was usually in the middle, and sometimes towards the bottom. It seemed that what was being rewarded was not just ability, but also overt competitiveness and aggression. I'm not saying that was necessarily wrong, but I didn't respond to the method at all. I lost a great deal of confidence in my ability, and most of my interest in the subject.

One might argue that a more sensitive teacher would have reined in the front runners, to avoid demoralising everyone else. Yet the system clearly brought the best out of some pupils. There's no system that works for everyone.

[Snail]

It sounds as if it wouldn't work, but it did. He was a fantastic teacher and only someone with his teaching abilities could have pulled it off. He concentrated on the whole class, and at the end of the year, everybody's marks improved. He was real old-skool, an ex-boxer who commanded instant respect, not fear. I remember one of bigger trouble-maker pupils near the beginning say something to him while leaving class. He simply pinned him to the wall with one hand, and whispered something to him. That boy never caused trouble again, and actually worked harder.

[Ludwig]

It sounds as if it wouldn't work, but it did. He was a fantastic teacher and only someone with his teaching abilities could have pulled it off. He concentrated on the whole class, and at the end of the year, everybody's marks improved. He was real old-skool, an ex-boxer who commanded instant respect, not fear. I remember one of bigger trouble-maker pupils near the beginning say something to him while leaving class. He simply pinned him to the wall with one hand, and whispered something to him. That boy never caused trouble again, and actually worked harder.

Unfortunately, these days that teacher would now be out of a job.

[postie]

I do think British people have become lazy and complaining, and I've seen several colleagues - I'm going to say it again, particularly younger ones - roll their eyes at being asked to do anything beyond the call of duty (and sometimes even things within the call of duty).

The fact that Poles work their socks off uncomplainingly shows that it can be done.

Hmmm... I agree and disagree with the 2 points above. Firstly, young people. A lad of 18 has just been sacked from where I work and rightly so. He is incensed he was sacked and is threatening all sorts of legal action. He sees his right to a job as something the employer can't take away from him. Although he spent the whole time whining about how much he hated the job, how boring it was and what an arsehole the gaffer was. (he was right about the gaffer... he went bust 3 weeks ago!)

BUT.. here's the crux. He was fired for stealing from the takings!!! AND he still thought he shouldn't be sacked. He was also openly smoking dope and drinking at work. He threw his rubbish on the floor and believed once it was on the floor it wasn't his problem.


I've seen Poles whining and complaining too. They can be lazy.. they aren't paragons of industrial virtue by any means. Yes, there is a tendency to see them as hard workers which is true to a large extent, but maybe it's as simple as this... those who want to work come here to work... the lazy stay home in Poland or go back pretty quickly. It's a form of Darwinism... the strong/effective/industrious are noticed, prosper.
I've worked for years with Poles in dozens of jobs all over the country, chip factory, car moving, print factory, electronics factory, marquee erecting etc. I respect their work ethic and their drinking!! I went out with a Polish lass for over a year. I've been to Poland and can speak a decent amount of pidgin Polish. So I have no axe to grind about Poles.

[Lord Beria3]

Regarding teaching the semi-ironic comment from maudibe is a classic of the teaching profession. They have the attitude that only professionals are capable of teaching children.

It reminds me of the comments of a leader of a teaching union at the prospect of a mums army going into teaching for the day as 'dangerious'. What an astonishing remark! Parents of kids are apparently a danger!!

This is the arrogence of teachers and typified by Maudibe.

The fact that he comes out with a load of nonsense just shows how little we should listen to these so-called experts. Ludwig's comments above are a fine example of common sense which has sadly been lost by too many of the teaching profession in the recent decades.

Luckily there are still pockets of traditional teaching in our private, grammar and a select crowd of state schools which maintain world class standards.