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New Civilization News: Cosmic Education for a Cosmic Age |
Category: Education 8 comments
23 Sep 2001 @ 00:50 by gyrfalcon : Education. 23 Sep 2001 @ 01:46 by ming : U.S. Education Education is generally poor in the U.S. compared to Europe. Sort of 3-4 years behind in my estimation. Somebody who's finished 4 year college in the U.S. seems to have a general education similar to somebody who finished high school in Europe. Anyway, brainwashing of the U.S. population is more through the media, I'd say. Well, education too, of course. It is fairly self-centered and provincial. They don't seem to end up knowing much about the world. 26 Sep 2001 @ 14:16 by sharie : Education in America I'd like to reply to the question of how children are brainwashed in America's educational system. To begin, our current educational system is based on the Prussian Military Academy of the 18th century. (This is not a friendly commentary, but it is not intended to bash teachers, it's just that this is the way our system is.) Generally speaking, school children are seated in desks positioned in rows and columns (so they can grow up to be good little soldiers), and then they're dictated to by their leader (their teacher) in a ratio of about 30 children/soldiers to one leader. This sets up a mentality in the child that they are to do as they are told and that no one is to get out of line with behavior or comments outside of what they're being told. The textbooks are another horror story. When I was a school girl, history class taught that "history" was about who fought the wars and who the heroes were. Of course there's much more to history than fighting, but because the textbooks mostly only told us about who fought who, we children grow up thinking that wars and fighting are the essence of history (which is far from true). My history classes taught that Columbus discovered America, which isn't true because there were already human beings living in this land... And the textbooks taught that the Civil War was a fight to free the slaves, which of course it wasn't (The proof is in Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, among other places)... and the list of textbook propaganda goes on and on. There is a lot of brainwashing in our school system and textbooks. There was a nationwide report several months ago on a major network of a number of high school science textbooks being given to some highly-respected scientists to review. The scientists reported that out of some 487 pages in the textbook, something like 400 pages had errors. There were photos demonstrating how to conduct a scientific experiment, but as it was demonstrated in the photo, the scientific experiment would never have worked, and so. The reporter was so appalled at what the experts reported, he contacted the textbook publishers asking if they would recall the textbooks; the publishers said they wouldn't recall the textbooks because it would be too costly. The system of education in America teaches that some people can be good at one or two things, most people are average, and some people are failures. This isn't true, but because of our system's grading scale of most students being "average" or "C" students, this is communicated non-verbally. The truth that everyone is a genius, and that we can all tap into our genius is virtually unheard of in the sytem. This serves the purpose of keeping the people dependent on the social hierarchy of the "highly educated", government authorities and the super rich. The purpose of the system seems to be to dumb and numb as many people as possible. When I lived in Chicago, 80% of the city's school children lived below the povery level, and 50% dropped out of high school before graduating. I suppose other major cities have similar statistics. I apologize for this lengthy commentary (and feel free to delete it Flemming). I've taught pre-school and college (psychology), and saw enough to make me politely excuse myself and run for my life. I also worked as a forensic psychologist for Children & Family Services and watched the "service professionals" fight to pocket as much money for themselves, while the babies and children were warehoused in decrepid housing projects, and paintings and sculpture were placed in museum palaces. The mainstream has some very warped values. 26 Sep 2001 @ 19:47 by sharie : Teachers I've known some truly wonderful teachers, who are devoted to the well-being and learning of their students. My earlier "comment" wasn't intended to bash teachers, many of whom do exceedingly well within the system (and often go outside the system when necessary). One of my best friends is a school teacher in the New York City public schools, and the stories she recounts are horrendous, but I love her and I'm in awe of her devotion to the children. I chose to leave the system because I believed in creating a way of life that works for people. I applaud teachers for doing work that I was not able to, and I know many teachers go far above and beyond the call of duty. 26 Sep 2001 @ 23:35 by ming : Teaching Yeah, all the teachers I know personally are wonderful, well-intentioned people. But they're of course seriously restricted by the system they're within. Its a factory or military model, as you point out. Teaching kids to stay in line and do what they're told, and just eat up what the authorities tell them. Any "critical thinking" skills taught are still narrowly within the same framework. Yes, we need to rather bring out the genious within all of us. I would be much more valuable to unleash the creativity of all those fresh, young minds, and see what they come up with. We need everybody to wake up to what they're here to do. We need everybody's contributions, not just for them to do like everybody else. What a waste that would be. 7 Oct 2001 @ 19:52 by vibrani : Today's teachers Many things have drastically changed since I was a child, and since many of you who left comments in here were children. I have two sons, one is going on 22 and another one is 12. I participate(d) in both of their educational process, been to each class and watched how it was being taught, read along with them in their textbooks so I know what they're learning. I know what the concerns of the teachers and students are and I've been really impressed with how all of these needs are being addressed and met. We have tried public school (which we did not like) and prefer private schools - and this is what I was talking about in the first paragraph. Here's one example of how education has changed: As a special teacher on Native American studies/spirituality, I have been very happy to participate and help change the cirriculum in several schools to include an accurate history, who Columbus was and what he and his men did, the Native American history, history of the tribes and the Europeans and their religions, and how they all interacted. Textbooks today speak very openly about how Native Americans were treated throughout the industrial revolution up to present time - you couldn't find that in a textbook when we were kids. Not all classrooms are set up in rows, nor in rows all of the time. There is great interaction and discussion, lots of creative arts, and I have to say that in so many ways is it different from when I was a kid. There are far more insights into child development, support, emotional and educational disabilities, sensitivites of children, they are treated like people, not like babies who have to be quiet and just follow directions. All in all, I'm very impressed with how education is progressing and meeting the needs as much as they can. However, I still have a few concerns: one is about testing and deadlines on how fast a child must learn something based on the California requirements. Even in private schools, I saw kids being more rushed through topics that should take a longer time to digest. My other concern is the amount of homework - I believe that homework should mostly be about reviewing what kids learned in school, should be brief, with a couple of long-term projects, and that their childhood play and creative time, and time with family and friends should not be lost. My last concern is scheduling. As kids grow older they do much better in studies if they start their day later. Schools today start so early, and kids are dragging and some actually fall asleep in their first couple of classes. Their biological clocks are not set for early schedules. School should start around 9am and go until 3 the latest, and high school should start at 10am. Kids in high school are night owls for the most part, and they don't really wake up and become fully functional until around 10am. Studies have proven this. But, because work schedules for parents start early, schools have changed to earlier scheduling to accommodate this, and to help the flow of traffic, believe it or not. Some are limited by neighborhood traffic flow to certain hours of school. I think we're missing the point here in putting the kids' needs last. One new high school that is currently being built will implement a later start time, which is great. Educators are aware of this but it's not always easy to make the changes. I recently made a suggestion to our school to include a class for the kids in the middle school to learn about financial matters, responsibility, planning, investing, so no one has to be ignorant or in poverty when they become adults. This was warmly accepted and will be implemented. In fact, the school already had a teacher just waiting to be asked to teach it. One of my mentors, Enki, wrote an article with me about education for the future. If anyone would like to read it, it's on my web site at [link] 7 Oct 2001 @ 22:40 by vibrani : more on education I also think that opinions about education vary according to one's location and experience. I've seen schools from inner city to exclusive, luxurious private schools. It does matter which school a child goes to. I know some great public school teachers, but the public school system isn't the best in most schools - again, depends upon the area. I don't see why all public schools can't be the best. If we remove more useless job positions in the government, and get a better grip on government spending, and the lottery money that's supposed to go for schools actually do get to the schools, we can make more of a positive difference there. 19 Oct 2001 @ 12:14 by marlon : Hello Interesting Comments! Other entries in Education 22 Aug 2008 @ 05:21: Final Exams 4 Apr 2008 @ 13:12: EDUCATION IS DEFICIENT FOR GIFTED MINDS 3 Apr 2008 @ 20:25: Welcome to the ratrace. 13 Feb 2008 @ 08:36: Horizon 9 Jan 2008 @ 08:33: About the Day 30 Nov 2007 @ 19:54: Nicotene and Smoking - Don't get Started!!! 31 Aug 2007 @ 14:56: Our Image Egos are not our Essential Beings 5 Jun 2007 @ 00:13: Action Learning 4 Jun 2007 @ 13:46: What is there to learn? 17 Aug 2006 @ 02:25: Update on Mac Computers for Mayan Kids
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