Question
four
A recent report by the OECD reveals that in both England
and Northern Ireland our 16-24 year olds are ranked 22 and 18 respectively out
of 24 in literacy and numeracy. The survey covered England and N. Ireland. Alone
in the developed world our 16-24 year olds performed worse in literacy than our
55-65 year olds. Is it because our generation was taught literacy and numeracy
by methods that today would be considered old-fashioned? These methods worked
for us. The present methods don’t appear to be working for many young people.
Discuss!!
Comment
Times have changed. Children are different nowadays. They
have higher expectations, they are less submissive. What worked in the past may
not necessarily be the best thing for our young. Echoing the past is probably
neither possible nor advisable. It’s not the methods which are in question
here. Rather there have been many changes in society which may be affecting our
young people’s learning.
One thing to consider is a child’s readiness to read. Is
there the support at home to allow a child to ready himself/herself for school?
Are there books at home? Do the parents read? Are the parents there? Are the
parents talking to their children? Are they caring for them? Are they stressed?
Is the child happy? Children learn best when they have all their needs met,
when they are happy, secure, content. A happy family makes a happy child.
But also our children here start school at a very young
age, much more so than in other developed countries. Are they ready for school?
I recently overheard a conversation between my two great nieces. The older one
had just started school and the younger one said that she couldn’t wait to be
in school. Niamh told her little sister that on the contrary she should enjoy
nursery because ‘when you go to big school you have to sit in a seat for a very,
very long time and you have to listen to the teacher talking for ages and
ages’. Obviously even the most dutiful Niamh finds it all rather tiresome and
was not quite ready for it all. I doubt even Niamh would appreciate us
requiring her to revert to rote learning in order to ensure better literacy
scores in the future.
Literacy is a huge
problem in this country and we do need to ensure that all our young people
reach high standards. But perhaps we might do better to adapt our teaching
strategies with children rather than
surmising that The Only Way Is Echoes
Every one seems to think that it is somebody else duty to educate and control their children. If people would become parents instead of being wedded to making money they could then spare the time to read with/to their kids and educate! them. Help them with maths - provided of course that the parents have an acceptable level of English and maths themselves. Cut out using others ( TV, mobiles and computer games) to entertain their kids with rubbish.
ReplyDeleteWhy do kids have a TV in their room ?
People say that Kids have an independent streak in them that we did not have - this I don't recognise it is just that children had more respect and were better disciplined than the modern brats oops sorry children.
I agree - we have a culture of expecting 'the government' or 'society' or 'teachers' to do it all. The 2 parents working trend makes it harder to spend time (when you're not tired) with your kids and this is what they need - parents who have or can make time to be with them, talk and listen, read stories etc and make them feel important and self-confident.
Deleteno matter how wonderful TV/movies/computer games are, the actual business of reading and listening to a book being read reaches parts of the brain and imagination that purely visual 'busy' formats don't. Always clicking and swiping is probably giving our kids shorter and shorter attention spans and stunts them intellectually.