Xref: utzoo comp.edu:1615 sci.math:5187 sci.physics:5245 Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!ncrlnk!ncrcae!hubcap!gatech!ncar!ames!pasteur!agate!web-2a.berkeley.edu!c60a-2by From: c60a-2by@web-2a.berkeley.edu (Oliver Juang) Newsgroups: comp.edu,sci.math,sci.physics Subject: Re: Student preparedness (was Re: Student and ... (was Rising cost ...)) Summary: segregation of students K-12 Keywords: student segragtion Message-ID: <18412@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> Date: 17 Dec 88 02:35:08 GMT Expires: 10 Jan 88 08:00:00 GMT References: <1131@osupyr.mast.ohio-state.edu> <1887@sun.soe.clarkson.edu> <1057@l.cc.purdue.edu> <776@afit-ab.arpa> <4893@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> <608@wuphys.UUCP> Sender: usenet@agate.BERKELEY.EDU Followup-To: article 608 by mrk@wuphys.UUCP Distribution: na Organization: University of California, Berkeley Lines: 63 In article <608@wuphys.UUCP> mrk@wuphys.UUCP (Mark R. Kaufmann) writes: >I don't know which kind of high school or college you attended; I >attended public schools in K-12 and a private university from then on. >My experience is that the students were VERY different in the two cases. >The major difference I see between these is that in the first case >there was a lot of, for lack of a better phrase, "dead weight." >That is, there were many students for whom school literally >was a day care center, and who simply refused to advance their minds >in any way whatsoever, and not only that, insisted on repeatedly disrupting >the classroom so that even those who wanted to learn were sometimes hindered. >The way I see it, a teacher simply cannot conduct a course when >there are both "geniuses" and "dead weight" in the same classroom. >What is called for, in my opinion, is segregation of students from day one >according to their ability AND WILLINGNESS (VERY important) to learn. >The latter seems much easier to guage than the former, though. >Those who are able, willing, and ready to learn should not have to be >dragged down by those who simply need a babysitter during the day. >My classes were segregated in grades 1-3 (somehow--I didn't pay much >attention to the methods used at the time!). >But teaching children who were able and willing to learn in separate classrooms >and at a faster speed than those who were either unable or unwilling (or both) >then became unfashionable and "elitist," and from then on, except for >_ADVANCED_ elective classes in high school, there was almost always >"dead weight" in my classes--and of course, the rate of learning >was determined by the slowest student(s) in the classroom. Comments/criticisms? >======================================= >Mark R. Kaufmann >UUCP: ...!uunet!wucs1!wucfua!wuphys!mrk > wuphys!mrk@uunet.uu.net >Internet: mrk@wuphys.wustl.edu >======================================= Unfortunately, although I agree with the idea of segregating the "dead weight" from the "geniuses", there are quite a few problems with making this happen effectively in real life. Especially with regards as to which people are "dead weight", or "geniuses". How do you propose to distinguish them? Their grades? (what if a previous teacher graded unfairly) IQ tests? (I'm sure IQ test have been discussed before on this newsgroup, but I'm new to it) Finances of parents? Nationality? The letter their name begins with? Also, what happens when you have someone who would be considered a "genius", except that he/she is "learning disabled (or whatever the popular term is now)", or can't read English, or was sick the day of the evaluation, etc. I should perhaps note that I went to a public schools system where K-5 was students mixed at random and in 6th they started "honors" courses. In high school they had different "tracks" or some such word in which they recommended (did I spell that right? Shows my education, I guess) different courses. It also had "competency" tests which you had to pass to graduate. (questions like "which way do you cut with a knife" "a. left" "b. right" "c. towards you" "d. away from you"). Well, anyway this is getting long so I'll end it here. Flame me if you wish, but send e-mail as I figure people want to read only follow-ups with something to say to everyone. Oh, perhaps a disclaimer: My views do not represent the University of California at Berkeley. The posters on my wall have an entirely different subject matter. Address: c60a-2by@web.berkeley.edu <-- this is arpanet, I think, but I'm new to this stuff.