Are we defining education? Or just leaving it undefined for the time. I ask because at age four I stuck my finger in an electric light socket that was on. I learned from that experience, indeed I did! But I doubt if that's anything you had in mind.

Or just in terms of results? Are we distinguishing between education and training? Animals can be trained. But I am not sure that anyone can be taught anything, if by taught you mean just the activities of the teacher.

Good question, but a question that must have its ground prepared before it can be answered.

From what I know education now and in the past differs in objectives quite radically. During the trivium/quadrivium phase education was about teaching the skills necessary for discovering knowledge. Modern education is about imparting knowledge. Of course modern scholars discover knowledge too but this aspect of education has been overshadowed by need to learn existing knowledge.

You could say that early education was about opening doors to knowledge and modern education is about exploring the rooms these doors open to.

There are at least two different perspectives on this question. From the position of society at large, education serves to give everyone a somewhat solid base for their economic and social interaction. Making them "good citizens" in a way, but the "good" here only means "capable of participating in a complex society".

From an individual perspective, I'd say the goal is to provide as much knowledge (declarative and procedural) as the individual is disposed to learn in order to provide them with the ability to make informed choices as much as possible.

Is it to make good citizens of our children
is it to help them cope in a competitive world
is to make them fit in and maintain traditions
is it to make them fully rounded out human beings
healthy psychologically, physically and spiritually? — Brett

All of the above, but who, what, when, where, how, and why.

Parents have the first and most critical responsibility: psychological, physical and spiritual health. When parents fuck that up, their children are screwed--not invariably, but almost always. Stupid, fucked up people have difficulty delivering healthy children to kindergarten. (There are unfortunate social reasons why some parents are stupid and fucked up; nevertheless, it is a major handicap to the child to have stupid fucked up parents.)

Citizenship is, I supposed, either learned by 5th/6th grade, or you end up with garbage. Some schools do good work in citizenship development. Some schools should be dynamited. (of course, it isn't corrupted bricks and criminal concrete. Of course, it is corrupted, criminally incompetent administrators and teachers who cause the problem. Plus, you can't make marble New England Citizens out of the dirt who populate a degraded slum.

Parents and schools can launch a child into the competitive world, but once out, it is up to the individual to adapt, survive, and succeed without screwing everybody else. Good luck. The facts of life are hard.

Becoming a well-rounded, four-square, and fully human being is a lifelong task, It's not over until it's over.

Whether fitting in and maintaining traditions is a good idea, or not, depends on the traditions. Maybe one should not fit in.

Are we defining education? Or just leaving it undefined for the time. I ask because at age four I stuck my finger in an electric light socket that was on. I learned from that experience, indeed I did! But I doubt if that's anything you had in mind.

Or just in terms of results? Are we distinguishing between education and training? Animals can be trained. But I am not sure that anyone can be taught anything, if by taught you mean just the activities of the teacher.

Good question, but a question that must have its ground prepared before it can be answered. — tim wood

True, true, true. That’s what I like about this forum.

I’m referring to education in schools. We’re defining what form that education should take, and first we have to define the objectives of this education. What is it for?

To me there are two needs that need to be balanced between which I waver: the practical demands of society: maths, english, etc, and then the whole critical thinking thing.

Parents have the first and most critical responsibility: psychological, physical and spiritual health. When parents fuck that up, their children are screwed--not invariably, but almost always. Stupid, fucked up people have difficulty delivering healthy children to kindergarten. (There are unfortunate social reasons why some parents are stupid and fucked up; nevertheless, it is a major handicap to the child to have stupid fucked up parents. — Bitter Crank

Yes, no matter what you introduce to them in school they go back to that environment. So should school/education be a way of escaping that? Is it more than teachers can do? Some kids go to school because they can get away from that environment for awhile, but they don’t necessarily engage.

You could say that early education was about opening doors to knowledge and modern education is about exploring the rooms these doors open to. — TheMadFool

Actually, I’m not sure by what you mean by ‘early education’, but early education, those years 5,6,7,9,10 would be about opening doors, and the following years about exploring those rooms.

However that is not the purpose, that’s the strategy.

In my opinion, it should be a combo of:

* Acquiring general knowledge/familiarity with culture, in a very broad, varied regard
* Acquiring critical thinking skills
* Acquiring practical life skills
* Acquiring more specific skills useful for making a living

In my opinion, it should be a combo of:

* Acquiring general knowledge/familiarity with culture, in a very broad, varied regard
* Acquiring critical thinking skills
* Acquiring practical life skills
* Acquiring more specific skills useful for making a living — Terrapin Station

Should we hope for, or expect, every pupil to achieve all of this, or is it realistic to expect only a percentage to achieve it? If so what’s essential for the others? What do we accept them failing at?

Actually, I’m not sure by what you mean by ‘early education’, but early education, those years 5,6,7,9,10 would be about opening doors, and the following years about exploring those rooms. — Brett

I'm trying to give a historical perspective on the issue. Medieval education is about logic, arithmetic, geometry and music. The three first subjects mentioned are simply means of acquiring knowledge. Granted they're great subjects in themselves but their role as tools to study the natural world can't be over-emphasized.

Modern education consists of science and humanities in a very broad sense and these aren't tools/means of finding new knowledge. They are knowledge discovered through the application of logic, arithmetic and geometry. Of course we could say we are taught to take a scientific approach to all matters but we all know humanities can't be studied scientifically.

This is what I mean. Medieval education was aboit opening doors to knowledge by teaching students logic, arithmetic and geometry. Modern education is about exploring biology, physics, chemistry, arts, history - the rooms these doors lead to.

It seems that medieval education knew the method but lacked knowledge and modern education has knowledge but now lacks method.

Should we hope for, or expect, every pupil to achieve all of this — Brett

I think so. And that's different than them all achieving it in the same exact way.

Yes, no matter what you introduce to them in school they go back to that environment. So should school/education be a way of escaping that? Is it more than teachers can do? Some kids go to school because they can get away from that environment for awhile, but they don’t necessarily engage. — Brett

So much critical development takes place during the first several years of life -- before most children get to school -- that the child can arrive at first grade with significant deficiencies. If optimum language development hasn't happened by age 6, the child has a good medium-term chance of not succeeding in school.

Cultural factors and poverty play a critical role. There are significant differences among groups in how much language children are exposed to, and the rule is, the more the better, the more positive the better. Children who are short-changed by hearing significantly less positive and complex verbal discourse from parents and other care givers just miss the boat on language development.

It is very difficult to remediate missed development in children as they grow older. It might not be impossible, but it would be a very intensive and long project.

Peers play a critical role in how well children do in school. IF most children in a given community like school, like reading, like learning, peer support will help. If the prevailing peer culture dismisses school as an unpleasant burden to be avoided, then peer support will go to avoiding learning.

So, that's one thing.

Another thing is cultural turmoil which leaves everyone uncertain about the nature and future of work, the future of our society (in terms of what anyone may need to know in the future), and the uncertainty of the natural environment and the economy.

We really don't know what exactly lays ahead, but it looks like children (and adults) could be running into unforeseen "cultural discontinuities" to use a vague term to cover over some very unpleasant possibilities in the years ahead that render obsolete and/or irrelevant whatever people have learned.

Just for example, to pick up on a trend that isn't getting enough attention... IF the declines in insect populations continues, the economic sustainability of agriculture will begin sinking (because insects pollinate). What kind of knowledge does one need to know if agriculture starts failing? Beats me. Maybe hand pollination of food crops will be a critical skill in the future.

education is suppose to teach us how to function in society. however it no longer serves that function because we are using the Prussian system which was meant to create conformity. this worked in the industrial economic system but in the information economic we need the exact opposite set of skills. however we don't fix this because democracy.

For a while in business there was the whole idea of ‘future proofing’ the business. Probably in response to the rapid and constant change we had found ourselves involved with in, maybe, the late nineties. It became a bit of a catchword, like ‘grow this ’, that everyone began throwing around. However surviving and adapting became a real thing. Some managed it, some didn’t.

It seems to me that education today is, or should be, preparing children to successfully cope with the near future, enough to at least cope with the beginning of this future before they then begin to get the hang of it. It seems to me that so far only successful business has been able to do this.

Which brings me to private schools. These parents know exactly what the purpose of education is; it’s to give their kids a head start over the others, to maintain their ideas of success, which is material, and to help those kids go on to build better life’s along those lines, and then stay in the top strata of society.

It occurs to me that through education some people are trying to shape the future as opposed to being prepared to adapt to it. By shaping it we then know what we’re entering. But I don’t believe that works because you have to reshape everything in society around that idea.

education is suppose to teach us how to function in society. however it no longer serves that function because we are using the Prussian system which was meant to create conformity. this worked in the industrial economic system but in the information economic we need the exact opposite set of skills. however we don't fix this because democracy. — hachit

It’s worth remembering that this forum is international. Down here in Australia and New Zealand I don’t think the Prussian system ever played much of a part in education and it certainly doesn’t now.

I have include an article on the Prussian education system. I send you this to let you decide for yourself if you use this model. because most don't call it by its name

https://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-the-prussian-education-system.htm#didyouknowout

Re the Prussian system, the article says, "At the same time, it also taught things like obedience, duty to country, and general ethics." That sure wasn't the case when I went to public school in the U.S. (I graduated high school in 1980)

you are right it is not the exact same. these are the traits that people use to label a education system are: discipline, obedience, subservience, conformity, grading, rigid curriculum, mindless memorization, and state funded. the U.S. remade the model to make it more humane than the actual Prussian system. they have made changes to try to make students independent thinkers but will little success. it dose teach obedience just not enforced.

To make people as aware as possible, up to date wth present information; to create unity and harmony between people.

To teach and inculcate the knowledge, skills, and values that will cause educated people to function in and improve their society - to leave it better than they found it. Trouble is, this involves duty. Duty implies a constraint on the license that many people confuse with freedom. That is, teachers are going to have to tell students what to do and how to do it, and students shall have to comply. Is this anti-freedom in the classroom? Not at all. It is merely a return to basic standards and measurements. Teachers and students have a job to do, a serious job. For at least sixty years, those standards, such as they were even then, have been continually evaporating. The bottom becomes a trap when teachers themselves are ignorant, and we have an education system of the truly ignorant teaching the uneducated.

But how much better off most would be if teachers were paid like lawyers and doctors, and the best competed for those jobs!

And it cannot pass unnoticed and unremarked here. While ignorant teachers are a bane, below them are most professional educators. You know, those who can't do, can't teach, and cannot even teach teachers.

Whether teachers are good or not, the problem is they are required to teach the curriculum. The government determines the curriculum through the department of education. So even the most highly skilled and highly paid teacher would still have to teach the curriculum, and if they did not then their students would fail their exams.

So I feel we’re back at the start; what should the curriculum be and who should determine it?

The most reasoned argument for a curriculum approach I have come across is that offered by Stephen Pinker in his book "The Blank Slate". He suggests that given our brains are essentially those of hunter gatherers, but with runaway high cognitive ability as a sort of interloper bolted on, and the environment of a complex modern culture we have not evolved to deal with, then the most important things to teach are how to use our rationality to understand ourselves and society. This is something our brains find naturally difficult - as opposed to interpersonal social interactions say - and something that only effortful training can achieve. He suggests that an understanding of evolutionary psychology, scientific method and a feel for statistics, for example should have first call on the curriculum - apart from the major interlopers literacy and numeracy. Seems sound to me.

One primary purpose of education should be to kick the stupid out of people. If you've gone through a process whereby you've had the stupid kicked out of you, then that can be helpful in many ways - ways which you can probably think of yourself, unless you're too stupid: in which case, would you like me to kick it out of you?

Stupid can be gradually trained away, not booted away, according to modern pyschological theory - our consciousness represents a weak rider guiding a lumbering subconscious elephant. The latter can be gently coaxed into different habits and trained over the long term, but not dictated to. Hence CBT.

, then the most important things to teach are how to use our rationality to understand ourselves and society. This is something our brains find naturally difficult - as opposed to interpersonal social interactions say - and something that only effortful training can achieve. He suggests that an understanding of evolutionary psychology, scientific method and a feel for statistics, for example should have first call on the curriculum - — Kippo

So the purpose of education is to create rational human beings. Because it does not come naturally, or because they do not live in a rational society?

I was suggesting a core curriculum for schooling rather than a purpose of education. I think there are many possible purposes for education in general. Anyways, I guess Pinker's idea of the curriculum is to teach how to use our rationality well, bearing in mind that a lot of our natural tendencies are known not to be rational, as are those of society also. The scope of this use of rationality would be to undersatnd ourselves and society better, and how we can make decisions that please us more in the long run. So the short answer to your question is "both".

The hope would be to produce happier, smarter individuals and a "better" society - where "better" includes more rational.

To clarify - thiough we have innate rational ability through cognitive process, we need to be trained how to apply it to our own situations and society because being rational does not come easy to us.

The purpose of education can be described as ‘to realise a child’s unique potential’. This ‘potential’ covers their physical, intellectual, social, emotional and spiritual capacity as an holistic approach.

The main purpose of education these days should be to prepare students to fulfil their potential in a future we can only begin to imagine. If we focus on the competency or knowledge of a specific device, system, set of traditions, axioms or theories as if they were constant, then chances are we will fail in this fundamental task. It is essentially pointless to prepare our children for the world of knowledge in which we currently operate.

These days, educators are beginning to realise that students have greater and faster access to informational knowledge than ever before. The problem is that most of it is misinterpreted, heavily biased or just plain rubbish masquerading as fact. And a decent proportion of what we can currently accept may very well become irrelevant, outdated, disputed or discredited within their lifetime, if not already.

So a good deal of education should be less focused on content, and more on developing critical thinking, data interpretation and communication skills, as well as creativity, flexibility and a lifelong love of learning. But this includes providing a grounding in a variety of written, verbal and visual languages, conventions and discourses across literature, television, art, mathematics, science and technology: their uses, concepts, terminology and diverse interpretations (and misinterpretations), as well as the disputes and rate of change they can expect.

Education as a whole should also further develop resilience, emotional intelligence and physical and mental health awareness, as well as spiritual awareness and interconnection within an ever widening sense of community. But without sufficient grounding in this area (from parents and community in the first five years), students begin school life at a serious disadvantage, and teachers are not equipped with time or resources to bridge this gap within the year and the hours they have with each child (on top of all the other requirements of teaching). This area is one of the biggest handbrakes to fulfilling each child’s unique potential, and therefore to education. It should be a whole school approach, if not a whole community approach - because few parents today have enough knowledge or experience themselves to provide this grounding - so long have we dropped the ball in this area.

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