Part 2: Hi I am doing a questionnaire for ages 70 + for university...can you help???

Question

What do you think of the current education system? How would you improve or change it?

What was involved in the basic learning when you were at school? How did it help prepare you for life? Were you prepared for 'life' when you left school? Do you think that kids today are more or less prepared for the 'real' world when they leave school?

Answer 1

I think the current system is coping with the requirements of new technology quite well the problem is the amount of tests and paperwork involved. My daughter gave up teaching because if she working every evening and all day Saturday she could have Sunday off due to the amount of marking and forms to be filled in. As to the basic learning I went to so many schools that I just cant remember what the basic learning is. Probably the national curriculum has helped with this. I think my preparation for life was not done in school but outside it. A near death experience which I had to use my management skills to save my life taught me something. And being seduced by a 40 years old man when I was 13 taught me a lot about sex and a lot about relationships and life in general.. For life skills I don't recall school being any help.
As to today's kids I don't think they are any different to how we were except they have a better knowledge of technology but as to life skills just the same as kids have always been for thousands of years.

Answer 2

The current education system is, in my opinion, very good, but stretched to the limit.
Things are changing too quickly these days, and all the updates require money. Kids today are just the same as before, but values have changed. Discipline seems to be a matter for concern, and others argue they should learn to write with pen and paper, and not rely on computers. I would partially agree with that, but when I went to school there was no fancy technology, and things were far more simplified. We did not have to learn as much to get on with life, as there was not the pressure there is nowadays.
The world is changing more quickly than ever, and like it or not, we have to accept it.
May I just give you a story that amused me, that can sum up the education system, and how it has changed, This is true. When I was at school, calculators were just starting to come on the market, and I once got the good old fashioned lines and a whack from the cane, for bringing one into school, my friends daughter the other week got detention for not bringing one into school.

Hope my comments help. Good luck.

Answer 3

Hi I am 73 and I will do my best to answer your questions. I left college at 18 with an o level in maths and several certificates in various commercial subjects. I did afterwards go back to university part time and I have and Honours Degree in Law. Best Lesson Maths worst Languages I went to 16 different schools due to evacuation during the war most there was no uniforms. Only at the Grammar School I never needed much discipline I only got caned once for walking on the cricket roller while they were rolling the pitch. However I belong to a couple of organisations that run BDSM events so now have a lot of experience with discipline As I recall the only compulsary tests were at the end of every term or other term. I have taken a lot of exams though because I enjoy them Worst one was my second year Archaeoligical exam. I made a right bog of that. I did go to see a careets officer he was crap I dont think there is a lot of difference with lessons except the advances in technology have added new dimensions. I think the main differences are the amount of paperwork involved t That is the point teachers now have to fill in so many forms they do not have enough time to teach properly

Answer 4

I am 72, I think we should go back to basics,when I left school 1950 there was only one kid in our year who could not read,and I met very few in later years who could not read.
Now apparently, there is loads of kids who cannot read when they leave school. So it must have been a better way of teaching then. My early school years was during the blitz, but we still went to school! I dont think it was compulsory, but we went.I can recall doing my early learning using a slate and a piece of chalk,but the point is I learnt to read, to write, and add up and subtract. But we went to the nearest school to our homes,so none of us was more than five Minuit's from home,in my case in the same road, and this is where the system today is wrong, not enough schools. In them times there was a school every two hundred yards or so. My( granddaughter had to travel ten miles to her school using two buses) mind you she has done well. At school you learn the basics,after you leave you learn a hell of a lot more. I think the kids of my time was far more prepared for the real world. But there are other things to consider.None of us had anything and we was all in the same boat,so no peer pressure,today kids have got everything, result plenty of peer pressure. I hope my memories will be of some help to you.
Excuse any bad grammar

Answer 5

I'm in the education system now and I felt like 3rd grade to 9th grade was such a waste of time academically. Everything important I learned was either from life lessons from literature in my honors English class or from outside of school. We're not allowed to take honors classes in anything other than English until 9th or 10th grade; I barely learned anything. School is overly geared towards those who don't want to learn or are not very intelligent. The teachers are forced to focus too much on students who are not up to par with the rest of the class. It feels awful when you're left out because you already understand the information.

Now I'm in AP classes and I'm ecstatic to finally be in a class that is challenging and makes you think. Next year I start the IB program and I hope this will be even better.

Answer 6

I am 70 and went to school during world war two and the cold war era, during the war we didn't have many books and the teacher would write most things on the board,having bad eye sight, that wasn't detected by anyone until age 12, thus my grades for all board work was almost always failing, all this was in southern Ca. our schools had mostly elderly teachers as anyone young was working in the defence plants, men who were able had gone on to war.I went all the way through the 10th grade and married at 16,( yes we are still married almost 55 years,and I love him as much or more as I did then)

In the schools,things are much better now,
but no matter how many time saving devices we come with, there seems to be less time for things every year,
the kids have no free time without gadgets, to use their minds, to invent their own entertainment, and now they find it hard to just sit quitely for any length of time with out some kind of distraction to keep their eyes and hands busy, I have 12 grandchildren and 5 great grandchildren, I have noticed they watch very little news,hardly ever read newspapers, and none were what I would call readers of books, unless forced. A person seems to learn more after they are through school, if they want to -you have to be a curious person and want to find answers for what ever presents it self during your life, I have felt that anything I want to know is out there some where in a book or now on the internet, without being curious your brain turns to mush, and you become a very dull person.

Answer 7

Cost to much to go to college. Have no idea how to solve it. I didn't go to college. When I went to school all that the teachers did was to get you throughrough one grade so you could go on to the next. When I was in the 9th grade we never opened our English book. Teacher was to busy trying to get his Masters degree. Wasn't prepared for life so I joined the service. I think that the kids today are getting a better education today than I did.

Answer 8

It's a complete mess.

How can we write a wrong, with the hippie generations, liberal
Professor's, teaching their own agenda, which is nothing but their theory. Not to mention, their preaching on the 3 to 4 survays that come out every day for the good of the people.

I'm one of the people they are refering to. I know whats best for me and they can shut up and mind to their own business.

I want the facts, Mam! Nothing but the facts!

72 and holding, I know the difference in knowledge and wisdom and I have the common sense to use it.

I wish for you when you march to the podiem and walk off with your diploma in hand, that you didn't allow them to brain wash your thought process.

Hang on. Hold tight. Stand tall, and take part in the changing of the guards.

I would like to share some quotes with you.

“ If you don’t know where your going.
Any road will take you there.”
George Harrison

“Never mistake knowledge for wisdom, one helps you make a living,
the other helps you make a life.”
James Oppenheim

“ If you can read this thank a teacher and since it’s in English, thank a soldier !! ”

Here is fun quote that I like.

“Be your own best friend and don’t forget to wink at yourself now and then.”
Diane von Furstenburg

I doubt that you will get much of a grade, if you use the material I have given you, but as my husband says, "I shoot from the hip."

Thanks for the question.

Answer 9

I recently found out 2 adults in their 30s never heard of Hans Christian Anderson....a few years ago I ran into a girl in her early thirties who never heard of Michaelangelo. ...and a lot of other famous people. I think they should at least teach a little about really famous people and make them memorize their names. Else...in the future..no one will be left who remembers them.
EDIT....We DEFINITELY learned more about the English language and spelling than the kids today. Good Grief!! What's our language coming to????!!!!!
EDIT...????!!! is called an "interrobang"http://www.interrobang-mks.com
Sorry that didn't come out blue..I don't know why it didn't.
OOPS....Sorry...I'm 65. My bad....I didn't read the directions properly. lol

Answer 10

It is only 4 pm here so we live all over, I would help you but I am 50