[ExI] Teaching kids philosophy improves their math and literacy scores

[spike]

From: extropy-chat [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Dan TheBookMan
Sent: Tuesday, November 08, 2016 6:02 AM
To: ExI chat list <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org>
Subject: [ExI] Teaching kids philosophy improves their math and literacy scores

 

https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/public/files/Projects/EEF_Project_Report_PhilosophyForChildren.pdf

 

Go to page 10 for what they mean by teaching philosophy. (Note: It is not memorizing the works of Adler.;)

 

Regards, Dan

 

 

 

 

Thanks Dan!

 

They are doing things like this at my son’s school and I find it encouraging.

 

They have done away with the old 4 point system you and I are so familiar with.  They have it where they can just give out all S for satisfactory and let it go at that if they wish, so teachers need not struggle and labor with numbers and records, with the notion being that a teacher should be a guide on the side rather than a sage on the stage.  A huge void that idea creates is now the students have no way of pulling rank on each other for brains, no cherished hierarchy of scholastic performance that we geeks cherished for want of anything else at which we could excel.  The new system has taken away the singular joy and source of “status” for nerds.  Now we are reduced to contests for who dresses weirdest and for most social awkwardness.

 

Something funny happened yesterday.  My son’s fifth grade teacher assigned them to do a self-evaluation, N for needs improvement, S for satisfactory, O for outstanding.  It was online with the big screen, so I got to watch my son fill out the form and see his reasoning (narrative justification was required for any non-S and encouraged for every self-evaluation.)  This was so interesting to see how he views himself.  

 

He went for hardcore humble, giving himself nearly all S and three or four N self-evaluations.  I am rechecking the DNA results to verify he is my biological son.  Apparently so.  The only way I can explain it is that the outstanding brains came from his mother and the astonishing humility from me.

 

spike

 

 

 

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