lol, that is what i was thinking. To be honest, i've never heard of a comptuer virus called Michelangelo. If i was to guess what most people thought of when they heard the name Michelangelo i would have though turtle also if they didn't know about the painter. Especially given that fact the they thought Beethoven is a dog and the fact that those movies are old.
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US Students Not So Worldly Wise
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lol, that is what i was thinking. To be honest, i've never heard of a comptuer virus called Michelangelo. If i was to guess what most people thought of when they heard the name Michelangelo i would have though turtle also if they didn't know about the painter. Especially given that fact the they thought Beethoven is a dog and the fact that those movies are old.
Enduring_Warrior
[H]ard|Gawd
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And that's the same reason you are stuck in your head and barely relate to people. Other than geeks like you. You don't know shit about humans or humanity. Obviously you completely ignore how to interpret and understand history.
skinnydaddy
Limp Gawd
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I have to say, My real education did not start until my last year in HS. During my first week as a senior, the English Teacher introduced me to the library really for the first time. Oh I had been in there before but it had always been the place i went to if I needed to do some asinine report for some other teacher that was really just counting time till they got off work. In that one year, I was introduced to Shakespeare, Beowulf, poetry, and in depth history that was just not covered in a text book that glossed over it in maybe a few paragraphs (civil rights)or if it was a whole chapter (WWII). Before that my interest lay in who was dating who and if I could kick his ass or him mine and Football was LAW! I'll give you guess as to what state. They recently did a very good job of removing brown people from their text books.(shudder) What she showed me was how really ignorant I was but I could also change that. Hell how many people here knew where the hell Kuwait was before 91? Kids just starting college are always dumb as bricks but hopefully they don't leave it same way they went in.
You are right, I don't relate to other people. I don't really care if I do either.
As far as "not knowing shit about humans or humanity" what is it that I need to know, that you think I don't? Merely having a collection of facts to regurgitate on command does not imply understanding. I know plenty of people who could recite such things.
I'll give you an example. My father was a History teacher. He barely functions in this world, because he knows nothing about computers. What is more tragic? While I have no doubt that he has forgotten more about humanity than I've known, whose knowledge is more applicable?
Lets assume I do decide to "learn" History. Whose version of History do I learn? One thing that's remained consistent, is the more I learn the more I find out that I was taught garbage in school.
Its to the point where some of it is almost like asking which political party is superior. People will argue Republicans vs Democrats all day long, each with the idea that their side is superior, and the other is evil and full of lies.
Here is some history for you, the founding fathers recognized even then that a two party system would be a bad thing. Does knowing that provide some unusual insight I could not have gained otherwise? Is it a critical piece of information? How does it make my life better, knowing that 200 years ago people were smart enough to think it was a bad idea?
Unlike the eyewitnesses to an event, those that can conduct postmortem stand a better chance to grasp the true nature of the event in question. History would have no value if otherwise.
Precedence is of worth. Legal system and that of modern science should be ample proofs of that.
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[RIP]Zeus
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Wow, I feel like I am looking into a mirror here.
Your opinion is spot on to what mine would have been. I fully agree with you, but I am going to have to disagree on the history.
Without history how are we to learn from ones mistakes? and improve one's idea's?
I want to get more into this, but I gotta finish this crap up here at work.
Oh and just so you all know how your tax dollars are working. Everyone here in my shop, at this deployed location that I am at. Failed a simple test I gave them, and it was just 2 questions.
1. What is the first thing that comes to mind when you hear Beethoven. (Everyone said the dog)
2. How long does it take the Earth to rotate around the sun. (1 said 1 week, and the rest saying 24 hours)
I am in a depressed mood cause of those answers.
Since I started programming before I was a teenager (I knew BASIC/Fortran/Pascal/Action!/6502 Assembly by High School...), I tended to be about two grades ahead in anything that really mattered to me.
For ninth and tenth grade especially, I just slept during our arithmetic classes. The teachers were fine with this, too. I had the same teacher both years, and he accepted I already knew the subject matter.
People thought I was stupid or a slacker. Then they realized the reason I was gone for two classes and missed lunch every day in eleventh grade was that I would leave during study hall, take an independent study course at another HS for some college-level education HS credit, then return during my lunch break.
They shut up when they realized I would sleep during a class, and then ace any test I was given. Once they figured out the whole truth to my life, they started asking me for help in classes.
The truth was simple: my real education started when I got home. Or study hall.
(And even for English class in Junior HS, if we were given a short story to read, I'd also typically read the book later at home...)
Maybe it doesn't work this way for all, but intelligent people I believe tend to get tired of their education being slower than needed at school and will take and teach themselves whatever it is that interests them. People say not everyone has the same opportunities, but I dunno, don't a lot of people have access to the free public libraries? By the time I had a car, I was in mine quite often!
TheCommander
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A lot of stupidity from some people commenting in this thread. First off, the same goes for the majority of people in the world. Are people stupid? No for most people. They are just uninformed or just don't care. I lived in Europe for a bit and and met just as many "dumb" people there. I've also met Canadians who knew almost nothing about US history. Fact is most people just go about their lives without caring what goes on outside their country.
Fact is most people just go about their lives without caring what goes on outside their HOME.
If you're married, what goes on outside your den. Don't even know what the wife and kids are up to...
could be a learning disability i cant read script ether dyslexia and dysgraphia
writing by hand is literally painful
and i cant spell to save my life ether again do to the LDs and how i learned to read based on what a word looks like in print its very hard for me to read some one script
i can barely read my own print handwriting
I used to work at a place where a lady there had some severe LDs like that, and it certainly caused problems in being able to work...
Problem was some bitch co-worker would constantly mock and belittle her for it... When I pointed out to this bitch that although she was college educated without any LDs, the best she apparently can do... is the same job as the just-barely-graduated LD lady!!!
When I explained to all that what she was really doing was just belittling others to feel better about her own personal shortcomings that she actually had control over, she STFU real, real good...
Don't dog people for a disability if you're just too god damn f-ing lazy yourself to do any better...
yea shit sucks THANK GOD for a great high school i was in that got me the tools i needed to graduate
sadly most people barely understand what dyslexia is let alone dysgraphia most have never heard of it
add on other stuff like depression and ADHD its hard for me to get any thing done
ah well
Blazestorm
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I write in cursive on purpose just so people don't bother asking me for notes
Eh I can read cursive but it usually takes me a while to remember how to write it.
I hate writing in general, I'd rather type on a keyboard where I can type more accurately and quicker than I can write something down with less wrist pain.
velusip
[H]ard|Gawd
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Corrected.
wrist pain if it sets in fast and the longer you write the worse your hardwriting gets can be a sign of dysgraphia btw
Blazestorm
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Nah I think it's because I don't write stuff by hand that often. Once I get into the habit of writing a lot (taking notes) there is no pain. It's more of an annoyance than anything.
But for some computer science classes over the summer the only time we wrote was for the mid-term and final. The rest of the time I was just taking notes on my laptop. Other classes don't allow laptops so I take notes by hand.
But for some computer science classes over the summer the only time we wrote was for the mid-term and final. The rest of the time I was just taking notes on my laptop. Other classes don't allow laptops so I take notes by hand.
nimbyfaygo
Limp Gawd
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Considering I haven't written more than a paragraph in 10 years, it's just pure luck that I can write at all. When the education system embraces typed reports and essays, writing skills are going to become weak. It's just a little fact. Not even a big deal.
Gorankar
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If our news covered happenings outside the US as much as the foreign ones spammed ours, we might know more about what is going on outside our borders. Not that it in any way matters to most. Hell, the EU is more interested in our elections than many US citizens are. Many, if not most in the US, on the other hand don't care who the prime minister of some EU country is.
Cursive is almost a waste of time. Once I left school, I have never needed it outside my signature. It just lacks the usefulness it once had in past. I can still read it though provided the hand is reasonably legible. Knowing who a long dead painter and a long dead musician are is not really all that useful either. That, and when asked a question regarding Beethoven, just because one responds with a modern entertainment figure, does not necessarily mean they don't know who the historic entertainer is. It could just mean they answered with what they considered the most culturally relevant answer. No excuse for not knowing that one rotation on the axis is a day, and one lap around the sun a year though.
I could make a pop quiz that made Europeans look stupid to the common American as well. Shit talking about each other based cultural differences in priorities is a long time form of bigotry that will prolly never go away.
Cursive is almost a waste of time. Once I left school, I have never needed it outside my signature. It just lacks the usefulness it once had in past. I can still read it though provided the hand is reasonably legible. Knowing who a long dead painter and a long dead musician are is not really all that useful either. That, and when asked a question regarding Beethoven, just because one responds with a modern entertainment figure, does not necessarily mean they don't know who the historic entertainer is. It could just mean they answered with what they considered the most culturally relevant answer. No excuse for not knowing that one rotation on the axis is a day, and one lap around the sun a year though.
I could make a pop quiz that made Europeans look stupid to the common American as well. Shit talking about each other based cultural differences in priorities is a long time form of bigotry that will prolly never go away.
D
dceremuga
Guest
Blame the parents. I take even my 6 year old to see symphonies, I expose them to culture. Inactive parents leave their parents to the communist school system which teaches tolerance, pop culture, and everyone is the same. Sorry to bust their bubble.
Take cursive out of school and replace it with something the kids NEED education on such as finances.
Good Replacement Classes
How to balance a checkbook.
What good are credit cards?
How to manage your financial obligations.
I didn't know anything about the important stuff that mattered when I left high school. I've learned it along the way.
From the article: "It was intended as a reminder to faculty at the university that references quickly become dated, but quickly evolved to become a hugely popular annual list that gives a snapshot of how things have changed, and chronicles key cultural and political events that have shaped a generation."
This whole article has nothing to do with the education system in America. It has to do with understanding references of the current generation of students, and how those references have changed over the years.
This whole article has nothing to do with the education system in America. It has to do with understanding references of the current generation of students, and how those references have changed over the years.
While true, the issue is the focus on impractical things that will not be used, and cramming to pass a test then forgetting. This is why so many people just cant print or write very well anymore - we just don't use it.
In the chase for a "well rounded person", so much gets thrown at students that just ends up being questionable how much they actually retained. Homework is another good example. You can know the subject material without it, yet fail the class if you don't do it. So much for caring about learning.
Take something like the MLA style guidelines. Is something like that really needed when writing is typically full of "u", "ur", and "4ever"? When people do not know the difference between their there and they're?
Its really a shame as well. Why focus so much on everything, when so many people are illiterate or close to when graduating. When critical thinking is alien to most of the people I run into. The Wikipedia pages on fallacies and cognitive biases would probably be a far better time investment than 80% of the subject matter in schools.
I can agree with that, but even so... cursive is basically a slightly different english writing... it's like writing letters in spanish, it's the same thing. I don't know how you can forget that... even with non usage.
And yea, I also believe that school shouldn't be as broad as they are, I mean... half the stuff I learned in history are either gone or just vaguely in my memory. Still though, taking away teh general education stuff would leave you with specialists that probably won't be able to do jack in any other fields.
dgingeri
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This is not really surprising. Our teachers are dropping the standard so minority students can pass and graduate. (They don't really need the standards dropped, because they are not any more stupid than white kids. They just need the lower standards so their parents don't have to push so hard to get them to graduate. I find this part really pathetic.) The history classes constantly teach the same subject over and over. (I went through the history of the US up to 1888 4 times before I graduated, yet never saw any world history until I was in college.) Geography isn't even taught anymore. (My 10 year old nephew couldn't even identify 5 of the original 13 colonies on a map, while I identified all 50 on an unmarked map at his age.) Their math lessons are a total joke. (My niece who getting a 4.0 gpa so far in her second year in high school can't even do the distributive property in Algebra. I was in Trig my freshman year in high school, and getting a 3.0 gpa.) Science is even more of a joke. (My nephew who just graduated from high school knows all about "climate change" yet can't even identify the chemical symbol for methane or ammonia, let alone glucose or sucrose. He doesn't have a clue what mitosis is. Plus he never saw anything in school on momentum or collision physics.)
Schools these days are a total joke. The kids graduating these days don't have even half the education I did at that point.
Schools these days are a total joke. The kids graduating these days don't have even half the education I did at that point.
Falling Anvil
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Going by stuff on the net, the people who graduate aren't so hot either.
In any case, it's an attitude problem more than skill, which I think is related to the country's superpower status. Losing that is going to have people singing totally different tunes I think.
To toss net generalizations around though, ignorant Americans square up pretty nicely with racist/cynical Euros and insane Asians. The numbers issue just makes the US presence that much more unappealing, but I bet the influx of Chinese and their trolls in the coming years isn't going to make them too hot with net communities either.
In any case, it's an attitude problem more than skill, which I think is related to the country's superpower status. Losing that is going to have people singing totally different tunes I think.
To toss net generalizations around though, ignorant Americans square up pretty nicely with racist/cynical Euros and insane Asians. The numbers issue just makes the US presence that much more unappealing, but I bet the influx of Chinese and their trolls in the coming years isn't going to make them too hot with net communities either.
Falling Anvil
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Also, I should stop my habit of repeating certain phrases in my writing. Guess that's what happens when you're half-awake at work.
NickJames
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I was raised in a typical American home. Went to a typical public school full of idiots and even dropped out in 10th grade. I just couldn't stand my learning environment, thus I went home and completed my education solo with the use of the internet. Got my G.E.D. and kept learning until I was able to find a great office job. It's weird but I was able to do just fine on my own with no guidance or assistance from anyone. Also I enjoy Classical, Oprah, Rap, Hip-Hop, Techno, Alt Rock, Punk and Indie. I am somewhat of a chameleon, able to blend in with any environment I am thrown into. It's how I manage to get along with anyone I encounter. I do think are education is broken and this is coming from someone who has lived in Florida all his life (considered one of the dumbest US states), and was raised in a 100% Cuban Family. I was also put in Learning Disability classes due to my ADHD diagnoses. I still think I managed to turn out very well given the situation I was in. My grades were awful but that's because I didn't care to learn in my classroom. I passed all my final exams and the FCAT but when it came to classwork and homework, I just didn't care.
Also I learned cursive in 3rd grade, and never used it again, I found it pointless to use in anything. Then again, my print can be compared to chicken scratch, I just hate handwriting in particular, I am more of a typist.
Also I learned cursive in 3rd grade, and never used it again, I found it pointless to use in anything. Then again, my print can be compared to chicken scratch, I just hate handwriting in particular, I am more of a typist.
Renegade_Azzy
Limp Gawd
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Interesting.. more tech comes into the classroom, and each generation of kids are dumber in this country. But we have to keep taxing to raise salaries for poor performance.
Sadly, it will be heading that direction. Most of the smart people I know have no kids, and a few have 1. Most of the err less gifted I know or grew up with have small herds. My faith in the ability of future generations to engage in logical thought is not very strong.
You lose fluency when stringing the letters together, and just do not know how to make certain letters at all. Even if you can remember what they look like (generally) you may not know the proper / efficient way to make the character. Ever seen anyone mess up an ampersand badly? Also its important to consider that we read text all day long, but I rarely read anything in cursive.
Again I have to ask what the value of such rote memorization is. I'd classify that as a waste of time.
JediFonger
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just wanted to say that most of [H]readers represent a very tiny fraction of the US population. as modders/gamers you know that you are already in the minority. and it still holds true when comparing yourself against that newslink.