12 replies to this topic

[Time_Traveller]

Could this be the future for teaching and this user on youtube has more The Future of other stuff as well.

[Craven]

Videoconference is nothing new really.
But I hope that school in future will not be about memorizing stuff.

[jjf3]

Yes schools need to be less strict about their overall schedules. I mean I am a freaking computer major, I don't wanna learn about art! Don't get me wrong the class is very interesting, I just wouldn't take it if i didn't have to. I think I can see the general education requirements slowly fade away, or if a student is undecided in a major he/she can take General Education courses as an OPTION! Not being forced down your brain. If they are undecided, students can take a number of different courses from different majors to see what they are interested too. Sometimes the basic courses, as in my school COM 130. Is really really basic and laughable to anybody with any interest or knowledge to computers. One lesson was about how to open up word and print something from it!!!! I think the majority of the people in America know how to do this!!! Come on.

However, there also needs to be reasons why you have to take certain courses. A lot of my friends, only want to code, code, code, and they hate the mention of the word business. But because our major is directly tied into the Business program as is computers in real life people need to realize that Coding can only get you so far. If you have business skills too, that's a plus on any resume!

As Steve Wozniak once described on a video, I think about hackers, ironically, is that Hackers and programmers tend to think a bit out of the box. Schools should look more into this. As proved recently with the gamers breaking that enzyme code. For instance there should be different WAYS of teaching, not just memorizing the same stuff over and over again. And some of it is actually wrong, if you were to do some research later on in life.

I for one am a visual learner, If you show me a documentary about physics or art. I would remember it well 10 years later. Now, memorizing my accounting book, is a failure before the memorization begins. Words, numbers, and maybe some graphs, just go in one ear and out the other for me. And after the test, i'm lucky to recall a single thing from a book. But the documentary sticks in my head for years later.

A plus however, is that my old high school is finally adding economics and computer courses to their general courses eg one has to take them. So that's good to see public schools heading in the right direction.

[Zachemc2]

This videoconferencing in a classroom is a great idea. I also think students should be able to pick and choose their classes rather than being forced to take 6 and have two "electives".

[Craven]

Actually I meant how things are taught. I believe that everyone should get basic education in art, literature, math, physics, history, geography, chemistry, biology... What I don't think has any use is forcing kids to memorize stuff. Reciting planets has no value, understanding how they formed, that they rotate around central huge star is another thing and let's you understand world.

When should kids get chance for specialisation - that's whole another, very hard subject.

[Shimmy]

a general education consisting of lots of core subjects is very important if you plan to be a happy social person in later life in my opinion. If all you know how to do is code programs and have no knowledge or appreciation of history or literature etc you're going to struggle to socialise effectively with many people. With regards to memorising I agree it should be becoming much less important, and in many respects in schools it already is. Soon it will be completely unnecessary once the megacloud is up and running and our mind are constantly linked to the hyperultranet and can get any information we need at any time.

[jjf3]

The glory of the internet is and advancing technologies is the fact that you shouldn't have to learn about things you don't wanna learn about. If you do end up in a situation where you don't know what people are talking about then there's the ever important question asking you can do, or you can just look it up on your mobile internet and come back into the conversation once you know something about it. But likely, you'll only be around people who talk about the same stuff you do anyway. It's why we keep coming back to this place. If one wasn't interested in technology or the future they wouldn't stick around very long (if at all)

[Shimmy]

yea, but i can't imagine being interested in "just" technology, it's sounds like a horrible existence. Can you really have a true appreciation of the world without understanding the history of humanity and the wonders of how and why societies work. Whilst at school lots of people think they don't care about a subject but often later on they're happy they learnt about it. Are you really suggesting that mid conversation you should tell them to wait for 2 minutes whilst you quickly get on google and check what they're talking about?

[jjf3]

well i usually avoid conversations where I don't know a thing about a subject. maybe later ill look it and and be interested in it. so i can talk in the future.

I am all about choice nobody's saying that you can't learn about that stuff. It's all available on the internet. I love tech, but still study stuff I am interested in like religions and culture.

[Craven]

well i usually avoid conversations where I don't know a thing about a subject.

Usually, huh?

Anyway you say, you shouldn't have to learn about things you don't wanna learn about, but young kids can't really know before they get basic knowledge. Also I really think there's plenty of very basic stuff that everyone should be familiar with, essential literature, geography, math, biology, history. After that you can exist in this world as a concious being, and make informed decision like what do I wanna study or do in future.

[jjf3]

True there needs to be a balance but I think in high school there can be a lot more freedom. They gave us classes to take, but I think kids are intelligent enough to make their own schedules at the high school level. There will always be those few that will schedule five lunches so there will need to be some type of system of checks and balances

[Prolite]

I still think it's important for students to memorize information. There's a gazillion things that are crucial to be memorized, but I do agree that a lot of things in school that are taught today don't need to be memorized. And a well-balanced student is the best student, not just in school, but in life. And "Shimmy" made that argument pretty well, as well others' did too.

If there's one thing I could change about today's curriculum, it would be that higher-level mathematics should be taught as an applied science as opposed to a "let's use this formula to figure out how to solve for this equation" approach. I say: let the damn computer figure out the math, just teach the students how to use mathematics to create things and solve problems, such as those found in bio-technology or advanced weapons systems.

[Caiman]

I remember when I was in my final year of school back in 2000 and my IT teacher was adamant that by 2010 his job would be redundant and all teaching would be delivered either remotely or by AI. Perhaps he was a little too optimistic about what he saw of the developing internet back then and emerging hardware, but I think a move away from the assembled classroom at some point in the next two decades is inevitable. Still, just like ‘videoconferencing’ didn’t kill of business air travel like was predicted in the early 90s, remote teaching probably won’t kill off classroom teaching. People work better together when they’re in the same room- so until that experience can be replicated remotely through VR or holographic presence, I think teaching as we know it still has a while left in it yet. Direct2Mind learning is a long while off yet imo.