Message from @tereško

Discord ID: 610759506137317376


2019-08-13 08:52:56 UTC  

another level

2019-08-13 08:53:07 UTC  

Yeah, international student. Graduate level. Accepted into the United States.

Couldn't do basic fucking addition.

2019-08-13 08:53:12 UTC  

might help

2019-08-13 08:53:35 UTC  

basic mineral ID is what I have trouble with

2019-08-13 08:53:46 UTC  

Quite frankly, anyone looking to immigrate into the United States should take a "skills test." If they cannot read, write, and do math at a fifth grade level, then they cannot come here. We should impose that test retroactively on any immigrants too, and deport anyone that can't pass.

2019-08-13 08:54:00 UTC  

@Arthur Grayborn ideally we should have classrooms of 6-12 kids. But to get that, we probably need huge advancements in AI, to get virtual teachers.

2019-08-13 08:54:02 UTC  

basic fucking mineral identification from first year college

2019-08-13 08:54:14 UTC  

they can't do the simplest stuff

2019-08-13 08:54:50 UTC  

@tereško - Small classrooms only make a difference for low performing students.

The research found that results were negligible for white students - they learned just as well in a large lecture hall as they did in a smaller hands-on class.

2019-08-13 08:55:10 UTC  

Where it made a difference was for black students, but it still came nowhere near closing the gap.

2019-08-13 08:55:32 UTC  

no, it makes huge difference for all students

2019-08-13 08:55:44 UTC  

I gotta crash

2019-08-13 08:55:47 UTC  

good talking

2019-08-13 08:55:50 UTC  

later all

2019-08-13 08:55:58 UTC  

it a way for more talented students to get even better results

2019-08-13 08:56:40 UTC  

@Arthur Grayborn it's not just the "slow" kids that get hold back by huge classrooms, it also affects the smart ones

2019-08-13 08:57:49 UTC  

and it all comes down to current systems being geared towards "teaching to pass a test"

2019-08-13 08:59:09 UTC  

I found the study, @tereško:

"This effect was concentrated in the first year that students participated in the program. In addition, the positive effects of class size were largest for black students, economically disadvantaged students, and boys."
https://www.brookings.edu/research/class-size-what-research-says-and-what-it-means-for-state-policy/

2019-08-13 08:59:29 UTC  

For gifted students you're better off being more selective about which teachers you hire, and giving them room to work.

2019-08-13 08:59:53 UTC  

Home School

2019-08-13 09:00:13 UTC  

naah, home schooling is a terrible idea

2019-08-13 09:00:17 UTC  

kids need to socialize and compete

2019-08-13 09:00:22 UTC  

They do

2019-08-13 09:00:29 UTC  

Doesn’t have to be through school.

2019-08-13 09:00:37 UTC  

Genetic confounding.

If smarter people are more likely to home school, then home school could outperform public school for entirely unrelated reasons. That said, home schooled students do have higher college graduation levels, lower crime rates, and better test scores across the board.

2019-08-13 09:01:09 UTC  

There are no recorded measures that I know of, where home schooled students perform worse than public school.

2019-08-13 09:01:16 UTC  

And (and this is the kicker) the parents are in control of of the rhetoric.

2019-08-13 09:02:03 UTC  

“How should a nation educate its children?”
Is a very different question to,
“How should *you* raise *your* kids?”

2019-08-13 09:02:17 UTC  

*"In addition, the positive effects of class size were largest for black students, economically disadvantaged students, and boys"*

@Arthur Grayborn that by definition is more than 50% of all students

2019-08-13 09:02:32 UTC  

and that just says "largest positive effects" .. no mention of negative effect at all 😃

2019-08-13 09:03:50 UTC  

@tereško - Have you also considered that class size might have an influence on academic performance, entirely unrelated to the teacher? Smaller class sizes mean fewer disruptive students, which means a larger percentage of your time can be spent on actual education, and not glorified daycare work.

2019-08-13 09:04:09 UTC  

You could likely achieve the same exact results, by ejecting disruptive students from the classroom and sending them to special ed.

2019-08-13 09:04:34 UTC  

Less kids in each class means the teacher has more time to devote to each student.
This is fairly obvious.

2019-08-13 09:05:06 UTC  

It's also probably irrelevant.

Less kids in each class means the teacher has to spend less time getting the class under control, which means you can cover more of the material and answer more questions.

2019-08-13 09:05:40 UTC  

It could be lecture time and total questions answered that are the driving factors behind class size and performance, and that actual time per student is entirely irrelevant.

2019-08-13 09:06:13 UTC  

Which would make sense when you look at Japan, a nation with massive class sizes and world leading academic performance. They have little patience for disruptive students.

2019-08-13 09:06:22 UTC  

@Arthur Grayborn so .. send all the disruptive students to .. emm .. prison

2019-08-13 09:06:48 UTC  

But Japan has an entirely different culture. A culture that I’d say is largely responsible for their results.

2019-08-13 09:06:49 UTC  

Nah. Just put them in a classroom with other disruptive students, and make it clear that if they don't learn to behave then prison is very much in their future.

2019-08-13 09:07:17 UTC  

that's just like an asian way for growing the most poisonous insect possible