I look at the work my son was covering in 2nd grade (fractions, pre-algebra, simple multiplication, cursive, geography) and I am AMAZED. I know I was NOT learning that in 2nd grade.
But many people think their kids are learning less than they did in school.
What do you think? More or Less?
@Cheryl, I def don't remember fractions in 2nd, my son had to earn his "license to write in cursive" in 2nd, AND they had a great deal of geography AND history. Odd how this differs regionally.
Really interesting to see the variety of answers here.
In some areas, I think they are learning more. They seem to do much harder math, for example.
But in high school, I sometimes have felt that they are not held to as high a standard, in regular classes. Most kids these days wouldn't be able to wade through Dickens, for example. Dickens was standard when I was in high school.
That's why honors classes are a great thing.
Kids are learning more in the way of different subjects but they have less time to get it covered because so many other things are being taught. I love that they learn more math but hate that they have crammed , computor, art, music, etc..... in and have now only 30 mins twice a week for pe that they don't spend more time on handwriting and math when I was a kid we had pe everyday we had math and science and reading/writing kids still get that but it is not as concentrated as it was. consequently you have overweight kids who can't read and write Don't get me wrong I love art, music computer etc but think in the lower grades it needs to be heavy on the basics. add the fluff in later so you don't get a middle school kid who can do anything on the computer but can't real aloud in front of the classroom
I think less. My kids did not learn history like they should have. Also, English was not taught very well. It seems like teachers are teaching to a test and not to what the kids need to know. For example, writing and spelling. Sentence structure isn't taught anymore as well. Priorities in education are all messed up.
I believe less....
I remember doing fractions in 2nd grade (I actually have a scrap book of some of my work from all grades (thanks mom)....
Cursive? They taught it BRIEFLY here in 2nd grade and haven't done squat with it since...that irks me to no end...it's like we are only teaching our kids technology and how to type instead of write.
Geography? PHHHHAAAALLLLEEASE!!! I've had to teach my kids where countries were on the map...we get mimographed/copied papers of select things they need to teach to pass the SOLs...which I truly believe doesn't mean Standard Of Learning - but Sh$t Out of Luck....
I learned more history than my kids are...but I also see how history is being twisted and that bugs me too...thank God I still have books from the 1970s where nothing is POLITICALLY CORRECT and changed to make it sound better...
EDIT: Yes, Denise - regions vary A LOT!!! We did fractions in Hawaii and California just as my kids are...but writing? the focus is more on passing the damn SOLs and teaching technology (i.e., typing and computers) than writing..
There is soooo much more to know now, than when I was in school in the 60s/70s. Computers, technology, advanced math, science - my 4th grade daughter is way ahead of where I was at that age. And unless we are willing to pay what it costs to have our children in school more hours (something I'm strongly for!) something might have to go.
What I see less emphasis on are history and handwriting/grammar. The history part, I'm actually OK with because I find the teaching of history to come with so many biases that I'd rather teach that myself. Handwriting will be unnecessary soon as it is taken over by keyboarding and then voice-recognition. Spelling and grammar I do care about and I find that lacking in elementary school.
But by far, students are learning more than ever before!
Less. They are taught to memorize MORE information, but they are not learning. They are consuming more information, but generally graduate with WAY less to use in practical life. They take more tests and quizzes, their academic livelihood counts on passing tests. They intake, memorize, consume...but don't do much actually learning and experiencing.
Know HOW to do something at an early age, does not mean they are learning. In my opinion.
I don't know if they are really learning more or less in school but I think they learning different things that we did ( if that makes sense). I know they teach math/ algebra WAY differently! I haven't been able to help my oldest since 5th grade. Even though we get the same answer he gets it wrong cause its not the way they teach it now. I don't know if its any easier to get that answer also! lol I know they are learning things sooner ( earlier grades) than I did also. They also have way more lessons with technology than I ever did!
More info is being introduced earlier in the curriculum today. Schools are pushing more info at these kids...but that doesn't equal more "learning". Kindergarten today is pretty much the equivalent to the First Grade of our day. In school it is called "pushed down".
I personally hope the pendulum will swing back and teachers will be allowed to "teach" the kids and not just throw mass amounts of info at them to which the kids then have to be "tested" on. Kids will learn and teachers will be able to be teachers. Teachers hands are tied...they don't like the testing and pushing mass amounts of info so quickly when the students aren't ready.
We recently got the standardized state testing scores back for our kids. We sat down and went over the scores. My daughter said, and I quote, "Oh ya....I knew I wouldn't get a good score on the Language Arts part. It was sooooo looooong and boooooring so I just did eeney meeney miney mo!" Yep...that is what the kids have reverted to when they don't find pride in these test scores cuz there is soooo much testing and it is all so boring. My kids do great on regularly weekly tests over material and love school. But these standardized tests DO NOT measure the true knowledge of what kids have retained.
We may have been taught less but really in the end it was more...cuz we learned it and retained it.
Compaired to what I leaned going to school in Europe....far far less.
More! And not just more content, but a deeper understanding. When I was a kid I got great grades by memorizing things, but didn't really have a true understanding. I could recite my multiplication tables but didn't understand the concept of multiplication. Now everything is much more hands on, kids are exploring with manipulatives and are taught more problem-solving skills. Today's reading and writing instruction is also more advanced than mine was. When I taught 3rd grade, the kids learned to write essays. I didn't learn that until jr. high or high school!
More - and I LOVE it! I am looking forward to the day my 9th graders math assigments challenge me.
I also think teachers are more open to different teaching/learning styles today - those that help kids learn and retain. Had someone used a different method (think Montessori or similar idea, non traditional) to teach me calculus, I might have actually learned it.
I think it's a question of more at an earlier age. Someone mentioned writing for example. When I was a first grader writing was basically penmanship, we just copied words and sentences over and over. Sure, I guess it helped me form nicer letters, but it didn't mean anything, and I hated it.
Our first graders are taught to write stories, they are encouraged to develop ideas and get them on paper in a way that makes sense to their readers. In theory, I love this concept, because many of the children enjoy it and do well, and of course it develops a solid foundation for quality writing later on. But in reality, it's way too much for some of the kids this age, they are just not developmentally ready, so they get easily frustrated and don't try as hard :(
I also think so much depends on where you live. We are in a high scoring district and all the kids, especially at the high school and middle school level are extremely challenged, much more so then I ever was!
About the same, they're just being pushed to learn it earlier.
FAR less in our area.
I'm rather blessed to have my grandparents' school books (late 1800's very early 1900s), and some of my parents' school books (40's-60's). I don't have many of my own (although I have a few, and I remember most of them), and *do* have my son's from awayschool, as well as the curriculua I use homeschooling.
My grandparents "primers" read like the constitution. BEAUTIFUL flowing language that *I* have to look up at least 1 or 2 words per page. The exquisite language is also describing events in the history primer that I didn't come across until college. A single battle in the Civil War takes up over 30 pages of small typed words that took me *hours* to read through (I read very, very quickly). My parents' books read more like the NY Times. The language is much simpler, but concepts are expounded upon and several different opposing theories are presented. A single battle of the Civil War (to continue the example in all 4 generations of 3rd grade books) takes up about a page and a half. Takes about 10 minutes to really read and digest. My own, were far more like Newsweek. Short paragraphs, simple phrasing. Individual battles of the civil war were not presented in the 3rd grade, but in 5th grade they got 1-2 paragraphs. Son's awayschool 3rd grade history mentioned that the civil war happened becuase ____________ 1 sentence with no opposing views or detailed information. (And the line was wrong. Said it was about slavery. Which is incorrect as well as incomplete.)
Looking at the example of the Civil War
Grandparents 3rd grade history : Entire book on the civil war. 30-40 pages per battle or event. Complex information presented, in ravishing language.
Parents 3rd grade history: Civil War takes up about 1/3 of the book. 1-2 pages per battle or event. Interesting articles, single view presented.
My 5th grade history: Civil war takes up about 10 pages. Up to 1-2 paragraphs per battle. Newsweek presentation of "this happened, then that happened"
Son's 3rd grade history: Civil war takes 1 paragraph of VERY simple words, and gives incorrect information.
Now... that's only O. example, but it holds true across the board.
- Grandparents 3rd grade Lit has essays by industrial revolution writers
- Parents had lengthy and interesting articles ABOUT I.R. essays
- Mine mentioned that the essays were written and by whom in a few paragraphs
- Son's says "Many people wrote about their lives" and moves on
- G 3rd grade arithmetic has Geometry, Trig, Algebra
- P 3rd grade has algebra, upper level arithmetic, and banking math
- M was upper level arithmetic
- S (awayschool) doesn't start addition and subtraction, telling time, etc. until 3rd grade (they do "qualitative" math until 3rd)
- G HAD "civics" books, and morality was extensively discussed, along with supporting essays of opposing views
- P had civics in their history books with supporting essays of a single view
- M had "social studies", morality is mentioned but not discussed
- S schools say that morality is not to be discussed by the schools and is the job of the parents
Each generation of books progressively "dumbs down" content, language, scope, and sequence.
Now, there are occasional areas that a following generation gets "more" than the preceeding... but it's mostly in "tech".
ALSO there is an anti-dumb-down-movement in this country that some schools are latching onto with a vengence (mostly private schools) where their curriculum is more like mine OR my parents... and gifted schools tend to have curriculums and present information the way my parents OR grandparents schools did. But overall, schools dumb down SIGNIFICANTLY for each following generation.
It's part of the reason we homeschool. And the curricula available is partly why I seek out Asian and British curricula 10:1 over American (I also use my grandparents books whenever possible).
About the same. The school I went to for grades 1-3 was excellent. The school after that (4-8)...meh. My high school was very competitive - all were Catholic schools.
We definitely learned cursive in 2nd grade, did a lot of creative writing, and had geography as part of social studies.
Our school system uses Everyday Math (a/k/a Chicago Math) and that system does introduce concepts of geometry and algebra early, in the sense of learning arrays, patterns etc. I was taught more old-school math - add, subtract, multiply, divide THEN more advanced concepts. I do find it more interesting and real-life than the abstract way that I learned. The "new" way is supposedly better but I find that the high-school kids who I tutor for SAT prep literally can't add or subtract (never mind multiply or divide or find a square root) without a calculator. I'm not even strong in math and if I can score 700+ on the math section of the SAT without a calculator, I think that a student taking pre-calculus should be able to subtract 8 from 14 or find the square root of 64 without a calculator. It'll be interesting to see if this changes as the kids who have been on "new" math since K (my 13 year old is the first class in our district to have started from that year) get old enough for me to work with.
More, most kindergartners are reading and writing by Spring
My kids are learning more, but I wouldn't be too impressed...the school district I grew up in was not great. There are a lot of "required reading" books that my school never made us read. In fact, there are a lot of basics that I realized down the road my schools never covered.
Currently, the school has the kids reading by the end of kindergarten, which is probably a year faster than when I was a kid about 25 years ago. My kids are fairly young, so that is the biggest thing I have noticed so far.
