Re: [Gnu-arch-users] OT: trained dependency

[Zenaan Harkness]

On Sat, 2004-11-06 at 17:51, Stephen J. Turnbull wrote:
> >>>>> "Zenaan" == Zenaan Harkness <address@hidden> writes:
> 
>     >> Results?  Results measure results, that's all.  This _is_
>     >> useful; all serious athletes own stopwatches (or other
>     >> appropriate measuring instruments), you know.
> 
>     Zenaan> Do you deny there are side effects to such constant
>     Zenaan> measuring (and the humiliation that results from
>     Zenaan> publishing those measurements) that may in many cases have
>     Zenaan> a net deleterious effect on individuals?
> 
> No.  (And "no" to all the similar questions.)
> 
> My point is not that the current system is _good_.  The point is that
> any transition will be remarkably costly in itself, and that the kinds
> of education you advocate are inherently _far_ more costly on an
> ongoing basis than the current system. Not in dollars; in terms like
> "induce Tom to give up Arch development, and teach software
> engineering instead".  The teachers have to come from somewhere, and
> we know that they can't be mass-produced by the current system of
> colleges of education.  To justify that cost requires some reason to
> believe that the benefits will exceed the cost.

Actually, I believe that it is the system that limits teachers. I
believe Gatto when he says that this is by design. It is _not_ a matter
of deficient teachers, not at all - you're still missing the point. You
as a teacher, as well as your students, are crippled in your respective
abilities to teach and learn, _due to the very system itself_.

A free market for education (! schooling), would have teachers competing
to educate, and learning from each other what works, _and being able to
use techniques that work_.

When was the last time you sent a student on a one-day-a-week
"apprenticeship" at the local museum, because they had a great personal
interest in archaeology/ antiquity? When was the last time you spent
(regularly) half day sessions on _anything_. Was there ever a point when
you effectively gave up battling the system?

Why would such things be more expensive? Why would you not be capable of
teaching in different ways? To think as much is to utterly miss the
point, to believe that people are _inherently_ incapable, _inherently_
all fitting within a bell curve. How many times do I have to state this?
It is not _us_!, not you or me!, not children! It's the goddamn fucking
system and it was designed to keep us normalized and minimize our actual
education!

I can't transcribe 400 pages, so if if there's a glimmer of light
anywhere in what I'm saying that you might relate to, you'll have to
read yourself.

> Neither you nor (based on your reporting) the sources you cite provide
> much reason to believe that the effectiveness would be spectacularly
> higher for the majority of the population, and no estimate whatsover
> of the costs.

You haven't read my sources (Gatto) and you are incorrect about
estimates of cost - Gatto clearly states a belief in significantly lower
financial cost per student. If I attempted (as my poor record with you
already shows) to pull out another set of stats, it would just fire off
another pointless pedantic thread.

You don't have to believe any of this, it's just a point of view.

And here's another belief of my own - teachers are predominantly doing
the best they can. Some even excel (relatively) within the existing
system. The fact that so relatively few do is an indictment of the
system, not of students and especially not of teachers!

cheers
zen