As I have read and attempted to digest what McCain has to say about preparing students for a world that doesn’t exist, I have come to the conclusion that we are attempting to meet the needs, but the world has changed so greatly just in the last generation that we can’t possibly anticipate what they will need to know. We are attempting to meet their technology needs, but the exponentional speed with which technology changes is so great that my mind is boggled from trying to understand it.
We are definitely focusing way too much on “school skills.” NCLB, Westest, end course exams, and all those other names for high stakes testing and ratings have created this monster. The answers are far beyond this, but as long as legislators set the rules, we have to jump through the hoops they place in front of us.
Since I am not a core subject teacher, I have a little less pressure than many of my colleagues, so I can focus a little more on practical lessons. My field, now Family and Consumer Sciences, was once known as practical arts. The nature of the subject which I teach is beneficial to teaching real world skills and the projects we complete have a little more balance that many other classes. Yet we still have to get the students to master basic skills to be able to apply them to the problems they face.
Currently my answer to the dilemma lies is focusing more and earlier on the need for vocational and career education. We have to realize that the majority of kids are not going to college and they need real job skills to support themselves until the can find themselves as responsible adults. Waiting until the majority reach the 11th grade to put them in “practical arts” means we lose way too many before they get a chance.
I love knowing that your field was once referred to as the “practical arts!” While I generally hated having to take a Home-Economics class, I learned a lot in that class (like, don’t put straight pins in your mouth or measure liquids with the measuring cup on a flat surface and not in your hand). I also did a lot in that class – knitted slippers, made a dress (and was in a fashion show with that same dress). For someone like me, who tended (tends?) to spend too much time with a book in her hand or thinking, it was good that I had to take it because I never would have elected to take it!
Karen
By: mccomas on January 9, 2008
at 10:26 am