What should the purpose of Education be?

I personally think it should teach people to 'react'

1) Basic English, Maths and Science
2) Understanding of the environment, school trips to the great outdoors
3) Social skills i.e learning to play nice, be friendly etc.
4) Art, appreciation of and pratical application
5) A sense of history

I think this is my idea of education up to about 12, it should be 60% practical and 40% fun.

It's like providing the foundations, you can build whatever house you like on top.

james seems to be an advocate for his own brand of parochial schools, teaching beliefs instead of theories or facts. strange that history would rank lower than playing nice or art or the environment which wouldn't need its own section had anyone even the most basic grasp of scientific processes.

They are all quite important keith...I shoulda used * instead of a numbering system.

"parochial schools"

I would use that term to refer to "faith schools", Tony Blair's latest big idea and one which, if applied in some parts of the north of England, would only reinforce an already terrible situation of polarisation, social division, warlike attitudes towards other people in the community ... those in the Lib Dems and in Blair's own party who have questioned the wisdom of this policy have my unqualified support.

So "faith schools" = DUD. Private education = DUD. The National Curriculum in its original 1988 form = DUD, though it is not so duddish now that it is more flexible. Comprehensive education as believed in by the 1960s Labour governments = CLASSIC.

geez I only meant that kids should learn a bit of everything. I missed out some bits of everything.

No worries, James, I like your idea. Out of interest what do you think of "faith schools"? Personally I would only support them in areas where the community is generally integrated (i.e. perhaps in London but certainly not in Bradford).

In my school the kids who are cranky like dave q would get cookies. The kids who are cranky like keith would get spankings. The bad kind.

All I find absolutely necessary is teaching the ability to read and write. (Not to interpret Lord of the Flies for three fucking months, just to READ the damn thing.) Possibly basic math After that school ought to be optional and for exposing people to new fields.

Education should be about preparing a privileged elite for a life of idleness.

'Lord of theFlies' has my all-time fave line. "I'm the only one who can help you now, and I'm the Beast"

To keep delinquents and peasants off the streets until society can enslave them with debts and bundle them wholesale into jobs they despise. Education is a farce. Bring back apprenticeship.

Read Illich's "Deschooling Society".

Here's a solution: Separate the process of "education" (ie learning to think, learning to learn, growth as a person, all that stuff) and the far simpler - more specific - process of "skill-learning".

There should be no compulsory schools, where children have to go and "teachers" are legally responsible for their behaviour and success/failure. Except perhaps for the very young to learn to read, write and count.

Current schools (of all types) are just holding camps for the young. We waste enormous talent and human resource, squishing the best and worst kids in the same place to get bored or boil over with frustration.

Instead there should be a range of drop-in social and educational resource centres for children to begin to make choices about what they wish to become skilled in. After that, once those choices are developed, it should be a process of apprenticeship, workshopping and earlier work-ages. Qualifications, such as they are, should be entirely devoted to specific abilities to do certain trades. So a car mechanic or hairdresser is specifically tested in relevent skills.

The "growth as a person" stuff is separated, becoming part of social life.

Meanwhile universities should go back to being elite academic institutions for those who choose further learning for non vocational reasons. They shouldn't be (falsely) seen/used as a route to a bigger pay packet or three years drunk.

Hmm, too much but you asked.

to inspire and slake curiosity

I'm a little upset at my supposedly college-level history class. They gave us a paper to write over the summer with almost no instructions that was supposed to break us into bad grades and huge efforts at once. I spent many hours researching and fewer writing. We finally got the papers back today and I got a good grade and no comments but a few extra commas in red pen. Where is my education? What are you TEACHING me?!

I don't like how college seems to be required to get a good job, not just to be educated. My mother said it's not really a conscious decision in today's world. Not conscious? It's FOUR YEARS! I think that most kids who come out of high school and go straight to college don't appreciate the learning aspect. I bet I won't. I'd rather take time off to get bored first and then go back on my hands and knees in desperation (or do it on my own).

Robin C is on the money this time. What a desperately repugnant idea 'faith schools' are. Steve Bell best nailed the absurdity of it.

I fear that if 'apprenticeship' were brought back, people like myself would simply be steered toward that type of thing. I've seen quite enough of how the elites replicate themselves to know that they would gladly chuck today's flawed system for something like apprenticeship. After all, who really would get to decide such a thing? But what do I know - I'm still carrying with me the hoary old notion that education is essential to a functioning democracy.

And who the hell needs 'apprenticeship' for dogshit rote industrial labor or dogshit secretarial work anyhow? Are we living in a Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale? Fuck, let's just check 'em into the factory when they're eight years old, just like we used to...

I think we should teach the youth critical reasoning skills over memorization they forget anyways.

education should be divorced from the demagogues, prised away from the proles and handed to the homosexuals.

repeal section 28! teach gayness!

To make sure everyone has the skills they need to take part in the society they live in and to learn whatever else takes their fancy.

I think apprenticeships are a better way of teaching some things than 'plumbing 101', 'a degree course in yoga instruction', 'plant identification' or 'animal husbandry'. I don't understand that appretenticeships necessarily mean indenture without choice.

What do you guys mean when you say 'faith' school, religious school? I don't see what is diabolical about the things Jel posted. I've tutored in K/1 public school in America, and a large part of the classroom is just getting the kids accustomed to fact that they are at school, and how to behave in a social group, how to get in line, how to listen when the other kids speaks, how to follow directions, etc.