An intimidating thought.

[Rafiq]

So I hear sleep is necessary to repair brain cells, correct?
'
Well what if the purpose of waking up early for school, is simply just so you can't fully repair your cells, and absorb all the bullshit they teach you?

It's kind of stupid, but still, something to think about...

[CommunityBeliever]

purpose of waking up early for school, is simply just so you can't fully repair your cells

Not everyone who wakes up early doesn't get a goods night sleep. Try going to sleep earlier.


Well what if the purpose of waking up early for school, is simply just so you can't fully repair your cells, and absorb all the bullshit they teach you?

Most schools do teach math, which isn't bullshit because it is based upon proofs. Everything else is bullshit though.

[a rebel]

The government wants us to leave our houses early for school, so they can sneak in and put tracking devices in our clothes to, right?

[Rafiq]

Yes.

[a rebel]

wow, if they are putting tracking devices in our clothes, then someone must have shot Kennedy from the knoll! it makes perfect sense! why didn't I see it before!?

[jake williams]

You have to get up early for school because children's parents have to work.

[Dr Mindbender]

'
Well what if the purpose of waking up early for school, is simply just so you can't fully repair your cells, and absorb all the bullshit they teach you?

It's kind of stupid, but still, something to think about...

I agree its awful that we operate a one size fits all education system. Its geared entirely to maintain the status-quo.

I became convinced a long time ago that the purpose of school (as we know it) is not primarily to educate us but to prepare us for the workhouse.

[Ocean Seal]

So I hear sleep is necessary to repair brain cells, correct?
'
Well what if the purpose of waking up early for school, is simply just so you can't fully repair your cells, and absorb all the bullshit they teach you?

It's kind of stupid, but still, something to think about...
I don't really think that they're going for that. I think its just the fact that parents have to get to work early and many of them travel to get to work so they want to make sure that the kids aren't home alone (especially for the younger ones).

[Rafiq]

wow, if they are putting tracking devices in our clothes, then someone must have shot Kennedy from the knoll! it makes perfect sense! why didn't I see it before!?

Becuase you are an idiot who wants to burn my consitution and take mah guns

[Rafiq]

I put this in non political, for a reason, jerks.

I wasn't particularly that serious.

Just a thought.

[Aspiring Humanist]

Education is something that should be celebrated and pursued at every turn...of course some teachers weave their own political views into their lessons, but that doesn't mean there is a massive neurological government conspiracy to indoctrinate you. Just use discretion in what you accept from the teacher.

I mean shit that would be a bad plot for a movie let alone real life

[xub3rn00dlex]

Education is something that should be celebrated and pursued at every turn...of course some teachers weave their own political views into their lessons, but that doesn't mean there is a massive neurological government conspiracy to indoctrinate you. Just use discretion in what you accept from the teacher.

I mean shit that would be a bad plot for a movie let alone real life

Perhaps you meant learning, or knowledge is something to be pursued at every turn. Education is an institution, and I agree with the poster above who stated it's meant to churn out a labor force ( even at different levels of exploitation of course ) rather than promote learning. You definitely hit the mark with using discretion, as I've had a few conservative professors who hated me for challenging their political intertwining into class lectures.

[#FF0000]

fun fact: the brains of teens and adolescents are, generally, sharper towards the late afternoon.

[Sir Comradical]

Yes, bullshit like maths and science.

[The Guy]

Teaching you to adhere to a dull system is fun! Isn't it? Although I did fairly well, I did equally hate it. I sometimes would intentionally head to sleep at 9pm. I'd wake up at around 5am refreshed. Not the most practical way of doing things, but it helps if you do it at least once a week (ideally Wednesday or Thursday).

[cu247]

Most schools do teach math, which isn't bullshit because it is based upon proofs. Everything else is bullshit though.

I don't think that everything else is bullshit. My old geography class was almost only based on facts, science classes are alright most of the time. Of course math is factual and I find my english and spanish classes quite useful. The rest is all bullshit though.

[Ele'ill]

And then there's the real world where waking up refreshed for work at 3am means starting to drink in the early afternoon to be in bed asleep by 6pm.

[Rafiq]

Yes, bullshit like maths and science.

:rolleyes:

In high school, we take subjects like Economics, history, current events, world history, government, civics, 20th century wars, ect.

All of these classes teach reactionary falsifications of history.

[The Guy]

:rolleyes:

In high school, we take subjects like Economics, history, current events, world history, government, civics, 20th century wars, ect.

All of these classes teach reactionary falsifications of history.

That's a badass high school you've got there. The closest we had to any political debate was "citizenship." It was that dull I actually can't remember any topics... At all.

[Sir Comradical]

:rolleyes:

In high school, we take subjects like Economics, history, current events, world history, government, civics, 20th century wars, ect.

All of these classes teach reactionary falsifications of history.

We didn't have those classes. What did you learn in current events?

[Rafiq]

We didn't have those classes. What did you learn in current events?

Current events is not required, but civics is pretty much like current events i guess.

[Lenina Rosenweg]

The idea behind school starting early, often earlier than the average work day is that learning takes place better in the early morning (assuming students get a good night's sleep). I'm a teacher myself. I have to be at work at 7AM which means I get up around 5:30 AM. Added to that I like to stay up very late, reading or chatting. Without a lot of coffee and NPR (which is propaganda but it more or less tells you what's happening in the world) I could not survive mornings. Br Friday I'm usually toast.

Advice to anyone still in school-yes a lot of it is propaganda and BS. The beauty of public education (and the reason why the US ruling class is trying to destroy it)though is that its free for the kids. Where else are you going to have people try to provide a service without having their hand out? In school-try to use it instead of letting it use you. Read and learn on your own as much as you can. Find a teacher who's cool (if possible) pump him or her for info and learn from their life experience.

[Desperado]

Our rulers aren't that clever. Most aren't even conscious of an awful lot of their exploitation - they're not pretending, they genuinely believe their own bullshit.

[Dr Mindbender]

Yes, bullshit like maths and science.

What, bullshit like being able to count and knowing what is poisonous? Sure.

[Dr Mindbender]

Advice to anyone still in school-yes a lot of it is propaganda and BS.
I can't speak for the US but certainly elsewhere i'd say that school is one of the few places where you are sheltered from propaganda and BS as it is one of the only places where you are allowed to use a critical mind.

The real bullshit starts when you enter the workplace and are forced to deal with office politics, lesson 1.01 being the boss is the alpha and the omega.

My advice to anyone still in school is make the most of your opportunity and freedom from economic bondage.

[Il Medico]

I can't speak for the US but certainly elsewhere i'd say that school is one of the few places where you are sheltered from propaganda and BS as it is one of the only places where you are allowed to use a critical mind.

Public education in the US, from my experiences, is basically putting people through the paces on the road to a life in the workforce. The 'education' is stripped down to its bare minimum of content and taught for short term memorization, an exercise in doing what you are told and doing it 'well' rather than critical thinking and expansion of knowledge. It is rather telling that when I arrived in college to begin my 'higher' education, that we started with basic grammar, history, science, and even a reteaching of basic arithmetic. It is as if you are expected to have learned nothing during your public education, which is sadly true for most of my peers here.

[Rafiq]

I can't speak for the US but certainly elsewhere i'd say that school is one of the few places where you are sheltered from propaganda and BS as it is one of the only places where you are allowed to use a critical mind.

The real bullshit starts when you enter the workplace and are forced to deal with office politics, lesson 1.01 being the boss is the alpha and the omega.

My advice to anyone still in school is make the most of your opportunity and freedom from economic bondage.

In the U.S. that's what college is like, but not k-12. the opposite actually.

[Rafiq]

Maybe if we stripped all the wealth from private schools, we'd get better funding :/

[Meridian]

The idea behind school starting early, often earlier than the average work day is that learning takes place better in the early morning (assuming students get a good night's sleep). I'm a teacher myself. I have to be at work at 7AM which means I get up around 5:30 AM. Added to that I like to stay up very late, reading or chatting. Without a lot of coffee and NPR (which is propaganda but it more or less tells you what's happening in the world) I could not survive mornings. Br Friday I'm usually toast.
I wonder what percentage of young students actually do get good night's sleep now though. I would guess it wouldn't be very high.

[cu247]

^ I don't think it would really be low. I think I'm an average person yet I sleep at least 5 good nights a week.

[xub3rn00dlex]

^ I don't think it would really be low. I think I'm an average person yet I sleep at least 5 good nights a week.

I for one slept good during k-12. It's college that keeps you up at night, I usually get around 5-6 hours a night, which is still pretty decent compared to some. In my experience school was no place for critical thinking. You were strictly taught to listen, not question the teacher. I ran into problems with this here and there, but my counselors were nice and would switch my classes. k-12 is strictly workforce based education. You learn the simple processes you'll need to communicate and work efficiently, yet are also taught to diligently obey and never question the higher authority. College is somewhat the same as I go to CUNY, but when you meet professors who love to debate, and have open minds, their classes are extremely enjoyable.

[Minima]

I don't really have a proper radical critique of primary and secondary education. Here's what I intuit, and you can tell me if it's unfair: Obviously, there are problems with standardized testing, and useless antiquated curriculum in most subjects, but my primary concern is with my knowledge of the people who go for these jobs. they're the worst of every field, In our culture, primary and secondary education are "backup" jobs for those who can't otherwise make it in their field. And the worst are those who knowing that a job in education is "easier," work towards them as a career, where any interest in education is purely 'mercenary.' for those with genuine aspirations in education, it seems like, you can either be an agreeable and pleasant clown and collect your wages at the end of every month, or remain bitter and still have to teach crap to boot.

[Minima]

"You learn the simple processes you'll need to communicate and work efficiently, yet are also taught to diligently obey and never question the higher authority."

I would disagree that it is simply indoctrination from top down. In my schools, and university, no teacher really cared, beyond passing you so they didn't have to deal with you, no I think this part of our education, this irreversible damage comes from the go-getter culture of success, that students themselves perpetuate. Students themselves perpetuate hierarchy, conformism, learned stupidity, careerism and so on.

Students who have a problem with this, don't have any way to deal with it - they don't have any real way to articulate their sentiments, so they either grit their teeth, get run through the mill, and end up all washed out and bitter, or get so incredibly messed up, like it is so easy to do as a kid.

Sleeping problems compound these problems. Don't sabotage yourself in the fight against captalism. get off of revleft! and go to bed!

[Kotze]

The idea behind school starting early, often earlier than the average work day is that learning takes place better in the early morningMost people in their mid-teens to mid-twenties might disagree with that idea (PDF) (http://cbn.eldoc.ub.rug.nl/FILES/root/2004/CurrBiolRoenneberg/2004CurrBiolRoenneberg.pdf). Just look at graph D. The assumptions that go into the chronotype number there are that when people go to bed on free days better reflects what they are comfortable with, and that owl types also incur a sleep debt during work/school days and pay that on free days. Your number is what time it is at the midpoint between when you go to bed usually on a free day and hypothetically waking up after 1/7 of your week's sleep time.

[praxis1966]

Here's the thing, and don't think I'm taking this personally or attacking you because neither is the case, but I've had the good fortune to be personally acquainted with teachers as an adult for a variety of reasons. My parents both worked in education and so have I (albeit not as a teacher per se). Not only that, but believe it or not there are teachers in the org I choose to participate in (yes, there are quite a few radical leftist teachers out there) so I've had many conversations with them there as well. In short, this is a subject I know quite a bit about.


...but my primary concern is with my knowledge of the people who go for these jobs. they're the worst of every field, In our culture, primary and secondary education are "backup" jobs for those who can't otherwise make it in their field. And the worst are those who knowing that a job in education is "easier," work towards them as a career, where any interest in education is purely 'mercenary.'...

I don't deny that there are people who enter the field for those reasons. The thing is that they're the exception, not the rule. I've actually known a couple: One who couldn't get work as a college professor for whatever reason and another who couldn't pass the CPA exam (leaving him to teach business ed classes in my high school). The overwhelming majority, however, actually do want to educate. This is despite the low pay and long hours--I do believe teachers deserve the three months off in the summer because most of them (especially at the secondary level) work 55-60 hours a week, much of it unpaid.

The reason teachers get bitter and disillusioned has more to do with politics, administration, and shitty parents raising shitty, ill behaved kids more than anything else.

Politicians love to cut education funding, suppress teachers wages, ban them from striking, and implement standardized tests (which turns actual learning from a comprehensive concept into one of rote memorization) whilst simultaneously raising the standards teachers have to meet in order to actually work. The "No Child Left Behind" act, passed during the Bush administration, for example made it a requirement that all secondary teachers must be "content area certified" in order to remain "highly qualified."

EG When the law was passed, my mother, who has a master's and 25+ years of experience in the field was suddenly rendered "unqualified." See, her certificate was in "exceptional student education" (read: challenged kids), not a content area such as science or history. She taught 7th and 8th grade developmentally delayed students from practically the beginning of her career, but because of this law, all of a sudden she was going to be forced into primary school where there was no such legal stipulation... Now, in her field, the national average for growth in years for kids classified as "exceptional" was 1/4 year. In her county, it was 1/2 a year. She personally averaged 2.5 years growth and all of a sudden she's not qualified to do her job?

As for the kids/parents and administration, well, this works hand and glove. It seems to me that the kids of my generation got beaten way too often... Corporal punishment without parental consent was actually legal in my home state's classrooms until I was in high school. I can to this day remember one of my best friends getting beaten in the cloak room by our third grade teacher 2-3 times per week because he was a "problem child"; the whole class sitting quietly wide-eyed as his screams echoed around the classroom.

Those days are over, thankfully, but the pendulum has swung too far the other direction. Too many parents are all too content, in an effort not to hurt their kids' feelings, not to give them any boundaries whatsoever. They indulge them completely as well, leading to everything from childhood obesity to temper tantrums at the drop of a hat... To top it off, you have spineless administrators who in many cases refuse to do anything to reprimand a poorly behaved child if they happen to get confronted by a parent. (Parents all too often refuse to believe that their children really are little turds because that would require an examination of their own parenting skills... can't have that.) Never mind that whilst I was working as a tech in a middle school, one of our assistant principals sent out a mass e-mail to everyone on campus with an article written by Pat Robertson's daughter that said 9/11 was God's way of punishing America for being so super gay... Fun times.

Now I ask you, if you were constantly being inundated from all sides, administration, the state, and the general public itself, wouldn't you be a bit bitter as well? I'd dare say you would. But most teachers continue to do it because they actually love teaching. The ones who don't wind up quitting on their own.


I would disagree that it is simply indoctrination from top down. In my schools, and university, no teacher really cared, beyond passing you so they didn't have to deal with you, no I think this part of our education, this irreversible damage comes from the go-getter culture of success, that students themselves perpetuate. Students themselves perpetuate hierarchy, conformism, learned stupidity, careerism and so on.

I would actually agree with a lot of this, but again, the state is to blame, not the teachers. Ever hear of mandated curriculum? Google something called the Sunshine State Standards sometime, a set of mandatory curriculum standards which practically spell out every month of every school year from K-12 in terms of subject matter... Many states have an equivalent, and they've basically tied the hands of teachers in terms of instructional creativity. This is a relatively new phenomenon, but it unfortunately doesn't look like it's going away anytime soon.

Conversely, it seems to be becoming more pervasive. In Texas, for example, the state just created a mandatory standard that says evolution is to be taught alongside creationism on level pegging. They've even changed the name of the Transatlantic slave trade in history books to the Triangle Trade in a fit of obvious racism.

I know, I know... It's a diatribe, but I hope this helps folks understand things from the inside a bit better.

EDIT: As a footnote, if you want to learn how I think a classroom should be run, read Paolo Freire sometime.