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Are We Failing To Prepare Children For Leadership In the US?
Vulcan195 writes "Would you let your three-year-old play with a real saw? You would if you were a parent in Switzerland. Suzanne Lucas (a U.S. mom residing in Switzerland) writes about the contrasts between the U.S. and Swiss ways of instilling wisdom. She writes: 'Every Friday, whether rain, shine, snow, or heat, my three-year-old goes into the forest for four hours with 10 other school children. In addition to playing with saws and files, they roast their own hot dogs over an open fire. If a child drops a hot dog, the teacher picks it up, brushes the dirt off, and hands it back.' She suggests that such kids grow up and lead the ones who were coddled (e.g. U.S. kids) during their early years."
No American child would be caught dead allowing a Swiss teacher to wipe dirt off their hard-earned American Hot Dogs. Freedom Dogs 4eva!
When the foot seeks the place of the head, the line is crossed. Know your place. Keep your place. Be a shoe.
As a general rule....yes.
These Forest-Kindergartens are all over Europe.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forest_kindergarten
Where I work, I can see them going by foot up a mountain to reach the forest. I can imagine their immune-system must beat those of TV-watching coach-potatoes.
In other news I read that 5 year olds, who did not go to such Kindergartens had to be rescued on a school excursion.
They weren't able to continue because they had never actually _walked_ a mile in their life, only from the couch to the car and back.
When it comes to being intolerant racist dumbfucks who ban Mosques in their country because they hate the brown people even more than the most staunch white hood wearing republican.
*jerky jerky motion* my country is better than your country.
I get where you're coming from, but the simple fact of the matter is that I have never worked for a Swiss boss. Ever. I know nobody who has. If they are such great leaders of (US) men, where are they?
End of discussion.
Step 1: Have a Rich Family
Not sure what the other steps are...
spawn of some HR lady just because she sends him out on lord of the flies outings when he's 3.
This is a tech news site. What's the tech angle here? Are the Swiss children building linux systems where the US ones aren't?
Nahh you're just plain failing.
Most people say there are two certainties in life. Death and taxes.
I'd like to add a third to the list: Mothers thinking their way of raising their kids is better than x, bragging about it and if allowed to will continue to write about it in a blog, on Facebook or in a magazine in excruciating (to the rest of us) detail.
Nothing new here, just a new fad 'that's better because...' and the reasoning is usually just thinly disguised as because "I'm doing it"
My niece and nephew were playing with real saws, hammers, and power tools long before the age of three.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
You don't think it's a coincidence that a lot of political appointees are the result of nepotism, do you?
Gentlemen, it pains me to tell you this but, we have a lumberjack gap.
crazy dynamite monkey
They teach crafts, hard work and leadership. The problem is Boy Scouts has become stigmatized, lampooned, and in recent years depicted as homophobic. Girl Scouts spends too much time focused on selling cookies.
Public schools wouldn't put a saw or hammer in a child's hand. It would take five minutes for an upset parent or a lawyer to show up. You can thank our overly litigious society for closing doors on an idea like this. And as a parent, I can tell you I'd need a high level of trust in the instructor before I let them take my kids alone into the woods.
We don't want our young cattle to grow into leadership roles, are you nuts!? Here, we make a point to keep kids docile with a mix of fluoride and Prozac.
No.
Have gnu, will travel.
I'm sorry, this is just too much. Every week there's at least a couple of these what's-wrong-with-American-education stories. It's always that Americans are doing it wrong, somewhere else is doing it better.
It's entirely reasonable to survey the different approaches to teaching and try to select the best for your own kids/schools/country. But the underlying nationalistic streak in all these articles, and the bogus tone of imminent disaster, is just baiting. And you're going to provide a big fat forum for the libertarians and plutorepublicans to grind away at "why don't we totally defund public education, it's clearly not working". Someone will misquote ol' Thom Jefferson.
God, I would like to be able to differentiate this week from the one that came before. Why is this what Slashdot has become? How is this "news for nerds"? This looks much more like "bait for hot-headed middle-aged guys".
Well, what you Americans do looks very much like organized child abuse to the rest of the world. Not letting children make essential experiences results in stunted development, and there are not many worse things you can do to a child. Even if you think you are protecting them, what you really do is setting them up to fail more drastically later, when they are less resilient and learning is harder for them.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Man, the woods are boring. Books and videogames are way more awesome. Fuck trees.
Glad that I was taught how to shoot guns starting at age 5. But then, I live in Texas.
Of course we are failing to prepare our children for leadership in the US! Hell, we are failing to prepare our children for anything!
How many of your local schools even offer woodworking clases anymore? Why is that? Whether it is the continual bitching by parents who are afraid Johnny or Jenny cutting their fingers off or the fear of lawsuits by the school districts themselves doesn't matter. The fact is, schools don't teach those skills anymore.
And math? Well, math is just too hard for kids! We can't damage their self-esteem by making them learn something that's HARD!
Reading/writing? Unnecessary! I knew the school systems were failing when my son told me that he could opt out of reading and writing to take a movie appreciation class. That's right - instead of learning how to read or how to structure clear, concise sentences, the school would let him watch movies and talk about them. Clearly equivalent!
Anyone who doesn't think that the US is failing to prepare children for leadership clearly wasn't paying attention as George W. Bush ran this country into the ground for 8 years!
... in the "leaders' seats"? Of course, given the current state of world economy, one can argue that they are not leading us (forward), but they ARE in that seat - not the people who had to take responsibilities growing up (read ppl from poorer famililes). what do you say, wise lady?
If you want to prepare children for leadership, the first thing that they need to learn is that responsibility is earned. Too often today those who excel are denigrated so as not to harm the feelings of those less capable. In this type of environment, those who would lead are discouraged from doing so and those who could possibly learn to lead are taught to sit back and go with the flow.
As far as the "pussification of the American Male" that George Carlin warned about it is a resounding yes. I don't have kids, but I have friends and relatives that do. And boyo, can I tell you how different it is.
Go ahead and hang out on my lawn while I rant...
Yes, in junior high I WALKED to school, which was over a mile away.
Yes, we had fireworks "wars" with bottle rockets, firecrackers and roman candles every summer.
Yes, PE in junior and senior high school was brutal, competitive and compulsory. The coaches and upper classmen were pricks, thats just how it was.
Yes, my parents usually had no idea where we were after school, or especially in the summer. Back then, parents weren't fixated/paranoid on children like they are now.
Yes, we played dodgeball in school and it was fierce.
Yes, there was hazing, bullies, fights, etc; same shit as now, only there wasn't a "national debate" about it.
Leadership however is a different animal.
We play the game with the bravery of being out of range
i wonder if in switzerland the media also tries to apply overly broad generalizations and stereotypes to an entire population
I don't understand, what is the difference between these schools and having what we call "recess" in the US? We always used to play outside and in the woods (granted never with knives and fires whilst unsupervised.) We learned leadership via school yard games such as man-hunt, tag, capture the flag, sharks and minoes, etc. I think as long as kids are playing with eachother outside, they'll develop these same communication skills that you can get from these Forest Kindergartens (and not pay $34,000 USD per year on tuition.)
BSD is for people who love Unix, Linux is for people who hate Microsoft.
The description of the Swiss mentality sounds quite normal to me as a Finn. Is the US really as bad as the article implies?
If so, what happened? Is it the insane damages you can sue for in the US that caused a climate of fear?
My kids have played with hammers saws and knives too, obviously being guided how to use those tools first. Just today my 5-year-old son was chopping carrots while we were preparing food. Had to stop him once when his big brother went WOW in front of the TV and he was about to run and check with the blade pointing in front of him. Now he probably remembers to put down the knife the next time. :)
.: Max Romantschuk
But playing with my files? Not on your life! What if there is a tax audit? I could be in big trouble.
Sorry, but gray text on gray background is making my eyes bleed.
My kid has mad Wii skills, has his own tool set. We go on nature walks. We talk about politics, math science and reading. He's 7.
Do you really think every American is raised the same? I am pretty sure we are closer to the majority than you may think.
When I was in Germany, the kids there seemed to be coddled ones.
I don't think its really an administrative decision to protect children and provide only safe choices that prevent an education like this. Its the need to protect the schools, the businesses and any other organizations involved from lawsuits. Here in the U.S., the insurance premiums necessary for any group that would allow a 3 yr old to even approach - let alone use - a functional cutting blade bigger than "safety scissors" would be astronomical.
Its like the need for all that squishy rubber surface on playgrounds these days. It isn't there to keep kids from breaking limbs falling off equipment because breaking limbs is a bad thing. Its to minimize exposure to litigation if they do.
What?
My specific comments on education is that in the US any sacrifice for education is seen as unacceptable. Thinking hard, asked for supplies, homework, separation between child and parent by banning cell phones, is all unacceptable. For students in certain schools, leadership is taught. Otherwise it is assumed that students are going to be worker bees, hired by some person better than them. If we ask for sacrifice, that is the purchase of general purpose computer rather than an xBox, or a notebooks and pencils rather than jordans, then we might be able to begin to teach the skills and techniques that allow on to be an efficient entrepreneur and creator of innovative product. However since there is an inherent adversarial relationship set up between those who know and have stuff and those who don't, such an education is difficult at best.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
I remember playing with some twist drill bits as a very young child. I was poking them into holes my father had already drilled; all good fun. When he offered me the cordless drill, complete with keyless chuck, all my birthdays came at once.
Even my own daughter has proper toys to play with. The medical certificated stethoscope we bought her was actually cheaper on Ebay than the toy version in Toys-R-Us. The magnifying glass she treasures will be awesome when she discovers the sun and it's fire-starting magic. muhahaha.
Children: They'll only cut their fingers off once.
This post contains benzene, nitrosamines, formaldehyde and hydrogen cyanide.
I have a six year old nephew, and his parents allow him to use a fork and a knife at the table. Which seems safe enough as it is a normal table knife, read not very sharp. But considering how he attacks his food with more enthusiasm than skill, I'd have some reservations about giving him a really sharp knife ;-)
C - the footgun of programming languages
I grew up in a different time, a time when children of all ages had expectation of behavior and responsibility handed to them at a very early age, and since I've become an adult I've watched the population coddle children more and more. I remember my uncle literally bubble wrapping the edges of tables and furniture so his little girl would not take a bump to the head. I mean really, he bubble wrapped shit.
If children don't learn right away how to protect themselves they do become rather weak, and the miss very important lessons. Gone are the days when a child could take a BB gun and shoot cans in the back yard. Gone are the days when children knew not to touch a hot stove because they've already learned that lesson. Gone are the days when children would be given homework in public schools an were expected to do more than 5 mins of homework a day. Gone are the days when we expected children to learn a subject well enough that they could write an essay about their knowledge.
Our children are poor in math, poor in reading, poor in data retention, poor in knowing right from wrong. Our children don't know common sense, how can they when an education system has a zero tolerance foundation. What happened to having the ability to stand up for ones convictions and not being suspended or expelled for it.
We American adults only have ourselves to blame. We've coddled the world. But this stems back to our litigious society. We put warning labels on the most ridiculous thing because some child received a Darwin award for drowning in a bucket, or some lady wins 8 million dollars because McDonald's didn't put a warning label on the coffee cup "Caution contents are very hot". We sue if someone wrongs us, even if we failed to read directions, or to use some sound judgment.
I'm not saying all litigation is wrong, just the frivolous ones. I'm not saying some safeguards are needed, but "coffee is hot" is a bit too much. I'm not saying that all kids won't struggle to learn, most will, and it's those struggles (which sometimes end with injury or death) that we learn from the most.
Allow violence on TV. Allow kids to be kids. Stop bubble wrapping our next generations.
Life takes interesting turns, but the most interest is when you're off the beaten path.
nine children leave. Worth it unless yours is the tenth.
..from the viewpoint of an outsider (here in Sunny Scotland) that is...
The constant bashing of Science over Religion in K-12 (?) is producing a generation of sheep rather than a generation of Sheppard's.
The Education system is too busy spoon-feeding test answers that in effect stunt creative and enquiring minds,
But you need minds that can think creatively (i.e. Out-side-the-box) in the fast paced society we have today...
It's starting to hurt us now especially in the UK where a generation of children have not had the IT experience of us older generation that built PC's from scratch (or at lest got a BBC Micro / Atari ST / Commodore / Sinclair Spectrum) and actually got hands on programming, rather than just moving boxes in a GUI. Europe and soon America will see a shortage of competent programmers and system engineers you'll end up off shoring all of your IT to places like India where they HAVE been actively pushing IT skills in schools.
Even If we act now, it will take 10-20 years for the problem to be fixed as that's how long it takes to get a child through the Education system to the level required for our future needs.
The Google Turing machine a few days ago is a prime example! How many of you's in your 30+ could do it, and how many younger than 30 managed it?
In my non-scientific survey of an IT forum it was 60% of over 30's managed it while less than 30% of Under 30's could only do it without cheating.
Laters Sol "Have you found the secrets of the universe? Asked Zebade "I'm sure I left them here somewhere"
Someone mentioned Scouting as an organization in America teaching these same skills. I was a cub scout as a kid, never a full fledged Boy Scout, but I'm curious - is Boy Scouts of America the only such organization for this sort of thing? I'm curious if there's a non-religious version. And yes, I think the Boy Scouts is basically an Evangelical organization.
I'm not sure why "forest school" needs to exist. It shouldn't be the duty of any government funded agency to do this sort of thing. Take your kids camping. Teach them this stuff yourself. Just because the Swedes have these programs does not mean Americans don't also instruct their children this way.
Before I was 10 I'd taken a lawn mower apart and reassembled it, made furniture, could identify all the varieties of hardwood in the northeast, and fired a longbow. That was thanks to my Dad. Not my school teacher. I think that's appropriate!
schools used to have SHOP but it's not on the test so it gets cut
Check out the story of Aeroflot Flight 593. Commercial flight with 63 passengers and 12 flight crew. Pilot had his kids on board and wanted to let them fly.
The real problem was he had TWO kids, which meant that he put one kid in the pilot seat and the other in the co-pilot seat. If he had just made them take turns, one at a time, he probably would not have crashed the plane and killed everyone on board.
But now back to reality. Yeah, everyone likes to complain about 'soft American kids'. People have been complaining about that for fifty years now. If all the "you are too soft" people were right, America would be a third world country.
We are not soft.
We don't baby our kids.
We protect them - but we teach them to live without rules.
We keep them away from dangerous things - but we encourage them to work hard and do things safely.
right in america. but over 60 years ago lol
I think the safetymania is evil and ought to be fought like Nazis - by all conceivable means. It's due to selfishness: off-load old-age worries onto welfare (social security), have few or no kids, borrow and spend. not much margin there, hence the safety mania, from global warming through the precautionary principle (how you can call a profoind error a principle confoinds me) and on to not spanking kids with paddles in schools.
Kids with leadership won't grow into government dependent adults, so their votes would not be easily bought by promises of "free stuff" (ironically paid for by funds taken from those evil self-reliant folks).
I find the concept that handling saws, and roasting hotdogs prepares children for leadership positions ridiculous. Every child that roasts a hot dog will become a world class leader? Ridiculous. Now, if you want to say group activities will allow a couple kids out of the group to develop leadership skills that I would believe. But really, when my siblings gather in a pack of 5-6, unsupervised in my parents back yard I'd argue that they are developing more leadership skills then some Swiss tikes that have an adult supervisor just about any day.
Leave children zoning out solo on the TV, reading books, tinkering with a computer, or tweaking lawn mower and they are not developing leadership skills. Not everyone needs to be a leader though.
But when it was 14 i was using power/table drilling machings, angle grinders, arc welders etc. :)
Had much fun.
Around 16 I got one of my fingernails squeezed between a door and the door frame. And the pressure from blood etc under the nail was really painful since the nail didn't quite fell off. So i took a small drill and used the table drill to make a hole in the nail. worked really well.
What city slicker posted this rant? I took wood working and metal working in middle school. I participated in Boy Scouts and soccer. It seems like the commentator is more concerned about hot dogs than actual working and leadership. If you're concerned about this stuff, then get out of the inner city and do something.
Leadership is a 20th century concept. Raise your kids to be engaged, informed, and independent so they can participate effectively in decentralized groups.
Parenting wars on Slashdot? The world is really changing for the worst.
Trolling headline seeking to scare parents on Slashdot? The world is really changing for the bad.
Exaggerating insignificant parental decisions on Slashdot? The world is really changing for the ugly.
Why is it "WE" raising my child? If you want your child to be a leader, innovative or smart it's up to you to drive them that way. If you are comfortable with a participation award I feel sorry for you.
End of discussion.
why?
She suggests that such kids grow up and lead the ones who were coddled (e.g. US kids) during their early years.
...Assuming they do not fall in the fire or chop off an arm, leaving them a hideously deformed social pariah.
Rich kids are definitely trained and prepared for leadership. Somebody like, say, George W Bush was born into wealth, went through the best schools we could come up with, was taught all sorts of skills that would help them run businesses or gain political office, put through a top university, typically followed by business school, and then starts their career near the top of the heap.
Upper-middle class kids go through lower-tier private schools or good public school systems. They are frequently taught leadership through opportunities like running school extracurriculars. They come out of their educational career with the skills they need to start in a white-collar position and work their way into middle management.
Lower-middle class kids go through pretty good public school systems, and learn what they'd need to know to get into college and have a good shot a white-collar job.
Poor kids, on the other hand, are taught to go along with things as best they can. They are given lousy schooling, and it's clear throughout the process that the best they should hope for is to manage the fast food restaurant rather than work for the boss.
There are exceptions to these rules, but they are definitely exceptions. There's some mobility: A bright poor person can work towards a white-collar career, and a real dullard may turn out a failure, but right now the primary determining factor of a kid's economic and educational achievements is the achievements of their parents.
I am officially gone from
Leadership is a 20th century concept. Raise your kids to be engaged, informed, and independent so they can participate effectively in decentralized groups.
It largely depends on what the social environment will be as an adult. If you bring some hot-dog-off-the-floor-eating gorilla into an environment where such a thing will be seen as uncivilized and reckless, there's a good chance your now-adult is going to alienate those around him, and that makes for poor leadership.
It's true that many American kids are coddled to the point of stifling, but the real issue is that parents want something different from what the kids want, and in the real world the parent always wins. If kids want to help us chop a watermelon with a butcher's knife, we say no. If they try to pick up that M&M off the floor, we say no. However, this can also work the opposite way. Your kid doesn't want to cut wood with a saw, but you make him do it anyway. He thinks eating off the floor is disgusting, but you make him do it anyway. The point here is that we are teaching children to -obey- without question. Making them do stupid/dangerous things doesn't solve the problem, it just makes them prone to being stupid/dangerous, instead of being timid and cautious. So, while this lady understands that coddled kids become coddled adults, she fails to recognize that stupid kids also become stupid adults. Coddling is just one extreme, and she's promoting the other.
We should stop -training- children to avoid risk and instead -teach- them about the risks and let them follow their own decisions. If your kid wants to use dangerous tools, explain to him the dangers, show him how to be careful, and if he still wants to do it, supervise him. If your kid wants to eat something off the floor, explain to him why it's considered unsanitary, and if he's not grossed out by it then let him eat it. If a child is raised like this, he learns that A) it's important to research something before making a decision, and B) he can make his own decision about what should be done and not just follow others.
If enough people did that, we might even end up with a functioning democracy.
I can hardly believe that this isn't a caricature of how kids are raised in the US. Is it really that bad? While this doesn't sound like it is a good preparation for leadership it also sounds like it isn't a good preparation for something far less ambitious but much more important: standing on your own legs, being able to deal with everyday life. Why the focus on leadership?
My wife is a grade school teacher and sees the results of this coddling. In just one example, she played a math game with her class and gave the winner a small prize. Most of the kids had a lot of fun and learned something too; but what took her by surprise is that some of the kids began crying. She asked them why, and [paraphrased] it was because they'd been raised with the belief that "everyone's a winner." They had never "lost" before, and it was devastating to them / they didn't know how to respond.
Just because the Swedes have these programs does not mean Americans don't also instruct their children this way.
Not that Sweden doesn't have programs like that but the article was about Switzerland.
A consumer-driven culture requires that we all live in fear, so we'll buy the products we need to protect ourselves. Our learned helplessness is central to the "success" of the economy.
If you grew up on a US farm as a kid, you got plenty of chances to handle equipment with a high potential for death or dismemberment. A 3yr old out by the wood pile with a bow saw is not that hard to imagine. Playing in the woods was pretty common too (if you had time to goof off). Not so sure there's all that much of it around anymore though. The MegaCorp Farms pretty much put the kibosh on all that 20-some years ago.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
Step 2: Narcissistic and psychopathic tendancies ..keep it rolling people, we can establish a framework here.
Rolling how far? Godwin's law?
I can mend the break of day, heal a broken heart, and provide temporary relief to nymphomaniacs.
Doesn't every generation talk about how the next generation has it so much easier than the last? Does this kind of talk really get us anywhere? Feel free to do an actual scientific study, rather than just saying "such kids grow up and lead the ones who were coddled (e.g. US kids) during their early years."
There is way too much speculation in the world today. Back in my day, we did experiments and only told the truth! Damn kids, get off my lawn!
When my then 4yr old son "moved up" to a new classroom in the co-op daycare we used at the time, I was pleasantly surprised to see they had a real workbench at child height with hammers, nails, a saw, screwdrivers, etc as one of their play "centers". My son enjoyed this, and was never injured.
I'm still surprised they were able to do that & not get sued by some moron. This was 2 years ago, though so they may have changed things..
Utter nonsense.
Switzerland is a tiny country. You can compare Switzerland to Maryland, not the whole of US.
If a healthy immune system developed through exposure of playing in dirt is the key for a bright future, then Indian kids are going to rule the world.
Anyways, I welcome all our future dirty overlords!!!
Tat Tvam Asi
The solution is a no holds barred tournament of parenting. Children of every nation will compete in a variety of activities ranging from eating adult foods to taking standardized tests to finding the way home from an unfamilar location. Success in these events will confer advantages in the Deathmatch; the surviving child shows us The Right Way to Parent.
We have a Zero Tolerance Policy in our household. Any kid caught without their knife... tsk, tsk. And yes, they use saws, axes, power tools, handle 600 lb to 1,700 lb sows and boars, etc. They also know how to work as a team. I'm not talking sports. I'm talking real life work. This isn't a game, as much fun as it is.
From the most boring and regulated nation in the West... Can't hang your clothes out to dry on Sundays. Can't flush a toilet after 10 pm.
Switzerland is not a nation of leaders. They like having government baby-sit them in a way that most adults would find ridiculous.
By the following statement: "Do not handicap your children by making their lives easy."
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
I guess it's not the duty of government funded agencies to teach geography either.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
Because.
Why is the teacher coddling them like that? Make them pick up their own damn hot dog!
Chelloveck
I give up on debugging. From now on, SIGSEGV is a feature.
They've been a fairly homogeneous culture for several thousand years, protected by survivalism in the mountains. But there have been some protracted disputes about construction mosques in the cities.
Leadership is not about being part of the group. A learder must be sepperate from the group in order to lead. There needs to be a certian amount of distance for a leader to issue commands. A leader must be independent, think for themselves, and be self confident. If your in a group you don't need any of these things. You can just follow the group. That said if you put a pack of 5-6 six year olds together one of the kids will elect themselves as leader. 5 kids will get no experiance in leadership and the 6th will get experiance in being a tyrant.
The Adventure Playground in Berkeley, California lets kids run around with hammers, nails, paint, wood, and, in fact, saws, allowing them to build what they want with adequate but limited supervision. They even have a zip line.
The problem with judging the USA like this is we are so big and have every type of person covered. We're growing kids like this still in Idaho. My daughter starts doing a summer camp doing exactly this this week, shes been going since she was little (9 now). Check it out at:
Twineagles.org
It might not exactly fit your North Idaho Wilderness stereotype either.
The question is, by teaching kids in essence Camping/Survival Skills, are we really teaching them leadership?
Yes the Boy Scouts teaches Leadership skills, and the Boy Scouts teaches Camping/Survival Skills, and some of them a joined together... However There is a lot of leadership training outside camping skills, Putting children in positions of authority, being able to give commands and take the consequences of such commands, are important leadership skills... However Camping and Survival Skills, don't really make you a good leader. It just means you can fend for yourself better (This is a good trait, however it doesn't make you a leader, it may just make him a more effective servant.
Good leaders don't need to be tough, they need to be smart, calculating, thoughtful, and ethical.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
This.
This, a thousand times over.
I've noticed myself doing it too, and it rattled me. I'd fob my daughter off because I was refreshing the football scores, building a VM, or engrossed in reading slashdot, and once I realised the mini tantrums I saw were a "hey I'm over here!" the epiphany was heartbreaking.
I am holding my daughter back the to same level as those learning by osmosis.
You don't think those clever kids that play violin, enjoy engaging sci-fi books, build wondrous things all at the age of five, were left to mentally fend for themselves using the same limited resources as the herd. They all had parents willing to put their kids before themselves. While we espouse our priorities, who of us really would miss the Match of the Day for our child's well being.
AC since I've modded a lot on this topic, and also it's hard saying you've fucked up, but harder to proclaim it when it can be attributed later down the track...
When I was 3 I repaired wooden children toys with an electric nail gun, without any kind of hand holding. That thing was quarter my size.
But yes, I live in Europe
When (if) Hansel and Gretel make it back out of the forest, they will know better than to go hiking without a map, compass, GPS, weapons, whatever. And, the benefit is that the other Hansels and Gretels that got eaten don't add to the population. Nice. Efficient. Most definitely Swiss.
No leadership in companies. No leadership in the armed forces. No leadership in the Governm.... err never mind.
What an idiot this woman is.
1) hotdogs are unhealthy - I teach my 3yr old to read labels and understand there ingredients to avoid (as a bonus he knows about carbs and proteins)
2) I also teach him that everything you read and hear is a form of (slash)advertisement, don't just accept facts - use and expand your knowledge
3) I thought my kid than knife is sharp and light bulb burns, glass shatters, drugs are not candy when he was 2 year old
4) I make him wear all of the protection, helmets knee, pads, gloves when on a scooter or skates
5) If he want's to know things I try to explain, never say that he will learn that later or he is too young to learn
right now the primary determining factor of a kid's economic and educational achievements is the achievements of their parents.
Looking through history I'd have to say that this is more the standard state of affairs, and 'right now' is no exception.
The exceptional period would be the time after WWII that allowed so many to enter the middle class.
I don't read AC A human right
Many articles fail to point out that each US state has their own educational standards, some higher or lower than others, some more successful than others. Therefore, it is difficult to compare the US as a whole to any other individual nation.
They had never "lost" before, and it was devastating to them / they didn't know how to respond.
I hope your wife kept up that teaching method/activity. Sounds like they learned a critical life lesson far more valuable than the math skills that day.
I don't read AC A human right
I also think lack of affordable public health care is a big factor. When even something as minor as a few stitches can cost an uninsured parent hundreds of dollars they my be more protective.
If that's their training for leadership I hope they plan on leading people who are using saws and eating dirty hot dogs. I can't think that's part of my career plan.
The key difference with swiss folk compared to americans is that practically all swiss woman fuck like rabbits sometimes even in orgies of 3 or more and don't give two shits about sexual diseases. Maybe teaching swiss girls to be less afraid of germs and boys makes them sluts later in life? :D
There are plenty of American parents wiping the hot dog off and giving it back to the kid. The American kids who won't be leaders are going to be led by the few that were taught to lead or figured out how to lead. So it's more or less going to be the same in the US as it is everywhere else like it has been for pretty much all of recorded history. The Swiss aren't doing anything new or special.
Swedes? You do know Sweden and Switzerland are quite a few miles apart yes?
Anyway, maybe you are against a public school system and was home schooled, but in the rest of the world it is seen as an advantage that the children are at school during the day so that their parents are at work. And as you yourself explained, not all knowledge is theoretical - parents do not have a monopoly on imparting non-theoretical knowledge.
I'm not sure why "forest school" needs to exist. It shouldn't be the duty of any government funded agency to do this sort of thing. Take your kids camping. Teach them this stuff yourself. Just because the Swedes have these programs does not mean Americans don't also instruct their children this way.
Before I was 10 I'd taken a lawn mower apart and reassembled it, made furniture, could identify all the varieties of hardwood in the northeast, and fired a longbow. That was thanks to my Dad. Not my school teacher. I think that's appropriate!
What's wrong with the idea of child-rearing being a societal responsibility. You got lucky and had a good parent. Too bad you couldn't share. There are many families which don't have the time or money to do anything other than put food on the table. When society values child-rearing, then you get society producing good people. When society dumps all the responsibility on the parents, then you get the US today. Those few who are lucky either by wealth or having awesome parents and the rest getting ground up and dumped into the depressing rat-race.
The problem with these sorts of judgements about the USA is that we are a large country with many different people. We raise kids like this up in Idaho still. My daughter starts summer camp that is hands this week this week. Check it out, not the Idaho survivalist camp you might think. twineagles.org
Public education has been a big target since the early part of the 1920s when Progressive reformers realized it was the perfect tool for turning dirty immigrants into model citizens. Of course, prior to that it was something to occupy kids in the winter when there was little farm work to do until they were old enough to work full time, at about the 9th grade.
Catholics never trusted it -- they were often the dirty immigrants targeted -- which is why there is such a huge Catholic school system in the US, which is becoming kind of the discount private school system in many areas as public schools disintegrate and desperate parishes de-emphasize religious education and chase fallen/non-Catholic money to keep their schools and parishes from becoming ghost towns.
Since the 1920s, though, the public education system has been repeatedly targeted by political activists. Option 1 was always get your propaganda to be the curriculum -- hence the emphasis on anti-communism and values in the 1950s and early sixties.
In the mid-late 1960s, the emphasis changed to the war on poverty and schools became both educational institutions and social welfare delivery systems (free lunches, immunization clinics, etc). In the 1970s it was desegregation as the mission --- we were going to fix race by putting the kids together.
In the early 70s, though, there were a glut of new teachers thanks to the baby boom and draft deferments for college students studying education. This basically was the liberal/academic colonization of education where you get all kinds of weird curriculum and a relentless focus on the "education gap", which I find to be like the emperor's new clothes -- a failure to realize that minority kids do badly in school not because we aren't teaching them right, but because they come from a failed social milieu. But accepting that means being racist and giving up your cultural relativism.
As a general rule though this is not a problem. I don't think we necessarily want or need everyone to be a leader. As long as enough people are successful to lead those that aren't we are still good to go.
Yes we're failing our children but it has nothing to do with kids playing with saws or fire/hot dogs. Our children are put into prison facilities (public schools) and required to do boring repetitive work for hours, encourage psychopathic behavior by drugging them with psychotropics (ritalin) and then boom boom boom every 50 minutes they have to change what they're doing (switch classes). We give them horrible food, demand that they submit to zero tolerance policies against fingernail clippers (weapons), Tylenol (drugs), etc. Let's not forget we expect them to all wear the same clothes, anything to wipe out individuality and independent thought.
It was about brain injuries from repeated concussions (and sure cheerleading has head injuries, but it doesn't have them at the frequency of football).
That's right. Unfortunately, in this society we don't treat head injuries as serioulsy as we should. "Oh, he just saw stars. No big deal!"
Yes, it is a big deal.
Even the "sissy" sport of soccer (football to the rest of the World) has issues with head injuries
Don't get me started on marial arts - like Karate. I've spent quite a few years doing that (local "champion" too ) and all I can say is, everything they (the schools who charge up the ass for their instruction) say about how martial arts improves every aspect of a kid's life is complete Bullshit. All it does is teach them to fight. Discipline? Cordination? ANY sport will teach them that.
Concentration? How about Yoga.
Teach your kids to meditate.
And most of all, teach them that hard work and discipline will help them maximize what they inherently have. All you can do is do your best. And sometimes that is not good enough. Teaching your kids to accept that is probably the best lesson they can learn. Teaching them the middle way that they have to work, that all the hard work in World may not make them "special" or "great" but it will maximize what they do have. And that's the key: where to say and know when to say, "I've worked really hard, but my talents end here."
I have worked my ass off at Physics because I had a dream of being an experiemental physicist, but the fact is, my talents do not lie there. But I enjoyed pushing myself and I gained confidence in my failure. And it helped me learn where to "wake up and smell the coffee".
There's a big difference between a "quitter" and someone who just will not accept reality. Or the other way, folks who give up too soon and will not apply themselves. The only person who can truly know is yourself.
Physics taught me that - NOT martial arts.
To me, survival skills means being able to change a flat tire. Anything beyond that and I'll call for help.
If I used a sig over again, would anyone notice?
Everything is risky, and we all eventually die. This neither means that we should avoid all risks nor that we should throw ourselves into every possible risk. It means that each individual should be able to choose what risks are worth it.
If kids want to play football, let them. If they don't want to play football, don't force them. Balance this with parental guidance (if they won't play football, make them run on the track instead or something safer but still physically engaging. If they have a condition that makes football exceptionally dangerous, don't let them play even if they want to).
Balancing these sorts of things isn't all *that* hard.
Innovation and growth is the result of shit. Without shit there is no growth or innovation. In water pure there is no fish. Purity is sterile. Plant a seed in shit and it returns a hundred fold. Plant a seed in sterile ground and you get squat. The teacher has a point. By creating a shit free "stable" and sterile society we are eliminating growth and innovation. Between all the censorship on the web (by forum admins, hackers attacking people with views they don't like, etc) and all the mis-information being taught in US school like "conservatives are evil and democrats are great" when the Democratic party is responsible for more genocide than the NAZI party the states is destroying itself. The nineties are a perfect example.
Apple and DEC innovation was copied by IBM and Microsoft who produced a far cheaper and far less advanced product. When the price came down the growth was phenomenal. Businesses were freaking out about the growth pace. Once Microsoft gained a position of near monopoly it used that position to eliminate competition and slow the pace of growth so that even now we are just beginning to get to the 64 bit systems Apple and DEC were using in the nineties. The market demanded growth and it was deliberately slowed. Growth slowed is growth denied. Growth has to be encouraged and yeah, that growth is difficult and creates huge stress. The United States failed its stress test and is dying.
Parents are too busy working multiple minimum wage jobs, or tons of unpaid overtime at their job, to be home spending time with their children. Children simply do not have enough adults in their life. Children spend most of their time in a classroom with 29 of their same-aged peers, and a single adult instructor who is forced to march them around like soldiers just to keep order.
I think it's more of an economic problem; the social problem is a symptom.
Spoon not. Fork, or fork not. There is no spoon.
Too much of the time I've seen one situation after another of parents showcasing their extreme ignorance and lack of competency in parenting.
Not that any parent is provided the 'Bible of Parenting' mind you, but I'm talking about common-sense, right v wrong, and relying on learning experiences for the kids
to grow by. Kids today read less, do less physical activity and more often than not "expect" things to be granted to them, not earned. Words like responsibility, accountability are not part of any dialogue between kid and parent, and neither is a good sense of communication. Add to that the ease of areas such as TXT, FB and other avenues, and it's to see why kids get lost so quickly. The nation as a whole needs a "get back to basics" campaign that involves education, and removing all politics from those channels. Ideology has replaced learning experiences that truly provide the answers, and testing testing testing has gotten us nowhere (thank you NCLB), especially because it's still billions underfunded. It's not the kids fault, it's the stewardship that's been lacking in the adults who were handed that role
and have done a poor job of passing onto their kids the same quality of life previous generations have seen. Now, we are in danger of extending tax breaks to the absolute wealthiest in this country, tripling the amount an education will cost for the college-bound, heading into an election with record amount of anonymous dollars being spent in the Republican party, and a Congress with the lowest approval rating in it's history - all the while we have two wars to end, and a global recession that was kicked into play by the rich and wealthy of Wall Street.
Things are going swimmingly well - and we wonder why other countries are ahead of us!
Society in the US is collapsing as politicians and people who vote for them polarize based on faith and ideology; no longer present are the ideals of common good and supporting each other in a community - that has all but faded. Our infrastructure is falling apart - as highways, bridges and the like are crumbling with no source of repair anytime soon. Teachers are being targeted as bad people, when in fact, next to doctors are the most educated workforce in the entire country (yes, most teachers MUST get at least a Masters, while most get multiple degrees including Doctorate degrees)
If a natural disaster occurs, you'd better be prepared to pay it back now - as the right-wing won't look at you unless you can pay them back or cut fire, police, emergency staff, trash, snow removal - cause those are just luxuries these days.
BIG business is making more money than ever and has trillions in the bank - just sitting there. Pensions and retirements plans have been slashed, and our entire political system can now be bought by the same corporations that caused the global collapse. This is the fault of the many ignorant, unintelligent and faithfully ignorant that exist in the USA... and base their decisions not on what they actually find out for themselves, but what the pulpits, blogs, and "paid for op-ed" radio and TV shows tell them is the real story...
This is all TFA is about. The same tired old shit of parents with mental issues needing their kid to be "better" than everyone elses.. Leading the coddeled comment speaks volumes.
If this is their parents vision of leadership my guess their kid will grow up being that stupid bossy little prick nobody likes and everyone ignores.
The problem is Boy Scouts has become stigmatized, lampooned, and in recent years depicted as homophobic.
The problem is Mormons.
Hey, isn't that dweeb running for president one of them?
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
You know I think you could drop 6 years in the seats of the congress, senate and supreme Court and we would be better for it.
of course you are
I guess mine is going to be a rather lonely life when the Zombie Apocalypse comes.
Carol vs. Ghost
"Or, a coding error ends up causing everyone convicted of a certain, obscure offense ... is condemned to death."
Okay, so commit Copyright Infringement of a movie about a child Natalie Portman (minus grits) who studies to become a Terrorist!
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110413/
"The Professional"
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Boy Scouts has been my major social activity, so I figure my own experiences are skewed positive on this.
At the least, the guys seem to mature faster - I've seen that in myself and others; observing that is one of the best parts.
Also, the fathers and other adults need to keep their distance without letting the boys run wild; that's an important balancing act.
In short, leadership seems to be about example-setting.
I do live in a liberal area of the US, and am fairly liberal myself, but I don't see the worst of the politically correct behavior around me.
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
Just so I make enough money to buy one of those cool Swedish watches it's all good.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
A well researched and more detailed treatment on what children are capable of, how we as a society went mad, and how they need to learn independently is in the book "Free Range Kids". My wife and I read this with for ourselves and our two kids and are beginning to try to counter the pervasive paranoia one friend at a time.
http://www.amazon.com/Free-Range-Raise-Self-Reliant-Children-Without/dp/0470574755/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1340643190&sr=8-1&keywords=Free+Range+Kids
End of discussion.
why?
Indeed, I'm sure there's a lot more bashing of Americans we can do. Fat capitalist pigs, religious prudes (lmao Middle East), tiny dicks, debt-ridden losers (lmao Europe), etc. Everyone is better than America!
He's kinda tired, didn't fall asleep until 5am last night.
This post is inflammatory on so many levels.
My belief is that boys (probably girls too) need positive male role models in their life in order to develop as leaders. For me the most valuable input into my life, as far as leadership training goes, was spending time with my Dad. Being with my Dad taught me how to be a 'real' man: to have confidence in myself, to let go of my insecurities, know when to be back down from a fight and when to step up, when to put other's needs before my own. Schools and other organisations play a very important role too and can certainly compliment and enhance this, but they alone are no substitute. The real failing in our society are fathers who are either absent, or fail to teach there kids (perhaps because they weren't taught themselves)
The anti-homosexual policy is indeed causing the BSA a lot of trouble; I feel it's one of the few black marks on a wonderful organization.
It obviously hurts the few percent of gay boys that can't get involved, but the controversy seems to be detracting from what the program could do for straights too.
Longterm Scout here, Eagle and everything.
Sometimes it's not a problem at the local level - I'm not sure if we had any gay kids around, but some have said it wouldn't be an issue if it did come up. And I know that my religious skepticism went over without incident.
Most Scout organizations are supported by houses of worship, especially with the controversy scaring off government entities and other secular organizations. The church behind my Scout troop is fairly liberal. However, conservative religious organizations (particularly Mormons) have a lot of influence at national headquarters.
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
Or another way to annoy your friends and neighbors?
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
wever Camping and Survival Skills, don't really make you a good leader. It just means you can fend for yourself better (This is a good trait, however it doesn't make you a leader, it may just make him a more effective servant.
You miss one key point. Knowing you can fend for yourself without relying on others and being confident in that fact is the first step on the way to becoming a leader. That confidence and self-assuredness is necessary in becoming an authority, necessary to yourself. One who is not confident in himself cannot effectively lead.
The question is, by teaching kids in essence Camping/Survival Skills, are we really teaching them leadership?
Perhaps; at the very least, it teaches kids not to be afraid of the unknown, not to be hopelessly dependent on those around them (especially those in authority positions), and so forth.
Putting children in positions of authority, being able to give commands and take the consequences of such commands, are important leadership skills
Whereas a typical elementary school student in the US is subjected to the following treatment:
How many people could possibly be prepared for leadership of any sort after 13-14 years of such treatment? Yes I know, we had "good reasons" for all of the above, but the result has been that our children are sent to some kind of Orwellian nightmare for many hours each day.
I cannot speak for other nations, but in America, our schools are in desperate need of positive reform. We need to stop using an authoritarian approach to education, and start creating schools that students want to attend, rather than schools that students flee from.
Palm trees and 8
About the grown man that got on the wrong plane and nearly had a nervous break-down when he landed in Mongolia instead of Taiwan. I can't find the original article told in his own sissy words instead the news article following is a kinder version of events. http://www.usatoday.com/travel/news/2006-04-06-strange-trip_x.htm
Sig. Sig. Sputnik
Swiss dirt is far cleaner than US dirt.
I mean, I bet you are thinking about all the famous leaders to come out of Switzerland right now, and how the US never produces anyone who takes any kind of leadership roles in business or politics.
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
Kids who grow up around horses tend to be more independent. I was struck by this when I was visiting some endurance rider friends camped in a mountain park. Some of the parents had teenage kids. Three of the kids, around age 12, went off to ride in the hills. No adult. They all had cell phones, water, food, hoof picks, and first aid kits. The parents were fine with this; it was just a routine ride. With three kids, someone could come back if there was an emergency.
For that group, the parents were all serious riders. I've seen the helicopter parent problem with riding kids and non-riding parents. That doesn't work out as well. In fact, for early riding lessons, it works better if somebody gets the non-riding parent out of sight so the kid can focus on the horse and the instructor.
There are risks. The kids are seldom seriously injured, but there are exceptions. I saw one girl grow up over the years, from age 13, always on horseback. She went off to Harvard, and was killed during her senior year in a riding accident while exercising a horse for the Harvard polo team. We have a plaque in her memory at our barn.
My troop (31, in Rochester NY) does have the budget and will for a lot of outdoor stuff. Definitely the best part.
We do have a lot of well-off families, which does help the budget, but I understand we'd quietly help a poorer kid if need be.
It is an important balancing act for the adult leaders to keep their distance without letting the boys run wild.
Our adults (mainly fathers) sometimes get a bit too involved; in another local troop (19), the adults (mainly troop graduates) sometimes don't get involved enough.
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
Because it's a hard problem to solve, and we are American's god dammit and shouldn't have to solve that shit!
+1 Disagree
locally, the discriminatory policies coming out of National don't seem to be an issue.
Don't know of any gay Scouts, but I understand it wouldn't be an issue for my troop if it did come up. I know that my religious skepticism went over without incident.
I mentioned Troops 31 and 19 in my sibling comment; I've also heard good things about 37, but don't know much either way about any of the others.
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
that the 1% are preparing their children.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
My troop does ban electronic devices on all campouts except the winter-cabin one in January/February. (using one on the way there or back is often OK)
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
this got modded up ? the question has nothing to do with camping or not, that's just the instance. The point of the article, is the US, for the most part, by coddling their kids, messing up. I think the answer is, yes. Camping or dirt are just good examples of coddling. So is the parent who does their kids homework for them, or writes their college entrance essay. That essay gets them into the college under false pretense.
>However Camping and Survival Skills, don't really make you a good leader. It just means you can fend for yourself better
Self-reliance is a critical component of leadership. If you cannot rely on yourself and don't have faith in your own abilities as an individual - you will never accept leadership (why would you want others to trust you if you don't trust yourself?) and if placed in that position you will not inspire confidence (people can instantly tell if a leader doesn't believe he can do the job).
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
I knew there was a lot of Mormon involvement in the BSA, and it had to do with the anti-homosexual and anti-skeptic policies. However, I had no idea it supposedly went this far.
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
Every time we've let the kids go play in the woods, we end up pulling tics off of them and looking for bullseye rashes for the following weeks. I have fond memories of exploring in the woods, but now things are different. At least in the Northeast US.
we are American's god
how nice for you
There are two types of leadership: Institutional, and Behavioral.
Institutional leadership is what we imagine normally when we think of the concepts of "leaders" or "leadership". These institutional leaders (officially) affect the actions of others directly and assume responsibility/accountability for the decisions of those under their influence. This may happen to varying degrees bases on competencies. One needn't be in a "leadership position" to be this kind of leader, but there must be some organization within a group (even if unspoken).
Behavioral leadership acts in such a way so as to encourage others to emulate him/her. This is also referred to as "leading by example". No organization is needed to be a behavioral leader.
The people most frequently recognized as leaders are those who exhibit the characteristics of both categories. Of course, actually good leaders from either category are hard to come by. But why?
First, people don't typically aspire to be "leaders". Many aspire to be in control, own a business, or be revered, but that's just ambition-- which is only very loosely related to leadership. Few understand the burdens involved and thus never learn to shoulder them. Be it living the virtuous life (or "walking the walk") or being able to admit without concern "yep, that error came from my team", people assume that either is too difficult.
Similarly, there are everyday leaders that exemplify the institutional and behavioral leader but refuse to take on the title because they assume it requires position and rank.
Today, we're kind of mixed up in the realm of leadership because the ambitious have retooled the term to their own cause while the actual leaders frequently attempt to evade visibility. Still, we would be better off if we could more consistently shine the light on real, everyday leaders and use them as role models for leaders of every type in the future.
The truth is that most of your child's future was determined at the moment of procreation. The best thing you can do for your child is to mate well. Twin studies research shows that most of what you do after that (as long as you are not horrendously abusive) will have a minor influence on their adult selves.
Now there will be societal and economic limitations on your children based on your society, economy, and government. The highest-IQ kid born in the countryside in North Korea will not do as well as a kid with the same IQ in San Jose. It is best to try to change your society to one that has high levels of economic freedom if you want to give your child the best chance in the future.
...because your kid goes outside and saws for 10 hours, that makes him a leader?
Lady, in this country, the leaders are those who:
a. had rich parents, so where the ones paying your kids to saw.
b. stayed inside all day studying law.
The problem is Boy Scouts has become stigmatized, lampooned, and in recent years depicted as homophobic.
Depicted? The BSA is not just homophobic, but also myopic, fascist and sexist.
Not many hate groups have gone to the Supreme Court to affirm their right to be unappologetic shitheads.
Why do we need 100% leaders? I've been in groups where everyone wanted to be the leader (and had some vague qualification claim for leadership). Let me tell you, that mix is a ticket for 100% politics and 0% action.
In reality, leadership is an emergent property of a group. Just because you can lean one group doesn't mean you should be the leader of another group. Many of the qualities of a leader are born, and others are a function of experience. The only preparation that we probably need to give our kids on leadership is the opportunity so if they are successful, they can build confidence on that. Many school teachers give these experiences to kids in small group to see how they do (e.g, let the group of students decide who is allowed to use saws, or if the hotdog is worth eating after it falls on the ground).
On the other hand, giving them the opportunity to saw off their hand will only give them experience leading the saw and having the teacher wiping off dirt from a hotdog will only give them the experience that that eating dirt won't kill them... Neither is a reasonable proxy for leadership...
I'd guess both Sweden and Switzerland have similar programs. But in fairness, you're right, I did make the mistake of thinking these events occurred in Sweden.
Regardless, to the more important content of the comment. I am not against public education. I want teachers versed in math, science, literature, and history to fill my children with knowledge. I also think it's important for teachers to challenge children and help them grow as critical thinkers. But I think a lot of that can be done without heading into the woods to play with saws. I also believe that such experiences should be provided by parents, I think it's their purview, and that part of growing up as an independent leader is having those unique experiences with your family and learning to establish relationships that have more content to them than being "required" to participate.
As a scoutmaster in a Mormon troop I felt stung by some of the accusations you leveled here, and did some research to see what truth there is in them. The rejection of the Unitarian religious emblem and barring of Wiccans from membership both seemed out of character for the organization.
From what I can find there is no official ban on Wiccans from BSA membership. There are, in fact, Wiccan units registered with the BSA, just not very many of them (fewer than 25). Things I did find included a Methodist troop asking a Wiccan scout to find another troop to attend (which is unfortunate, but they're in their rights to do so), and the Wiccan religious emblem program being denied recognition due to insufficient membership. I can see how Wiccans would find the religious emblem thing frustrating; asking Wiccans to create a national program is like asking anarchists to elect a president - Wicca just isn't a centralized sort of religion. To the credit of the Methodist community their leaders overturned the scoutmaster's decision, and recognized the validity of the Wiccan scout's faith.
The Unitarian emblem decision is more complex; it seems that the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA) decided to make a point of using their emblem program as a test case for protesting the BSA policies on homosexuality. To avoid the controversy that caused, the Unitarian Universalist Scouters Organization (UUSO) was created (I'd guess that it's members are scouts of the Unitarian faith, but not members of the Unitarian leadership) and submitted a program that left out the clauses about homosexuality; this was accepted by the BSA, but is not recognized by the UUA.
I think it's not fair to blame the Mormons for either of these situations. There were no Mormons involved in the incident with the Wiccan scout, even indirectly. In the case of the UUA the real issue was homosexuality, not "doctrine"; Mormons are not alone in their position on homosexuality, the National Catholic Committee on Scouting has a similar position.
I don't deny that the Mormons lately have a large influence on BSA policy; unfortunately, it seems our influence is largely due to the size of our program relative to the total number of Scouts in America. I wish the solution to this would become "recruit more scouts", I'd have little problem with the BSA requirements board adjusting the program to accommodate other people's needs as well. In the mean time, I hope that those "social adjustment" merit badges help aspiring scouts learn to balance their check books and get out to vote; the community could certainly use more civic-minded Wiccans speaking their minds and helping others see that a policy of "harm none" is good for everyone.
"Space Exploration is not endless circles in low earth orbit." -Buzz Aldrin
We are also not well known for our literacy :)
Thanks though, that catch made me giggle!
+1 Disagree
Yes we were less coddled. But it is also true that many more of us went paralyzed, dead, or even drooling idiot. Heck in my own friend circle I can speak of 1 dead 1 semi crippled (hand still work partially but is a horrible mess). And if I increase to my acquaintance, the number of dead and crippled rise. On the other hand my nephew and my 2 nieces, grand cousins, and a few good friend have heard of no such death. And whereas it is true none of them can hunt and open a rabbit like I do, they aren't worst off since in the west you rarely need to know how to open an animal to prepare it for consumption, walk in the wood or all the shit I see cited above. You all sound like people crying for the loss of buggy whipping skills really.
Make a choice : coddle up or break some eggs in a very definitive and final manner. Most parents goes for coddled and I betcha in our generation if there had been a choice, a lot of parent would have too.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
Being able to take responsibility for yourself and not to do anything stupid is not the same as "leadership".
That's what American kids would do.
Yes, however there are other ways of doing this.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
But you are taking the extremism example. For the most part a protective parent may allow the kids do their own work, they will join other activities, Sports, clubs, etc... That will teach them a lot of skills. The entire argument is based on the fact that there is a minority of Helicopter parents, who are training them to ace school without having a real life, so you need to counter it with throwing you kids out of civilization.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
A friend shared this with me this spring.
My wife and I have been seeing a lot of books and headlines indicating physical activity is important for brain development.
I don't know if it matters much what sort of activities are included. I was a sports playing kid myself, although I did a little time on farms owned by relatives or family friends, and camping as well.
So, for individual development, some time should be spent outside.
For leadership development, you need some activity where the person is on a team or group, and some of the time, has responsibility for directing others.
Because there is little point in discussing fact?
Actually it does work that way, in fact that's pretty much *exactly* how vaccines work, an was in fact their inspiration: Edward Jenner noticed that milkmaids who had been infected by cowpox were immune to it's often-lethal relative, smallpox. Show your immune system a weakened form of a dangerous disease and when it learns how to fight it off it can use it's new weapons against many related diseases, including as the original "wild" version the vaccine is descended from. Obviously there are infections that move too fast for your body to fight off without preparation (the whole point of vaccines), but the vast majority of infections are relatively harmless, most you won't even be aware of, and every one your immune system faces off against is a chance for it to learn new combat techniques. It learns entirely by trail-and-error, but has a very good memory - the reason vaccines don't work well for things like AIDS or the flu is that the virii are unstable enough that you are perpetually encountering completely new strains that old defenses don't work against.
Basically, the more infections you fight off the more immunological weapons are in your arsenal, and the better the odds that that one of them will be close to what's needed to fight off a completely new infection. Imagine an immense army of engineers constantly tinkering with their weapons while fighting off wave after wave of zombies - the more types of zombies they've encountered the more creative countermeasures they come up with, and the more likely it is that a minor variation on an existing weapon will turn out to be effective against a totally new kind of zombie. Now imagine the engineers also have access to replicators and the internet so that they can rapidly share what they've learned whenever someone figures out how to fight back against a new and powerful type of zombie that's joined the fray and you've got a pretty good picture of how your immune system actually works.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
+1 Spot-On.
The only thing I would add is that our focus on change needs to be at the base level-- it's far easier to move a mountain by pushing at its base than by poking at the top, but it does take a lot more effort. The change needs to start within the families. When parents are more involved with their children and excited about their education, that's a huge step toward motivating and exciting the kids themselves. If parents are more involved in the teaching process (and I don't mean by telling the teacher they're a failure because their child didn't perform well enough), teachers have more feedback to be able to help the children well. Yes, teachers need to improve too, and I think that improvement should include continued education on their own part, but the best place to start is in the family.
And a suspected citizens of the USA can't keep Switzerland and Sweden apart? Should take that as a sign of the downfall of the school system of the USA.
... by simply pointing out legal concerns often are obstacles to children doing things many adults take for granted. One strongly worded note on a law firm's letterhead is usually enough to make a principal or superintendent do something boneheaded.
I've raised two sons. The first did not have it as easy as the second, who was coddled.
Son #1 is definitely leadership quality. Makes his own decisions good or bad. Strikes out on his own and follows the crowd only if it entertains him. He is the physical doer.
Son #2 lacks that leadership quality. He very happily follows the herd. Rarely if ever initiates his own activities. Rarely questions anything. Most incredibly, he never complains about anything. Even when he's sick and clearly miserable, he'll never come out ans say so. He is the thinker that, despite working out at the gym and being exceptionally fit, is not an undertaker of physical activity nor an explorer.
Its now a "Mantovani School".
The kids get together, all play strings and do great renditions of Beatles and earlier classics.
Hats off to them for changing with the times.
Show me a kid who is the sole survivor of his "Forest Party" and is not blamed in any way for it, and I will show you a future politician.
Chef's don't need pointy knives, and neither do you!
A good leader says "it's just dirt, wipe it off and eat it." A bad leader says "we'll have to wait until the adults bring clean food."
Only among men.
Activity performed outside of public view- check
Peer pressure used to force children to perform acts - check
Adult with questionable parenting skills in charge - check
Dangerous tools in use - check
Sounds like Saturday night mass to me.
Because he wasn't provided with leadership training in conducting discussions, you insensitive clod!
The US is not an equal system. It could be but most of the problem is that the parents don't care in many communities. Parents that don't care have children that don't care. And when the parents and students don't care the teachers don't care.
This is the problem with the inner city schools. The parents don't care. If they weren't required to deliver their kids to class every day they'd just be sitting at home watching tv.
Outside of that realm which is hopeless, US education is actually pretty good. Even our public schools are pretty good in any situation where parents give a damn and that is allowed to matter.
Student busing is a problem. Mostly because it pushes kids from communities where no one cares to communities where people do. It tends to create unequal environments. I saw one public school where all the local kids went to honors classes. ALL OF THEM. The non-honors classes were considered to be for stupid people for bused kids. And the local kids all did honors or AP. Without exception. The local kids didn't much talk to the bused kids because they didn't leave near each other and didn't share classes. A few bused kids took honors classes but it was less then five percent.
Anyway, communities where people care there are community programs that people participate in and teach them how to be adults. There are sports programs that teach team work and the value of hard work. There are camping groups that teach kids some basic skills as well as respect for nature. There are various hobbyist groups with their own emphasis and often secondary benefits.
The US is complicated. It's a mistake to take our national numbers and lump them together into one number. That would be like lumping all the education stats of the EU together and expecting that to make sense. It's just too complicated. You have to break it down so you can see where the system works and where it doesn't.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
I'm not sure why "forest school" needs to exist.
Well, they tried "city schools" but the kids kept coming back hooked on heroin.
Force your children to eat dirty sausage. They'll turn out fine.
I'm not blaming the Mormons for having a position against homosexuals or atheists, or enforcing policies like that for Mormon sponsored troops. But I think that the Unitarian Church should be able to make their own statement of Unitarian ethics. If you put yourself in their position, you would not find the solution of individual Mormon scouts sponsoring a watered-down alternative as vindication of the national organization's not allowing the LDS Church its own emblem..
I agree that if people don't like that they should recruit more diverse scouts and sponsoring organizations. I don't see what I wrote as an accusation because it's perfectly natural for the largest bloc of participants to have the greatest influence, so I apologize if what I wrote stung you.
I stand corrected on the Wiccan issue.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Why do we need 100% leaders? I've been in groups where everyone wanted to be the leader (and had some vague qualification claim for leadership). Let me tell you, that mix is a ticket for 100% politics and 0% action.
I think that statement misses the distinction between being named the leader and having leadership skills.
We don't need 100% of people to be named the leader (or try to claim the lead), but having more people with leadership skills is a good thing. One of the more important aspects of leadership is knowing when it is appropriate to lead and when it is appropriate to follow (and being a good follower). Leadership is not just taking charge of people, but it's taking charge of situations. It's also doing what needs done without requiring specific direction from someone else.
As to "100% politics and 0% action," that's the result of too many people being named a leader and too few actually possessing or exercising good leadership skills, and I'd agree, that's what we currently have too much of and it doesn't really do anyone any good.
Same rank as an NFL player, eh?
How much money comes with that "rank"?
--PM
Teacher here. It's pretty obvious you've never been one, else you'd understand why we do what we do.
>Sit at an assigned desk, arranged in a grid
Letting kids sit wherever they want is completely chaotic and results in kids talking with their friends and not paying attention.
>Boring, repetetive assignments whose completion is a determining factor in their grades and ultimately their ability to advance to the next level of education
Not with social promotion
>Systematic discipline systems in a well-defined power structure
What, you'd much rather have Johnny with an axe to grind help you discipline?
>Flourescent lighting and uniform floor tiling
What's wrong with energy efficiency?
>Regimented schedules, mandatory evacuation from the building at the end of the school day unless you have a specific, authorized reason to stick around.
Having kids run around freely isn't very conductive to the school process.
>Locked doors, locked cabinets, locked desks, chain link fences, bars and grates over the windows, locks and chains over the gates, security cameras around the perimeter of the building
Schools have expensive equipment they'd like to protect from the kids.
>Metal detectors and X-ray scans to enter the school; no expectation of privacy in lockers, desks, or even on a student's person. Contraband items are collected at the door -- cell phones, various tools, etc.
Cell phones have done more to destroy education than any other gizmo. Letting them keep it means claudestine texting in class, playing games, interrupted because of cell phones ringing, and so on.
>Computers that are programmed to thwart any deviation from the prescribed curriculum. Firewalls and invasions of online privacy, systems that block Tor and proxy servers, etc..
This is to reduce support costs and improve student safety online, same as any sane workplace. If you want to be a magical hacker rebel, go do it at home and don't vandalize school property
Children attacking trees with a saw, and roasting their wieners over a fire. That's fucking hardcore. Wanna impress me, tell me they go into the forest and attack bears with pocketknives and roast THEM over a fucking fire. Otherwise, the notion that they're somehow future leaders because they eat food that has fallen in the dirt is retarded. We don't do this, not because we're not as much men as they are, but because... the hot dogs fell in the fucking dirt. DIRT.
Why not expound on the virtues of dropping your food in shit then eating it? This was a non article. Slashdot fails again.
I've attended many different schools with many different educational philosophies. Some were of the sit-where-you-like variety and they were no more chaotic than the others. What made the difference was the degree to which the kids were already disposed to behave (by home and previous school experience), and the degree to which teachers were able to manage the classroom. Seating had nothing to do with it.
Natural light is more energy-efficient than fluorescent. I am not aware that enforcing uniform patterns for floor tile installation has a measurable impact on energy usage.
How is this relevant to "mandatory evacuation"? I'm too old to have experienced this; we were always allowed to hang around the schools I attended until the building closed around dinnertime. I am not sure how that adversely affected the "school process". Can you elaborate?
Workplaces with aggressive internet policing have lower morale and productivity. School is a place to learn. Exploration and experimentation are critical parts of learning. If your IT department can't set up the computers to re-image periodically then something's seriously wrong with your HR department.
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
The question is, by teaching kids in essence Camping/Survival Skills, are we really teaching them leadership?
Well, how do you teach leadership or whatever? By putting them into a situation where they have the opportunity to lead and to succeed or fail at the task without major drama. Outdoor activities are a pretty good way because a) they are isolated and the participants are forced to rely on their own means, b) It's fun, c) the outdoors is a lot more complex than any human environment, and d) you can learn a lot of vital life skills other than just leadership and get a bunch of exercise.
Because not all parents know how to do this?
All people cannot become leaders. It's like demanding that everyone be above average; the number of leaders is always going to be much less than the number of followers.
We certainly wouldn't accept an article which complains that not everyone is a manager, or not everyone is the President. How does it even mean anything to say that everyone can be a "leader"?
It is the duty of government to foster a society where the parents have the time, money, and left over energy enough to take their kids camping. Failing that, some reasonable substitute is required.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
While maybe not at age three, (seven though) this is being done every day here in the Good Old U.S. of A. and all over the world by the World Scouting Organizations under which all the nations Cub Scouts, Boy Scouts, Explorer Scouts, and similar organizations of other names in other nations all provide character building, values in personal fitness, and skills in the outdoors.
Yet another article that attempts to portray a reality in the US that is not.
So whats the optimal floor tile installation for the learning environment? Of all the things that could be so much better with the American education system, I think the tile and physical building parts are... minimal.
..it is that those in positions of leadership absolutely need someone else on hand to pull their wieners from the fire at need.
That was not my experience as a child in public schools and it's not my experience as a teacher in a public school. Without question there are prisons like the one you know, but there are many, many other flavors of education.
There's nothing magical about camping as such, agreed. But there is something important about learning to be able to take care of yourself, then learning to take care of others, to take responsibility, to lead, to solve a challenging problem as a team.
The thing is, it's easier to set new rules if you change the setting. Kids are used to living in a house, sleeping in a bed, washing under a shower, having clothes cleaned (by mommy) in a washing-machine etc. If you keep that setting, odds are the kids will expect that the rules are the same (or similar).
The Boy Scouts don't teach leadership. They teach some teamwork, but the troupes I was associated with didn't teach "leadership". Even as a leader since, I remembered a number of helpful tips from other situations, but never one from the BSA.
Learn to love Alaska
This quotation in various versions attributed to Socrates and many other ancient people is probably just an urban legend.
See here: http://www.bartleby.com/73/195.html "...efforts of researchers and scholars to confirm the wording of Socrates, or Plato, but without success. Evidently, the quotation is spurious."
Of all the things that could be so much better with the American education system, I think the tile and physical building parts are... minimal.
Never discount the effect that the environment people work in has on those people. If it were just that the floor tiles are arranged in simple, periodic patterns, it would just be a minor footnote about aesthetics. The problem is that you have such floors in buildings where the classrooms are identically sized and shaped and are arranged in simple, periodic patterns; the desks have identical sizes and shapes, and are arranged in simple, periodic patterns (ranks and files); the windows are rectangles of identical size, arranged in a simple, periodic pattern that is synchronized with the classrooms. The doors are all identical -- identical colors, identical window locations, identical doorknobs. Classrooms are numbered, using a code that identifies the floor and location on that floor.
The entire design of many schools is based only on a single shape, the rectangle -- rooms are rectangles, desks are rectangles, doors are rectangles, windows are rectangles, desks are arranged in rectangular grids, and the building itself is just a giant rectangular parallelepiped, or if you are lucky perhaps several intersecting parallelepipeds (and the intersections are, naturally, at right angles).
It is a bureaucratic design that encourages bureaucratic thinking, and it is embedded in a larger bureaucracy, where everyone is identified by numbers and ranks, where forms are all based on the same shape and pattern (usually the rectangle), and where enforcement of the rules is considered to be a high ideal.
Oh, by the way, there are other, less oppressive ways to do things, even down to the floor tiles:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topkapi_Scroll
Palm trees and 8
"And for people suffering from constant headaches... the most common cause of headaches is dehydration. Drink water, get better"
I'd like to know where you think you got this information; it is incorrect. From the NY Times Health article on the subject, the top causes of headaches are: Tension, migraines, overuse of medication, infections and other health problems. Hydration is only mentioned as a precaution after you've vomited from a migraine.
On a more personal note, I've suffered from headaches for a long time. The most common pieces of advice I'd get were: (a) you're dehydrated, or (b) you're addicted to caffeine, both of which were false and useless. For me, I had to learn that my headaches were from sinus congestion and the only solution was to take a decongestant. There are many different causes for many people (although dehydration is not one of them). Personally, I suffered for years listening to spurious explanations like that.
http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/symptoms/headache/overview.html
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
Seriously... the Swiss? Ouch.
But yeah... our kids are weak and sad.
I blame... "...for the children" "...think of the children" "...children hardest hit" "...effects on children"
YES! kids in the U.S. will never have the leadership skills as long as parents coddle them through life.
Whats the big deal about going into the forest in all sorts of weather. The biggest things you have deal with in the forest are the wolves, bears, cougars, coyotes, poisonous snakes, constrictor snakes, or alligators. Our American schools are much more dangerous than that.
Wow! I was modded "Insightful"?
I was aiming for "Funny," I also would have expected "Troll."
It is a sad state of affairs when making a throw-away joke about a completely fictional catastrophe is deemed insightful.
That's weird, even in Slashdot.
-dZ.
Carol vs. Ghost
Wasn't it the Swiss, not the Swedes?
The Swiss have the Alps, the Pope's Swiss Guard, the Gnomes of Zurich, secret mountain cave-fortresses, cuckoo clocks, secret banks, Swiss chalets, great skiing, borders with Germany/Austria/Italy/France/Liechtenstein, speakers of French, Italian, German, English, Romansh and Schwiizertüütsch, and lots of snow.
The Swedes have the fjords, some of the Vikings, Abba, Volvos, the Arctic Circle, some of the Lapps, borders with Norway/Finland, arctic wildlife, the midnight sun, only speak Swedish, English, Norwegian, Danish, some German, and some Sami (Lappish), and lots of snow.
So you can see that they are almost identical, but at least they do get different amounts of snow!
Yes.