I think that the trend towards more focused learning in K-12 is not limited to Asia. I went to school in Europe (Italy, Germany mostly)in the 70's and was always astonished at just how little the kids attending the American high schools were knowlegeable about. The interesting point I found was that like in Asia, the American kids were always busy memorizing things - how absurd, I felt then as now. Our schools focused on teaching us methods of thinking. In other words, being able to recite from wrote memorization like a monkey merely in order to be able to pass a multiple choice exam was ludicrous. I never even saw a multiple choice exam until I joined the Navy and later when I took the SATs before going to UC Berkeley. The concepts of discipline, respect for teachers, respect for learning, applying the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair, and striving for academic excellence are long gone in the U.S. Save perhaps for the elite who send their kids to Andover, Execter, CPS and other pricey preparatory schools, and where the system is geared toward producing well educated pupils, the public school system has lowered its standards so as to become all-inclusive. There are no poor performers because whenever they are found out, the standard is lowered. Finally, with 4 kids in the public school system, I am painfully aware and continuously engaging my kids to learn more, study more, and forget asking about TV, video games, gameboys, or any of that other garbage that masks for toys for youth these days - don't have them, don't use them, books, they have lots of books;-)
Stephen Evans' story regarding the perpetrators of the MyDoom virus was based on much speculation and was thoroughly devoid of any true understanding of the SCO vs. The Rest of the Linux World issue. Imputing the Linux and open source community with collusion or specific direct participation in the development and deployment of the virus is both factually absurd and irresponsible. Suggesting that the Linux community is unjustifiably outraged at SCO's despicable manipulation and devious attempt to steal the work of thousands of programmers and label it as their own belies any understanding of what Linux is, how it came to be and what it is now. Such ignorance is unbelievable in what amounts to a lead story on the subject. Preserving open source has everything to do with those exact thousands of developers protecting and preserving what they created and the community for whom they created it - SCO is blatantly trying to steal that via serruptitious means.
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I think that the trend towards more focused learning in K-12 is not limited to Asia. I went to school in Europe (Italy, Germany mostly)in the 70's and was always astonished at just how little the kids attending the American high schools were knowlegeable about. ;-)
The interesting point I found was that like in Asia, the American kids were always busy memorizing things - how absurd, I felt then as now. Our schools focused on teaching us methods of thinking. In other words, being able to recite from wrote memorization like a monkey merely in order to be able to pass a multiple choice exam was ludicrous. I never even saw a multiple choice exam until I joined the Navy and later when I took the SATs before going to UC Berkeley.
The concepts of discipline, respect for teachers, respect for learning, applying the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair, and striving for academic excellence are long gone in the U.S. Save perhaps for the elite who send their kids to Andover, Execter, CPS and other pricey preparatory schools, and where the system is geared toward producing well educated pupils, the public school system has lowered its standards so as to become all-inclusive. There are no poor performers because whenever they are found out, the standard is lowered.
Finally, with 4 kids in the public school system, I am painfully aware and continuously engaging my kids to learn more, study more, and forget asking about TV, video games, gameboys, or any of that other garbage that masks for toys for youth these days - don't have them, don't use them, books, they have lots of books
Stephen Evans' story regarding the perpetrators of the MyDoom virus was based on much speculation and was thoroughly devoid of any true understanding of the SCO vs. The Rest of the Linux World issue. Imputing the Linux and open source community with collusion or specific direct participation in the development and deployment of the virus is both factually absurd and irresponsible. Suggesting that the Linux community is unjustifiably outraged at SCO's despicable manipulation and devious attempt to steal the work of thousands of programmers and label it as their own belies any understanding of what Linux is, how it came to be and what it is now. Such ignorance is unbelievable in what amounts to a lead story on the subject. Preserving open source has everything to do with those exact thousands of developers protecting and preserving what they created and the community for whom they created it - SCO is blatantly trying to steal that via serruptitious means.