chipped bottle

Another day at school. Good day, but no day passes without me getting upset about the modern education system. Some might say I am a fossil as in my days there was a lot or rote learning (not that I still remember much of it) but it was not just mindless repetition. The teachers (at least the good ones) tried to put it in context of every day life. These were times when PC education newspeak was still to be discovered. Syllabi did not have crosscurricular links and co-teaching was light years away. Teachers did not even have photocopiers to produce those copious amounts of handouts let alone LED devices.

My generation attended 8 years of elementary/junior high combined as one institution carried on with 4 years of general high school or 5 years that gave you A levels equivalent and a profession. After that some of us went to universities. Some students went to vocational schools with minimum of proper studying and learned a trade for 3 years after the first phase.

To supervise my learning my parents went to school as required around 2-3 times a year or when a teacher requested (which was generally bad news). All other parents did the same.

After my Teacher College I decided to become a teacher. Photocopiers were then in every school, mostly used for tests and exams and sometimes for handouts (we all had to remember the cost of paper and toners). I basically followed the route of my own teachers when I was younger and everybody was happy.

After that, I emigrated and experienced International education. What a fucking difference! It could not be more different if I went to another galaxy I guess. Here it seems that the teachers are responsible for teaching, learning, organizing students academic after school time, filling in students recreational after school time, pleasing the head od department, pleasing the head of school, pleasing the parents, and pleasing the students most of all!

No more content learning. All is based on learners’ based inquiry, so the role of a teacher can be reduced just to that of a vigilant monitor and skillful planner. Academic side of school is practically neglected (except in the loftily worded but conceptually extremely simplistic learning objectives of your syllabus and curriculum).

Now, it is incredibly non-PC what I am going to say now: some students are cleverer than others. Some students get what they read and some don’t. Some students are inquisitive, some are not. This is just a simple fact. Putting students in sets based on abilities used to be trendy, but no more so. This is where I have a bone to pick with people who I generally respect, including Chomsky. I cringed when I saw his interview where he disagreed with the idea of streamlining classes due to cognitive abilities of the students. He said that there is no need to categorise people into smart ones and others.

Well, school is a community and like in any other and things can’t stay hidden for very long. During my school years we were all thrown into a class based on where we lived, so we had the perfect mix of abilities. Very quickly did we learn who was thick and who was smart; there was simply no way of concealing the fact. It was incredibly frustrating to be stuck with some of the challenged ones for both the teachers and the students. The first 8 years we were then stuck like this. The next stage of education dealt with the problem: some went to better schools, others went to other ones. I can tell you this though: such a set up revealed very quickly any flaws in anybody’s intellectual make up. No matter whether or not students are divided into ability-based groups does not save them from being singled out for either being smart or dumb!

I think now schools tend to not use sets under parents’ pressure. I think it would be very embarrassing for the parents to admit that they have produced an academically challenged offspring. So, sacrificing the chance for weaker students’ better development in a better suited environment the parents mend their broken egos saying that now everybody is special and throwing everybody into the same class. Everybody is a winner! Everybody deserves a prize! And everybody fucking loves you! Because you are so special. So special you go to special fucking needs. But wait! No! No more Special Needs! Now it is Student Support!

Hooray!!!

But let me tell you, if you have a dumb kid everybody knows this anyway! HA!

Travelling within a country may make you witness a lot of difference. Travelling to different countries exacerbates this. Travelling between continents might be the ultimate of witnessing the change between peoples. In my travels it seems I have been travelling not only in places but also in time. Not just linearly in one direction. The travel took me back and forth technologically. Going from Europe to China in very early 21^st century was indeed like going back in time; they seemed to be slowly catching up with the development of internet and IT solutions. Over a decade later coming back home was just a similar experience! In spite of government limitations and censorship the Chinese have embraced the technology to a level surpassing that in Europe. And then the unexpected turn for me happened and I found myself in Africa and the technology is present here but it seems I was taken back in time even further.

Being a teacher one is more acutely aware of the differences of available technology in different countries and how it is utilised in every day life. Here I am in a top-notch international school and on the notice boards in the homeroom of year 8 I see students’ introductions where they drew their portraits! In pencil! In China no year 8 student would disgrace themselves with such a thing! The pictures would be taken, airbrushed and polished to perfection before they would be laminated and put up on the wall. Here, in Africa, a scrap of paper with a mere stencil of remote resemblance to the subject will suffice. Apparently the colour printer is somewhere but it takes a lot of back rubbing to get a colour print. Not saying it is wrong; just observing. The waste of resources was shocking to me in China, I am hoping this might be e refreshing change.

The students have access to mobile phones and to computers or laptops but they somehow do not seem too obsessed with them. Or maybe this is just an illusion.

In China getting a taxi was super easy even for foreigners once an app was installed and familiarized with. Apparently the government had to meddle with that too and made it difficult for the drivers to sign up for the service that ultimately reduced the number of taxis available on the didi app. The reasons behind it are all obscure and I am sure everybody is hiding behind the safety curtain. Funny how the safety regulations usually just inconvenience the ordinary folk. Back to the point; mobile phones are widely used here but trying to get things done online is paramount to impossibility; everything must be arranged by a friend of a friend who knows another friend. So, as long as you have a friend to start with, life should be relatively comfortable.