Stuff you wish they taught in school

[aelf]

I want a "you're a beautiful and unique snowflake" class and I actually want the principle to be put into practice in education as a whole (as opposed to trying to provide a "one size fits all" conformistic education system).

An education at conformism is a test of individuality. While not seeking individuality is no guarantee of it, the more people seek individuality, the more it tends to elude them as they vainly try to impose it on themselves only to be forced back into conformity.

 

[Cutlass]

Well, there's anyone who says that World War II brought us out of the depression. The only difference is digging the holes would have been, though hard to imagine, less destructive and less evil. Instead of holes, Krugman offers us imaginary alien invasions.

What Krugman is saying is that virtually anything that gets us back on normal unemployment and growth tracks is superior to doing nothing. And that's a truism that really can't be disputed. He's not actually advocating wasting money. Just saying that it's better than nothing.

I don't know what socialized medicine has to do with awful theories of stimulating aggregate demand and providing unproductive make-work jobs. I suppose I'd inclined to describe socialized medicine as a giant hole, though.

See here is where you believe that black is white, and white is black, that freedom is slavery, and that slavery is freedom.

The private sector insurance companies are a zero productivity hole in the ground, endlessly dug and filled. They are pure unproductive makework. All they do is generate bureaucracy for the express purpose of generating more bureaucracy. If you, at some point in your life, decide that you do not want unproductive makework at the public expense, then the very first thing you do is eliminate the private sector insurers and start Universal health care.

 

[squall78]

I want a "you're a beautiful and unique snowflake" class and I actually want the principle to be put into practice in education as a whole (as opposed to trying to provide a "one size fits all" conformistic education system).

unfortunately corporate structure doesn't deem individuality to be important. schools need to keep pumping out workers to feed the economy.

not to mention the resources that are desperately needed aren't getting to the classrooms.

and lets face it, some people are gonna be janitors no matter what their schooling was like.

 

[Ayatollah So]

The thing is that most human beings learn how to deal wiht each other far better from doing it practically than being taught it formally. The British system has always tried to engender 'gentlemanly' qualities into its spawn, but that's probably more to do with the not-always intuitive rules of engagement that we have over here.

Your phrase "taught it formally" neatly encapsulates a lot of what schools have been doing wrong for a few generations. Paper and pencil are overemphasized. Learners need to go out and do stuff. For social learning, some film clips might be good, e.g. how to make your parents go ballistic, vs. how to get them to actually listen to you. Also, get the students used to public speaking (in front of the class). High schoolers should probably learn to deal with rejection. Middle school might be a good age to start learning to debate. Etc.

I'm wondering if a basic research and critical thinking class is necessary in high school, or if it should be dispersed into other classes along the way. Part of me thinks that if it is dispersed, we'll end up where we are right now.

That's easy: both. Take a few complex arguments or chains-of-evidence from each subject and go over them with a fine-toothed comb. For real fun, have at least one HS teacher whose job is to "red team" the curriculum. S/he visits classes and attacks the weakest points of the text, the practical relevance of the day's chemistry experiment, or what have you.