Do teachers teach these days?
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Skyed:
Just graduated from Sec 4... All teachers teach... The issue is whether they teach well or not =.=
That's a good one
ChiefKiasu:
They are facilitators? :roll:
My kids have no tuition either, unless you consider their weekly Chinese enrichment classes as tuition. But certainly not on a one-on-one basis. So you are actually not in the minority.kamom:
Or they expect the kids to know because they all have tuition. I am probably one of the minorities who have refused tuition for my kids. How many parents here DO NOT send their kids fro tuition classes?
If teachers do not teach, what do you think they do in school?
Teach as in explaining concepts, teaching how to apply these concepts in their work, allow Q & A. -
kamom:
There are 2 broad approaches to education: constructivist vs objectivist. A brief but effective comparison of these approaches can be found http://www.csub.edu/tlc/options/resources/handouts/teach_issues/constructivist.html.They are facilitators? :roll:
Teach as in explaining concepts, teaching how to apply these concepts in their work, allow Q & A.
I believe you subscribe more to the objectivist view
. But for better or worse, education in Singapore is shifting more to the constructivist approach. The case in point are the changes to the 2015 English PSLE exam format, which requires higher ordered critical thinking, and not just mastery of the English language.
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I like critical thinking and I think they are excellent for children BUT only at a higher level. I allow my older kid to engage in mental sparring with me.
Children at elementary level should focus on writing using good grammar, strong vocab. How to write critically when one can’t even write fluently.
Our system is so wishy washy. -
kamom:
There are those (myself included) that believe that a constructivist approach to learning may be more effective, especially for young children. Remember how we were forced to memorize the times tables? We were never told why we needed to do so. We just do it and understand why only many years later when we were \"old enough\" to understand. Teachers never bothered and go for the easy way out, which is to teach exactly what the syllabus demand, and grade according to how close our renditions are to the original texts. It is straight-forward, easy and safe.I like critical thinking and I think they are excellent for children BUT only at a higher level. I allow my older kid to engage in mental sparring with me.
Children at elementary level should focus on writing using good grammar, strong vocab. How to write critically when one can't even write fluently.
Our system is so wishy washy.
The outcome of such a system is a meritocracy that favors the exam-smart \"regurgitators\", and not the innovators. We are the output of such a system. The average Singaporean is far better educated than an average citizen from other parts of the world, but when it comes to innovating and critical thinking, quite a number of us had problems expanding beyond our comfort zone.
In my opinion, critical and unstructured thinking will feature as one of the most important qualities that our children must have in the future economy. Our children should be taught from young to keep asking \"why\", to keep challenging the norm, and not simply accept facts as facts. If we had never asked the question why \"1+1=2\", we would never have invented the computer, which could only operate on 2 states, and hence can only interpret the same concept as \"1+1=10\". You and I would have to see and yak with one another in a kopitiam instead of in the comfort of our homes over the Internet.
It is never too early to start getting our children to do critical thinking. And it is much harder to teach them critical thinking than simply throwing them a thick textbook and testing them only on material explicitly written in the book. So we may think that teachers are not teaching children because they keep throwing questions back to children to answer instead of answering the children's questions. But that cannot be further from the truth. There's no better way of getting children to remember facts than to get them to understand how to recreate those facts. -
me too, it’s a waste of money
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Most parents get tuition for their children regardless whether the child actually needs it -shrugs-.
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My kids have no tuition too.
I guess we're indeed the minority but definitely not to the extend of being endangered.. -
No tuition either. I think the problem arises when the teacher is not teaching to the child’s level. Dc had a Chinese teacher who was used to kids who do well in Chinese. He was totally lost in her class and learnt little that year. Subsequently he went to a class for those who did not do well for Chinese and it worked out well. The teacher paid a lot more attention to their foundation.
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ChiefKiasu:
Precisely! Taking the times-table as an example, there’s indeed no necessity to memorise. When DD2 was in P1, her friends bragged about knowing the times table so she asked me about it. I spent about 5 mins explaining the concept to her while waiting for the food at a restaurant. Guess what? She could explain and tell me the correct answer (though slower for bigger numbers as need a bit of counting) to times table of numbers up to 10 after that!
There are those (myself included) that believe that a constructivist approach to learning may be more effective, especially for young children. Remember how we were forced to memorize the times tables? We were never told why we needed to do so. We just do it and understand why only many years later when we were \"old enough\" to understand. Teachers never bothered and go for the easy way out, which is to teach exactly what the syllabus demand, and grade according to how close our renditions are to the original texts. It is straight-forward, easy and safe.kamom:
I like critical thinking and I think they are excellent for children BUT only at a higher level. I allow my older kid to engage in mental sparring with me.
Children at elementary level should focus on writing using good grammar, strong vocab. How to write critically when one can't even write fluently.
Our system is so wishy washy.
The outcome of such a system is a meritocracy that favors the exam-smart \"regurgitators\", and not the innovators. We are the output of such a system. The average Singaporean is far better educated than an average citizen from other parts of the world, but when it comes to innovating and critical thinking, quite a number of us had problems expanding beyond our comfort zone.
In my opinion, critical and unstructured thinking will feature as one of the most important qualities that our children must have in the future economy. Our children should be taught from young to keep asking \"why\", to keep challenging the norm, and not simply accept facts as facts. If we had never asked the question why \"1+1=2\", we would never have invented the computer, which could only operate on 2 states, and hence can only interpret the same concept as \"1+1=10\". You and I would have to see and yak with one another in a kopitiam instead of in the comfort of our homes over the Internet.
It is never too early to start getting our children to do critical thinking. And it is much harder to teach them critical thinking than simply throwing them a thick textbook and testing them only on material explicitly written in the book. So we may think that teachers are not teaching children because they keep throwing questions back to children to answer instead of answering the children's questions. But that cannot be further from the truth. There's no better way of getting children to remember facts than to get them to understand how to recreate those facts.
Indeed, I do value the “constructivist approach”. However, there are certain fundamentals that need to be taught first before this type of teaching approach can be effective. -
ammonite:
No tuition either. I think the problem arises when the teacher is not teaching to the child's level. Dc had a Chinese teacher who was used to kids who do well in Chinese. He was totally lost in her class and learnt little that year. Subsequently he went to a class for those who did not do well for Chinese and it worked out well. The teacher paid a lot more attention to their foundation.
DD1 had the same experience as your son. Teachers do need to understand the standard of their students and teach at their level.
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