Fun & Exciting Stuff

That was the discussion last week when I gave a quiz to the 10th grade global class on imperialism. They had to name one colony and one imperialist country. The colony = Asia or Africa. The imperialist country = Europe. So I threw the same question out to the 11th graders. Too many of them didn’t know it either. That’s one of those basic facts 100% of the students should know. I am not worried about higher order thinking skills. I am worried about basic content.

Granted they don’t use that type of knowledge regularly (what teenager is asked “Is Europe a country or a continent?” regularly?) But it is basic common knowledge that they should know so that they don’t look like a moron regularly.

I was born 20 years too early. I was not a Rhodes scholar by any strech, but I had a good dose of common sense and I paid attention. If you are a high school senior today and have a basic understanding of specific knowledge, you are already head-and-shoulders above many of your peers.

This is just amazing. 438 students are freshmen this year.

# Percentage of first-year applicants who applied online in 2003: 33%.
# Percentage of applicants who did last year: 89%.
# Year that an incoming Amherst College class first created a Facebook group so that they could socialize and otherwise get to know each other prior to arriving on campus: 2006.
# By the end of August 2008 the total number of members and posts at the Amherst College Class of 2012 Facebook group: 432 members and 3,225 posts.
# Students in the class of 2012 who registered computers, IPhones, game consoles, etc. on the campus network by the end of the day on August 24th, the day they moved into their dorm rooms: 370 students registered 443 devices.
# Number of students in the class of 2012 who brought desktop computers to campus: 14.
# Number that brought iPhones/iTouches: 93.

And I am running dittos and using a textbook. Sheesh. I have never felt like an old lady driving a 1970 Pinto in the slow lane of the 6 lane super highway. Teaching is passing us by.

This post from Doug Johnson would lead some to question that idea. I like to think of myself as educated, but I have been finding more and more evidence that leads me to think the jobs haven’t all disappeared overseas. As Mr. Johnson says:

Is NAFTA really the problem? Or is it the inability or unwillingness for our secondary schools to offer more than just college prep programs to their students

I have been guilty of blaming India, as if a country specifically came and took all the jobs.