It has been a disaster from the start, but it got worse and worse with time. I remember reading that the schools would give the children iPads and other things just so they would sign up for that school. Basically they would bribe the children to get the parents to send them so that they could make more money. And that’s only the top of the iceberg …

(PS: I changed the title from “free school” to “charter school” which is the correct english name for what is described in the article.)

  • Uglyhead@lemmy.world
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    8 months ago

    Can you list off a few of the things you see as educational time wastes?

    *Edit: Here,…in good faith I’ll throw one out— Cursive Writing.

    • irdc@derp.foo
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      8 months ago

      Cursive writing helps in developing fine motor skills.

      • troed@fedia.io
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        8 months ago

        Kids of today have vastly better fine motor skills due to extensive usage of computer mouse, gamepads and touch screens.

        • irdc@derp.foo
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          8 months ago

          Those are different kinds of fine motor skills than used when writing cursive. Ideally kids should be exposed to both.

    • thenumbernine@infosec.pub
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      8 months ago

      Well I don’t know what Troed is referring to but my kid in the first grade is doing “Letter of the week” for the fourth time. (He learned them the first time 3 years ago in kindergarten). They also use something called Bornholmsmodellen that is from the last century and has been highly criticized for not encouraging curiosity nor building interest.

    • wwaxen@lemmy.world
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      8 months ago

      I love history, and I think people should learn about all of it, but if I had to pick I’d dump ancient history for more contemporary history. People need to know in detail the 100 years leading to today far more than the 5000 years before that.

      • no banana @lemmy.world
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        8 months ago

        Tbh if you love history or handling historical documents that might even redeem learning cursive writing.

        • SheeEttin@lemmy.world
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          8 months ago

          I can read and write modern cursive just fine (well, mostly), but I often have trouble with historic documents. It’s not really that helpful in deciphering the handwriting of someone who learned their cursive over a hundred years ago.

    • troed@fedia.io
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      8 months ago

      Rote learning - anything. That’s 50% of the time currently - which can then be used to shorten school days with the same. We’re living in a world where information is available at our finger tips - and that won’t suddenly become less so.

      Every generation suffers from the same faulty thinking. “Because this is the way it was for me it must be the right way also for my children”.

      (Cursive writing was a waste of time already when I went to school in the late 80s)

      • HobbitFoot @thelemmy.club
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        8 months ago

        Rote learning can be helpful for some things, if just to give an idea of what information is there and how to process it.