Homework. by Fremdfirma

REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

Homework.

POSTED BY: FREMDFIRMA
UPDATED: Tuesday, August 24, 2010 10:07
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VIEWED: 733
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Tuesday, August 24, 2010 4:22 AM

Ok, firstup - this is a pet peeve and likely to involve some serious ranting/venting.
Just so you know that goin in here.
=======================================

DPS to mail kids homework packets due first day of class
http://www.detnews.com/article/20100824/SCHOOLS/8240364/1026/DPS-to-ma
il-kids-homework-packets-due-first-day-of-class

Quote:
Detroit Public Schools announced Monday it will mail 62-page packets of homework this week to 28,650 students in grades three through eight. The packets, which must be finished and turned in the first day of classes, focus on areas in which DPS students have tested poorly.

Ok, you know what, FUCK them.

Firstoff, this bullshit has NOTHING to do with "education" and EVERYTHING to do with MEAP scores, political points, and trying to procure funding, the story all but freakin admits it - stuffing this crap onto kids and making them pawns in their own machinations under the guise of educating them, and folks wonder why our schools are so fucked up, why children hate them so bitterly, do you REALLY think some of them kids ain't figured out what the game is here ?

And that ain't even my main problem with it!

For a fact, I resented public school from the very first clash over the fact that I could already read (not well, but I could) without their assistance from on-high and how this fact seemed to offend the hell out of them, quickly followed by the inhuman, inhumane, prison-like atmosphere from both a social and physical aspect.

Not in so many words at the time, but I was kinda pissed off about it right up front, not to mention bored as hell cause I was even at the start just a bit ahead of the game and my voracious reading appetite only increased that issue as time went on, especially after my mother got her hands on a used set of encylopedias and I practically devoured the damned things cover to cover.

They did try shoving me up the line a bit, but that failed disastrously since I was maybe half the size of my own classmates, and my puny stature in combination with the age stratification and related social-class warfare by age group sparked a serious hatred quickly devolving into sufficient mutual violence to convince the administration it was a terrible idea.
In retrospect, think of the attitude of a bunch of medieval lords having some upstart commoner thrust upon them, and you get the picture.

That, as much as the violence, are what got me shoved into the second chance school system since there was no fastrack or gifted/talented programs at the time and I was about as square as an educational peg could get, a double whammy of intelligence welded to a severely "antisocial" nature, and all too willing to verbalize my displeasure with the educational system and those in charge of it, something all the more galling because it was about the only time you'd get more than a single sentence out of me, and that I had damned good arguments, which of course offended them worse.

Past a point, I considered school a HINDERANCE to my education, since doing the endless, routine busywork shoved on my desk was "teaching" me nothing but a hatred and bitterness for those responsible, in fact I dredged up every slang term I could find for prison guards and would apply them liberally to the teachers to express my disrespect for them, out of sheer boredom.

Which is how one of the english teachers wound up with a snake in their desk - hand copying five blackboards of notes, damn near verbatim from the teachers guide (which I of course had stolen and read cover to cover weeks ago), followed by a story from the weekly reader and a ditto with ten multiple choice questions... while said teacher hung out in the teachers lounge drinking coffee, wasn't exactly an "educational" experience, especially when I could, and sometimes would, answer the damn questions correctly without even picking up the weekly reader just to be a smartass about it - the snake was my retaliation against a so-called educator who didn't even try to hold up the pretense of teaching us.

With all that in mind, you can imagine what I thought of homework - bad enough that they stole my time, my life, trying to crush it into some pre-approved mold, bad enough they forced me to be around hostile people larger than me and unarmed, with predictable results...

But to demand I waste more and more of my personal time on their fucking useless busywork ?

Seriously, I already KNEW how to multiply a set of two digit numbers, doin it a hundred more times is just fuckin with me, trying to break me to the grindstone so I would more readily be their wage-slave (again, not in so many words, but I understood the concept) some time in the future.

And book reports, HA! - I knew by then that was a waste of time, if your report did not fit a pre-determined conclusion and viewpoint, you might as well not even write it, cause heaven forfend you find yourself looking at a story from something other than the pre-approved interpretation, oh no, what a terrible heresy...

Fuck that, it was time I could spend and enjoy much better scouring over the War of 1812 and the causes leading up to it via encylopedia britannica, from which I not only learned things, but also took pleasure in.

Seriously - think about it, a kid already has to deal with school for hours and hours, and then hours more of homework, toss in a punitive assignment like endlessly writing some lame bullshit phrase over and over, then college and the cycle of bitter crushing debt, and some wage-slaving experience where they get to in turn neglect their own children as they're crushed under ever mounting expectations, ever more defined requirements... is it any wonder that their humanity suffers, that they curse the ones murdering it, pencil scratch, by pencil scratch ?

What little childhood I had - I stole.
And that is one of the ways I stole it.

You see, I never, EVER did homework, save in the extremely rare occurance that it was actually something of interest I could learn from, and those usually came from science classes, projects I would invest far more effort in than strictly necessary.

I will say that when I found a real teacher amongst the drones, I venerated them almost unto deification, Chaffinch, Dorsey, Zoeller, they were like heros to me, they had KNOWLEDGE, they had INFORMATION, and they were willing to share it, even outside officially-approved channels!

Zoeller in particular knew I was "borrowing" additional educational materials, and would deliberately place them in a certain spot as an unspoken encouragement to do so, as well as look the other way when I needed materials for my own extra-curricular experimentation - I suppose having a 98% *average* in his class kind of incited him to encourage me, heh.

In the end, though, it was naught but a hassle and a waste, particularly since I walked out and self-graduated two years early via GED by exploiting a loophole that allowed me to take the test following summer vacation.

Ergo, I always found, and still do, the concept of homework itself despicable.

While it was lost in the greater issues of the time, during the 2000-2004 period there actually was a lot of investigation and research done on just how detrimental large amounts of homework can be, a little poking around on the web will find it readily enough if you care to try - and despite the results being pointedly obvious, this seems to have had no effect on a conventional "education" system growing ever more ineffective for anything but producing worker drones and hostile youth who see our society as their enemy.

I wholeheartedly support the idea of torching those packets in protest.

-Frem

PS. Ann Arbor, down the road from here, has a long history of unconventional education, and has recently opened another "Free School" as well as having several existing alt-education venues.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community_High_School_%28Ann_Arbor,_Michi
gan%29
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchistic_free_school
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudbury_model

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Tuesday, August 24, 2010 4:37 AM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important

Hello,

In sitting down with my son and niece, I felt that Homework was becoming rather time-intensive, chewing up every hour of the day between end of school and going to sleep.

But egads, now they're giving homework- SIXTY PLUS PAGES OF IT, and BEFORE you actually attend a goddamned class?

I might be tempted to 'lose' that in the mail.

Like you, Frem, I rarely did homework. I did almost none of it in Elementary school. No amount of bribery or punishment could move me on the issue.

This, however, was not part of a grand plan of resistance.

I just didn't care about the stuff. It was so boring and pointless. I'd rather be punished to stay in my room for a week and read books.

In late Middle and High School, the homework became more interesting, and I started doing it. Thankfully I had teachers who encouraged my creative outlook on subjects at that time. I still remember Mrs. King, who allowed me to write all my Ancient History reports as a fictional narrative from the perspective of a time traveler who was accidentally deposited into the era in question.

--Anthony

Due to the use of Naomi 3.3.2 Beta web filtering, the following people may need to private-message me if they wish to contact me: Auraptor, Kaneman, Piratenews. I apologize for the inconvenience.

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Tuesday, August 24, 2010 6:09 AM

EVILDINOSAUR

wow, some teachers really have forgotten how to teach haven't they...

"Haha, mine is an evil laugh."

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Tuesday, August 24, 2010 6:12 AM

WULFENSTAR

http://youtu.be/VUnGTXRxGHg

Much of the problem is that parents expect teachers to RAISE their kids for them.

AND... if the kid doesn't pass, to give them a good grade anyways.

Much like "autism", these "parents" can't believe their precious little snowflak isn't perfect... and they actually have to WORK at being a parent.

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Tuesday, August 24, 2010 6:13 AM

NIKI2

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Rant on, darling, you're right on target. I think it's despicable!

Hippie Operative Nikovich Nikita Nicovna Talibani,
Contracted Agent of Veritas Oilspillus, code name “Nike”,
signing off

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Tuesday, August 24, 2010 6:32 AM

FREMDFIRMA

Ha, my entire LIFE has been a "grand plan of resistance" from the moment my mother was told her own immune system was trying to kill me, as I was a secondborn.
http://kidshealth.org/parent/pregnancy_newborn/pregnancy/rh.html
Seriously, I was supposed to be stillborn, they even had a priest there to console my mother when she finally had to face the inevitable - according to those who were there, it was apparently somewhat disconcerting to have that tense silence broken by a sudden howl of defiant rage.

But yes, agreed, boring and pointless - you probably learned more from reading than you would from the drudgery...

Also part of that problem is the school trying to inflict certain morals and viewpoints upon you by selecting what you read, instead of maybe selecting something you'd be interested in - I loaned my niece Harry Harrisons Stainless Steel Rat collection, which provoked some commentary from a teacher who did not think those books "appropriate" for a young lady...

I didn't even have to field that ball, my niece kicked it right back into her teeth by calling her out on assigning Connells "The Most Dangerous Game" to her, and asking if THAT was appropriate given that not only was she a young lady, but also against violence.

Given just how prevalent, how powerful, the curiousity of a child is, it constantly amazes me how an institution supposed to educate them never makes use of it, preferring to stamp it out, crush it utterly, even if it involves drugs or physical abuse and coercion, because curiosity is something that cannot die a natural death.

S'funny, that - since for all the shit I've caught about it, when science *DID* catch up with society about this, while completely ignored, it did prove I was correct from a scientific as well as social viewpoint.
http://teacher.scholastic.com/professional/bruceperry/curiosity.htm
(Again, Doc Perry - the man's a genius)

One of the reasons I seem to be every kids adopted "uncle" is that I do actually countenence questions, and I will answer them, if possible with a demonstration - I recall a conversation at Six Flags, I was playing with one of those waterfall coin-pusher things, and some kid comes up asking how I am pulling it off, resulting in me explaining the basic principles of elementary physics to him as he watched the shiny coins reflect the arcade lights in pure wonder, and pointing out that such knowledge could be applied practically, since it was about to score me some goodies from the prize rack.
(my ex has a bookshelf full of stuffed animals from claw machines and games of skill/chance)

I had enough tickets by then, and a pile ready to go over, so I set the slider, handed him a quarter and bade him good fortune - it's not enough to just teach kids things, without them knowing WHY you are, or what USE the things you mean to teach will be to them.

I suspect that lesson might stick a little better than the ones his teachers were delivering - not all education takes place within the classroom walls.

-Frem

I do not serve the Blind God.

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Tuesday, August 24, 2010 6:49 AM

FREMDFIRMA

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
Much of the problem is that parents expect teachers to RAISE their kids for them.

AND... if the kid doesn't pass, to give them a good grade anyways.

Much like "autism", these "parents" can't believe their precious little snowflak isn't perfect... and they actually have to WORK at being a parent.

Bullshit.

Ok smart guy, explain how a parent is going to DO it working seventy and more hours a week to keep food on the goddamn table, up against an educational system which is outright hostile to their child and has all but given up on them from the very start and is just going through the motions - OR has certain nefarious intentions, like when Andover HS deliberately screwed my math credits because they felt I needed more "social adjustment", neh ?

Or how smart kids who BECAUSE they are smart, do not fit into the assembly line, teach-to-test model and are subsequently discarded or given poor grades, while those who bow to the system come out damn near illiterate and with no practical knowledge of how to do anything but obey orders ?

Or maybe you'd like to justify some of the primitive and abusive tactics used to "cure" dyslexia, by people who were shovelling the same bullshit about that which I hear spewing from your favorite fecal-flow orifice right now ?

Shit, you know how, it's actually easy to teach kids with autism spectrum issues, cause they'll hyperfocus when you get them interested in something, but trying to shove them down the assembly line is a disaster waiting to happen.

Oh, and did it also never occur to you that one reason for the hostility and defiance of those children is rooted in the very things I mentioned in the first goddamn post, how *inhumane* the entire structure is - how much of a fucking TRAP it becomes, when we tell em all that was just a warmup and sign em into $80,000.00 of debt for a piece of paper that makes them cost too much to hire, and for what, when everything has been outsourced - and that degree means shit when the employer sees their age and instantly dismisses them anyway ?

Or how bout the wacky fun of trying to fucking SURVIVE on minimum wage, I'm sure some of those parents slaving seventy-some hours and unable to actually *BE* parents because of it would be happy to express it to you if they could find the time - or how bout that kid lookin at their parent slaving away, never getting ahead, and knowing that is THEIR future ?

Hell, for that matter, they look at the dystopian nightmare we offer them as a "future"... why should they give a rats ass what WE want of them ?

Cause let's admit it, we want them to be the fucking worker drones feeding OUR retirement, just as our "elders" fucked US over, you think they don't realize this, you think they don't care ?

Those "precious little snowflakes" have RAZOR edges, sonnyboy - and a lot of them would very much like to use them on you, for the sole sake of the world you and yours created for their so-called "Future".

I spent far too many years with that red tide of hate myself driving me, before I realized I could if nothing else, at least TRY to shove things towards a better way, a better future, to give them something other than the sum of all OUR failures.

So don't fucking whine to me Wulfie, until you have some idea, even the tiniest clue, of what the fuck you're talkin about beyond programmed and regurgitated talking points and racism smothered in lies which you prefer to accept because as long as you can smear the mirror of truth with em, you don't have to look into it...

And face your own complicity.

-Frem

I do not serve the Blind God.

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Tuesday, August 24, 2010 8:26 AM

BYTEMITE

Hearing lots of familiar things here, Frem.

Particularly the book reports. Bored and listening to the other kids around me take a week to read a single chapter of a thirty four page book out loud, when I finished the assigned book the first day. Working on a report for a month to get an F from a teacher with an axe to grind against me, while a well-behaved teacher's pet could write a report the day before and get a B+.

Although, to be fair, no one ever taught me multiplication before I encountered it in public school, and I was behind in math (algebra, trig, calc) up until high school. In retrospect, I actually needed those classes and the repetition... Though really, it didn't help most of the teachers weren't very good. Once you get this stuff, it's easy.

Haha, tiny kid science Frem. In elementary school they eventually just threw their hands up and let me do whatever the hell I wanted, and let me have free run of the science and art supplies too.

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Tuesday, August 24, 2010 10:07 AM

FREMDFIRMA

Quote:
Originally posted by Bytemite:
Haha, tiny kid science Frem. In elementary school they eventually just threw their hands up and let me do whatever the hell I wanted, and let me have free run of the science and art supplies too.

That does give cause to wonder, doesn't it ?
Fits right in with the whole concept of free-schooling, and how a gentle nudge is a far better guide than a stranglehold.

Of course, by the time I met Zoeller most of my experiments were in the direction of increasing the effectiveness of home-made stuff that went kaboom, ah the joys of Potassium Chlorate, and a fistfull of Ragnarock (proper spelling rackarock), those were the days...

S'why I laugh at most would-be bombers, cause they're stupid and lazy, a knowledgeable soul could make stuff in the average kitchen that'd give the goddamn heebie-jeebies to DepHomeSec, which is why that's all just theatre and they know it, an excuse to get paid and act like the jackboots they always wanted to be, but no real affect one way or the other on any but the most incompetent of plotters, most of whom they baited into it in the first damn place.

Even more fun was the discovery of Thermite, and how simple it was to make, which I had no problem igniting cause I already had a radio shack pocket torch and occasionally used it to do things such as weld some assholes locker shut, which in combination with a small packet of Thermite, had such wonderful potential....

But I digress.

Anyhow, it's just not mad science without the explosions, and I am very much a traditionalist.

-Frem

I do not serve the Blind God.

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