Different Curriculum

The one comment that continued to resurface in class on Wednesday is if we had the same curriculum within the public school system then it would help level the playing field or no one would have a head up on anyone else. But it's not only the curriculum. It also depends on who is teaching it and how they present the info. If everyone had the same curriculum wouldn't it be cheaper to just make photocopies of all the assignments and send them home with the children so that the parents that don't attend these ever so necessary PTA meetings can teach it to them. It's not just about the curriculum even though this is a very important aspect within the problem but it's also the supplies and the teachers. If a teacher is just going to read word for word from a textbook in comparison to a teacher that has us re-enact the event or encourages us to question what we read who do you think is going to learn more?
One of the comments that annoyed me from the reading was on page 69, "I wonder why there are not months dedicated to the entirety of the melting pot." We are a not melting pot because when different elements are put into a melting pot they become one entity and are the same in my opinion. If we were a melting pot then we wouldn't need Black History month since we'd all be of the same culture we would all be able to relate to different lifestyles and ideas. I feel that by becoming a melting pot we all lose our identities and I would never want to be like certain other people. I am proud of who I am and where I came from. I feel like this ideal of a melting pot is being forced upon us in school in order to cause us to lose a sense of history and to adapt the American lifestyle completely. This idea of a melting pot never existed and I hope it never does.
Another thing that upset me is how little teachers are paid. These are the adults that are leading our youth and future by helping them learn. On page 73 it says, "There is shame, somehow, in having two master's degrees and yet still be struggling, on occasion to make ends meets." I think this is Crystal England talking about herself but if she is I think it is a shame to have a teacher making so little that she can barely give her child lunch money but we can all pour money into the entertainment business that isn't promoting many positive ideals. To have actors, atheletes, and singers making so much money is a damn shame but if that's where our head is at then our society should stop trying to act like they give two sticks about our education and train us at young ages to shake our ass and rap so that we can be successful like J.Lo and Britney Spears.
----Internet Thug =-)

Here's an article from the Local London about exams being dumbed down in order to help students: http://www.thisislocallondon.co.uk/indepth/features/display.var.1736188.0.a_different_kind_of_learning.php