Comments on: Literacy Quiz Day

By: cperkins

cperkins — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 10:28:10 +0000

I went through school just before the ‘don’t teach them boring dates, teach them what happened’ idea became so popular, and initially I thought that sounded great. I don’t enjoy memorizing things very much, I’m not good at it and was always relieved that even in my time, things had relaxed from my grandmother’s day. She could recite the Victorian poems she learned in school from beginning to end and told us how she had been expected to draw a free hand map of our (province, then country) and label all the major bays and towns. From memory. And it’s a complicated map, not like some states or provinces, which are basically rectangular.

I, on the other hand, can’t remember even the bit of Shakespeare my high school English teacher got us to memorize, and know the first two lines – and nothing else – of a vast range of hymns and songs (which is as close as I get to memorizing poetry).

But then I tried to teach the history of science to students who’d experienced the newer approach, and soon realized that they missed the whole point since they had no idea approximately when various notables (Galileo, Einstein, ‘the Greeks’ etc) lived. And without a mental framework of what happened when, it was very hard to learn the ‘what’ – isolated stories are harder to remember than stories that fit into an over-arching framework or context.

So dates are important. Students should know that in 1941 the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbour, and what role that event played in WW II. The exact month and day are optional.

My grade – 8, I think – English teacher had the right idea. I forget what we were reading, but it had a reference to something being the biggest or newest or something since 1066. Mrs. S. said ‘And you know what happened in 1066.’ None of us did, since we had not yet done history covering anything outside Canada. When she realized this, she said ‘Of course, you’ll learn all about that in . I won’t spoil it for you by telling you now.’

Of course, that made me wildly curious about what important event had happened in 1066, and I found out pretty quickly, and didn’t forget. I don’t know if any of my fellow students had the same reaction.

By: jd

jd — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 03:34:57 +0000

I’m not sure if this is relevant but one major difference between science and the arts is that science courses are hierarchical, You take A because its needed for B, you take B because its needed for C, C is needed for D and D will be a professional working tool all your professional life.

That does not seem to be true for Liberal Arts subjects. You can study George Bernard Shaw without studying Shakespeare.

But I’ve notcied that thinks I studied in graduate school in the 60s are now being taught at the undergraduate level. And things I studied as an undergraduate have been dropped. There is so much to learn that faculties have to continually revaluate what in necessary as distinct from nice to know.

I do know what happened on Dec 7, 1941 but is it necessary for students to know that?

By: Michael.Fisher

Michael.Fisher — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 23:12:43 +0000

My youngest son, Nick, a couple of years ago (oh how time flies) went up to Eureka Ca. with a couple of his friends to go to school. The three of them had been buddies all through middle and high school.

Unfortunately I had infected Nick with a bad habit. You see, if he made a factual mistake about some subject in conversation at home, I would correct him. And since we had computers enough for everyone quite frequently when he would ask me a question I would send him to google.

This apparently rubbed off on him, particularly the correcting of errors part.

His buddies basically kicked him out of their apartment. These were not happy times in the Fisher household.

I guess it’s just not a good idea to be too smart these days.

By: mab

mab — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 22:22:46 +0000

Lord, this is SO depressing.

And that’s all I can think of to say.

By: robert_piepenbrink

robert_piepenbrink — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 20:19:41 +0000

I am indeed the guilty party, but my point was at least in part that this is one of the reasons “good writing” is not an absolute or objective thing. I have certainly missed jokes by lacking the assumed knowledge. They weren’t bad jokes. They were bad jokes FOR ME. I treasure my copy of Poyntz Tyler’s A GARDEN OF CUCUMBERS, but can’t loan it to my son. He lacks those cultural referents. It’s a good book for me, but a bad book for him–and at that point an objective standard of literature starts having problems.
For me, allusion-free writing would tend to be long and dull, but that doesn’t mean FINNEGAN’S WAKE is inherently superior to a work which uses fewer allusions.
And would that I knew how to engrave “Riki tiki tavi” on the hearts of men–especially students. I would settle, in a pinch, for getting them to be able to explain why they think something is so. You’d be amazed at the answers I get some days.

By: cperkins

cperkins — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 17:54:22 +0000

Oh, yes, I remember your quiz. I did it. It wasn’t that hard.

The students lack curiosity about such things. I used to think that people like that lacked curiosity about all things, but I’m now inclined to think that they don’t. They might have a ravening curiosity about anything affecting their favourite sports team, or most admired celebrity, or their families and friends, or cooking or clothes or any number of other things. They just don’t happen to have any curiosity about the way they are governed or the way other people live now or lived in the past.

And I assume that the culture (sub-culture?) they live in doesn’t require them to have this sort of knowledge, or they’d have at least a minimum bit – the same way people sometimes fake knowledge about fashionable books or classical music when they’re in milieus (or subcultures) that they believe requires such knowledge, or at least the appearance of having it.

Cheryl