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Open letter to the Montreal Gazette
It's been a while since I did my "Response to Newspaper Stupidity" posts. But today I wrote a letter to the Gazette in response to this opinion piece in today's paper. Here it is:
I disagree with Harry Sterling's assessment of Canadian students. ("Educating our kids: We need to aim higher," Gazette, A27, December 29) Where Mr. Sterling decries our educational system, I'd like us to look a little deeper at the results.
First, Canada ranked in the top 10 in all three categories of the International Student Assessment. Fifth in the world for reading! I think this is cause for celebration, not hand-wringing!
Second, if the ISA test is anything like the SAT or other standardized tests, it assesses students' ability to take tests, and very little else. It doesn't measure their creativity, team-work, innovation, or real-world problem solving abilities. It may or may not have any correlation with how well these students will do in the workplace.
Third, what is the cost of the Asian nations' success? I've heard that students are forced to do schoolwork and homework to the exclusion of almost everything else. I'd rather my child have a chance to play and enjoy being young, even if that means that Canada is "only" seventh in the world.
Canada should, of course, continue to improve its school systems. It should expect the best from its students. But I would look deeper into the ISA's results before we start bemoaning the state of education in Canada.
I disagree with Harry Sterling's assessment of Canadian students. ("Educating our kids: We need to aim higher," Gazette, A27, December 29) Where Mr. Sterling decries our educational system, I'd like us to look a little deeper at the results.
First, Canada ranked in the top 10 in all three categories of the International Student Assessment. Fifth in the world for reading! I think this is cause for celebration, not hand-wringing!
Second, if the ISA test is anything like the SAT or other standardized tests, it assesses students' ability to take tests, and very little else. It doesn't measure their creativity, team-work, innovation, or real-world problem solving abilities. It may or may not have any correlation with how well these students will do in the workplace.
Third, what is the cost of the Asian nations' success? I've heard that students are forced to do schoolwork and homework to the exclusion of almost everything else. I'd rather my child have a chance to play and enjoy being young, even if that means that Canada is "only" seventh in the world.
Canada should, of course, continue to improve its school systems. It should expect the best from its students. But I would look deeper into the ISA's results before we start bemoaning the state of education in Canada.
no subject
1) Japanese students are no longer required to attend reckoning school after their normal school days, as they were befoe 1989, but the tradition remains strong. Many Japanese teachers find that students are getting most of their guided practice work done outside of the traditional school day, and so they feel freer to introduce more theoretical topics.
2) Singapore is a special case. It's very close to Malasia, a much poorer country. Malasian laborers commute into Singapore to be dock workers, domestics, or factory workers, but aren't allowed to settle in Singapore itself, so they commute back to Malasia to live. So the students who take international tests as Singapore residents are almost universally well-off kids from upper-class families who value education and can afford whatever remediation they think appropriate. It would be like looking at the Northwestern Chicago suburbs as its own country.
None of these excuse otherwise poor performance from other nations. (The U.S. is ranked quite far below Canada, for example, and I'm not going to claim it's because snow makes kids smarter.)
no subject
The ISA goes beyond the typical standardized tests. It does require higher-level thinking skills (as does the SAT, especially with the writing portion.
I am not sure if akitom referenced it, but in this case, Singapore equals China. The test was not given in the rest of China.
What's really surprising for the Chinese kids (beyond the fact they come from the best schools), the test they need to take to get into college is one of rote memory, not thinking skills.
Excellent piece on this on NPR.