What do children really need to learn about in school?

[dms1972]

Speaking of primary / elementary school age children or between the ages of 4 - 11. What sort of stuff do they need to learn about in school?

Do they need to learn about plastic surgery, facelifts, boob-jobs etc?
Do they need to learn about Transgendered people?
Do they need to learn about Big Pharma?
Do they need to learn about Catholicism and Contraception?
Do they need to learn about intensive farming methods?
Do they need to learn about Advertising self-regulation?
Do they need to learn about the Bell curve controversy?
Do they need to learn about Creationists?
Do they need to learn about Quebec Nationalism?
Do they need to learn about Homosexuality?
Do they need to learn about Subliminal Advertising?
Do they need to learn about Tax Reform?
Do they need to learn about the Fast Food industry?
Do they need to learn about Funeral Plans?

These are just a few of the multitude of controversial topics that they may or may not come up against at some point in their adult life (by which time they will have had a higher and perhaps a university education)

Devote limited time to each of these, or concentrate on Maths, English, Science, Art (painting and drawing) etc?

 

[Dave-W]

Readin’, writing and ‘rithmetic.

 

[TuxAme]

Logic and Classics desperately need to be taught.

 

[d taylor]

Need to learn to listen, keep their mouth closed,
just because you finish first does not mean you are the best (discounting areas of physical education or sport) but a big area when it comes to activities like writing, art, etc..,
to learn to follow directions, to raise their hand and wait to be called on, not to break in front of another student (that can apply to may adults also).
This list can go on, but here are a few.

 

[Ringo84]

Schools are for learning the skills and knowledge you need to carry on in the world ("readin', writin' and 'rithmetic, among other things). Churches are for religious education.

Public schools need to find a sweet spot between teaching marketable skills (like, say, programming or other job-related skills) as well as helping them to become well-rounded individuals. Knowing classic English literature isn't necessarily going to get you a job, but it's good to know because it's part of becoming a literate adult. Schools these days spend so much time teaching to tests (standardized exams) and trying to churn out efficient workers that they often miss other important skills.

I don't think it's bad for students to learn about Transgendered people. Learning about people who are different from you, and finding that those differences aren't really that major, is an important part of true tolerance. Gay people aren't going away. Some people are gay. That's OK. Rather than learning to hate and/or fear gay people, or view them as so different as to be completely alien, is to do them a disservice.

School also shouldn't be just about teaching respect for authority. A healthy respect for good authority is not necessarily bad, but that doesn't mean that children should be unthinking, uncritical automatons who accept what they're taught without question. They should not be taught to accept bad authority that tells them to break the law or to do immoral things. That's where civics and critical thinking come into play - both things that are sorely lacking in a lot of our world today.
Ringo

 

[mama2one]

our child subjects:

subjects are math, science, social studies, English language/spelling, and specials which they rotate & have two per day including art, phys. ed, music + 3 more


nothing listed in the OP is taught

 

[dms1972]

I don't think it's bad for students to learn about Transgendered people. Learning about people who are different from you, and finding that those differences aren't really that major, is an important part of true tolerance.

But why single out transgendered, does that not isolate them even more? Does learning not happen more or less naturally, in schools that have an ethnic diversity for instance, kids learn more or less naturally not about differences but how much they have in common by merely interacting with each other joining in tasks together, they learn that whatever differences there may be they have more in common, learn that many differences play little or no part when it comes to participating in lots of everyday stuff, that is until foolish educators decide to draw attention to them.

 

[dms1972]

Need to learn to listen, keep their mouth closed,
just because you finish first does not mean you are the best (discounting areas of physical education or sport) but a big area when it comes to activities like writing, art, etc..,
to learn to follow directions, to raise their hand and wait to be called on, not to break in front of another student (that can apply to may adults also).
This list can go on, but here are a few.

This is going into the discipline side of things and away from what is taught. I do recall teachers at school in my day who were more disciplinarian but not extreme in that, and I prefered those classes, and done better in them. A few other teachers could not control the class no matter what they tried, and those classes i hated. So I agree with you up to a point.

 

[Dave-W]

Logic and Classics desperately need to be taught.

Not in grade school.

 

[Ringo84]

But why single out transgendered, does that not isolate them even more? The learning happens quite naturally, in schools that have an ethnic diversity for instance, kids learn quite naturally not about differences but how much they have in common by merely interacting with each other, they learn that differences play little or no part when it comes to participating in lots of everyday stuff, that is until foolish educators decide to draw attention to them.

That sounds similar to the "if we don't talk about race, it'll magically disappear" canard. I agree with you that Trans people shouldn't be singled out, but the next big avenue for expanding our understanding of others seems to be people who were born one gender and feel more comfortable as another. Simply ignoring the issue won't make it go away.
Ringo

 

[Jamsie]

Not in grade school.

"Nine- and 10-year-old children in England who participated in a philosophy class once a week over the course of a year significantly boosted their math and literacy skills, with disadvantaged students showing the most significant gains, according to a large and well-designed study (pdf)."

Teaching kids philosophy makes them smarter in math and English

 

[dms1972]

That sounds similar to the "if we don't talk about race, it'll magically disappear" canard. I agree with you that Trans people shouldn't be singled out, but the next big avenue for expanding our understanding of others seems to be people who were born one gender and feel more comfortable as another. Simply ignoring the issue won't make it go away.
Ringo

The difference between transgender and race is this: studies that have been done (for example by The Portman Clinic, London, and Vanderbuilt University) have indicated 70 to 80 percent of children spontaneously lose these feelings over time (of gender dysphoria) this is known as desistence.

What’s Missing From the Conversation About Transgender Kids

The myth of the “transgender desistance myth”

I believe that with appropriate skill, sensitivity, direction most children could be helped with this sort of dysphoria, and to accept themselves as how they were born either boy or girl. That is what is needing to be talked about, that is were research needs to be done.

It is not right to start a child on a course that will post-pone their puberty using powerful drugs, leading to multiple surgery, continued drugs through their life, and that in the end doesn't seem make many who go through with it any happier.

Here are some recent news reports that people need to be aware of especially as many vitally important issues that need public awareness and debate are getting buried amidst the news about Brexit.

NHS transgender clinic accused of covering up negative impacts of puberty blockers on children by Oxford professor

NHS child gender reassignment 'too quick'

Governor of Tavistock Foundation quits over damning report into gender identity clinic

Gender identity clinic accused of fast-tracking young adults

Calls to end transgender ‘experiment on children’

Stop this trans exploitation of children

Suspend (Trans)gender Services at Tavistock Now

Workers at transgender clinic quit over concerns of 'unregulated live experiments on children' | Daily Mail Online

Tavistock’s Experimentation with Puberty Blockers: Scrutinizing the Evidence - Transgender Trend


Suicide rates are higher post transgender surgery than before.

Johns Hopkins Psychiatrist: Transgender is ‘Mental Disorder;' Sex Change ‘Biologically Impossible’

Long-Term Follow-Up of Transsexual Persons Undergoing Sex Reassignment Surgery: Cohort Study in Sweden

 

[ChristianGirl_96]

Right now I am concentrating on basic numeracy and literacy skills. We also do cooking and other household tasks too. This is a interesting article on life skills Life skills - Wikipedia

As part of the class we focus on good social skills too.

 

[timothyu]

Readin’, writing and ‘rithmetic.

Agreed along with the old ability to have an open mind and think for themselves. Too bad that fell out of favour. Giving people choice by pre-determining the choices is not democracy. Neither is blind allegiance.

Also 30 years ago schools dropped responsibility before rights and reversed it. Just happened at a time when school psychologists and resource types were trying to get a foot in the educational tenure door.

Oh yes and hard as it is to realize at the time, it is not always necessary everyone is on an equal footing in that everyone should come in first. Real life does not work that way and the world is now full of young disillusioned adults who wonder why they all can't start at the top or have it all. They have every right to blame the adults who sheltered them from the fact life gets hard.

 

[mama2one]

life is already hard for some elementary children

 

[timothyu]

life already is hard for some elementary children

Agreed and a perfect chance to reverse the no one left behind thing. Instead of bringing 'losers' to a 'winners' level, reverse the process to give the better off an understanding of the effects of the system. Or would that be seen as anti-capitalist?

 

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[Paidiske]

A second language (or one other than the primary language of that society) would be high on my wish list for young children (alongside the reading-writing-maths type basics). My daughter's school offers Chinese, and I'm very pleased about that.

As for the stuff in the OP, some of those items might realistically fall into science, learning how our society works, ethics or the like. I'd certainly like children to learn to analyse the messages aimed at them in advertising!

I think it's important that we not underestimate our kids or unnecessarily dumb them down. They are - we hope - growing into capable and responsible participants in a very sophisticated society, and the more we do to equip them for that, the better.

 

[dms1972]

A second language (or one other than the primary language of that society) would be high on my wish list for young children (alongside the reading-writing-maths type basics). My daughter's school offers Chinese, and I'm very pleased about that.

As for the stuff in the OP, some of those items might realistically fall into science, learning how our society works, ethics or the like. I'd certainly like children to learn to analyse the messages aimed at them in advertising!

I think it's important that we not underestimate our kids or unnecessarily dumb them down. They are - we hope - growing into capable and responsible participants in a very sophisticated society, and the more we do to equip them for that, the better.

Yes second language sound good, perhaps at higher school, or at the end of elementary, after all children of elementary age are only beginning to master their own language, pronounciations, spellings etc.

What I am really asking is how much if any controversial issues need covered at that age, and why single out one or two when there are dozens of controversies in the adult world. And that these often befuddle adults who have greater life experience, because of the complexity of them, why should young children with very little life experience have to be grappling with any of these complex topics?

 

[Paidiske]

Yes second language sound good, perhaps at higher school, or at the end of elementary, after all children of elementary age are only beginning to master their own language, pronounciations, spellings etc.

I disagree, only because it's easier to learn a second language when you're younger. But then, I come from a home where my parents spoke four languages between them, so that's just my normal!

What I am really asking is how much if any controversial issues need covered at that age, and why single out one or two when there are dozens of controversies in the adult world. And that these often befuddle adults who have greater life experience, because of the complexity of them, why should young children with very little life experience have to be grappling with any of these complex topics?

I guess the way I see it is that you can't shelter even young kids from some of these controversial issues. Transgenderism or homosexuality? Some of them will have a same-sex couple for parents, or in their families; older relatives or family friends who are transitioning or have transitioned. (I know one person whose father transitioned when she was a child). That stuff will be discussed in the playground even if not in the classroom. I think it's good that kids be given some understanding of and context for that, and certainly that they be discouraged from bullying on account of it. (For example).

Creationism; well, some will be getting that at home, so again, any decent science curriculum is going to have to put that in context too. And so on.

Quebec and funeral plans maybe not so much; but on the whole, life is complex, and I'm reluctant to pretend to kids that it's not.