What pissed you off today?

[Aurelia_Malys]

Really? What fresh hell is this?? I am so glad my kids are out of school. I worry for grandkids however. I really do...

I teach middle school and while I understand the theory behind the common core standards (which are leading us to informational text over literature), there are many problems with the educational system that are being pushed aside for the new "easy" push toward science, technology, engineering, and math. I worry that we are looking at surface fixes that don't address underlying problems. I literally and truly have students in my 7th grade class who are on a 2nd grade reading and comprehension level who will be continually passed on through school. And no push toward STEM classes or reading informational text will make those students any more prepared for the work force in their next 6 years of schooling.

 

[Ropebunny]

American literature classics are to be replaced by insulation manuals and plant inventories in US classrooms by 2014.

A new school curriculum which will affect 46 out of 50 states will make it compulsory for at least 70 per cent of books studied to be non-fiction, in an effort to ready pupils for the workplace.

Books such as JD Salinger's Catcher in the Rye and Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird will be replaced by "informational texts" approved by the Common Core State Standards.
Suggested non-fiction texts include Recommended Levels of Insulation by the the US Environmental Protection Agency, and the Invasive Plant Inventory, by California's Invasive Plant Council.​

<Sigh> Full article here.

I have no words for this. And here I thought the Kiwi education system was in trouble. Well, time to think about home-schooling I guess...

 

[Netzach]

I teach middle school and while I understand the theory behind the common core standards (which are leading us to informational text over literature), there are many problems with the educational system that are being pushed aside for the new "easy" push toward science, technology, engineering, and math. I worry that we are looking at surface fixes that don't address underlying problems. I literally and truly have students in my 7th grade class who are on a 2nd grade reading and comprehension level who will be continually passed on through school. And no push toward STEM classes or reading informational text will make those students any more prepared for the work force in their next 6 years of schooling.

It's things like this that make me understand the impulse toward something like No Child, even though that winds up being half the problem. Just throwing more standardized garbage at everyone doesn't raise the standard.

Of course if you actually gave someone Walden or Silent Spring or any of the myriad science related non fic benchmarks, someone's going to complain about evolution or reality. Shit the rest of the world can hardly believe we're allowing onto the table.

 

[Red Sonja]

http://www.albertmohler.com/2012/12/06/the-injustice-of-helpful-parents-yet-more-insanity/

Essentially, the President of France wants French kids to stop doing homework. Why? Because some kids have parents who are engaged and active in their child's schoolwork and that just isn't fair to those kids that do not.

How long til this drive for standardization makes it here?

 

[midwestyankee]

It's things like this that make me understand the impulse toward something like No Child, even though that winds up being half the problem. Just throwing more standardized garbage at everyone doesn't raise the standard.

Of course if you actually gave someone Walden or Silent Spring or any of the myriad science related non fic benchmarks, someone's going to complain about evolution or reality. Shit the rest of the world can hardly believe we're allowing onto the table.

Actually, the Common Core curriculum movement can be traced to a complete disillusionment with NCLB, as it posits that schools should develop curricula on their own, though using certain core principles. Where NCLB is all about metrics, Common Core is all about content. Like any broadly applied philosophy, it has its strengths and weaknesses. No one is being required to read technical manuals on insulation but the capacity to follow the writing in such manuals is, in fact, a pretty useful thing. Schools that choose to drop Catcher in the Rye from their reading lists are doing so not because Common Core tells them to, but because they choose to do so. From what we've seen in our area - and I know some of the more active Common Core thought leaders around here - some schools are using CC as a blind to make changes that they think will make them less of a target of tax-reduction fetishists.

 

[Loverskitten]

what pissed me off? My own stupid hypocrisy.

 

[Sir_Winston54]

WTF?

A blue whale-sized asteroid (~65 feet/20 m.) passes within 32,000 miles (51,500 km.) of earth - that's approximately one-quarter the distance between earth and moon! - and it doesn't make front pages, lead story (or at least featured story) on the nightly news?

A smaller (15 ft/4.5 m.) asteroid passes within 8,950 miles (14,400 km.) of earth, closer than the orbits of geosynchronous satellites, and IT doesn't make front pages, lead story (or at least featured story) on the nightly news?

Come on, folks! If we're going to have an apocalypse, at least let us know an hour or two in advance! K?Thx!Bye!

Click the "WTF?" at the top for the Wired article.

 

[midwestyankee]

WTF?

A blue whale-sized asteroid (~65 feet/20 m.) passes within 32,000 miles (51,500 km.) of earth - that's approximately one-quarter the distance between earth and moon! - and it doesn't make front pages, lead story (or at least featured story) on the nightly news?

A smaller (15 ft/4.5 m.) asteroid passes within 8,950 miles (14,400 km.) of earth, closer than the orbits of geosynchronous satellites, and IT doesn't make front pages, lead story (or at least featured story) on the nightly news?

Come on, folks! If we're going to have an apocalypse, at least let us know an hour or two in advance! K?Thx!Bye!

Click the "WTF?" at the top for the Wired article.

Maybe they didn't want to stir up Ben Affleck's need to go plant a bomb on the asteroid.

 

[Loverskitten]

I can't seem to shake this depression funk I've been in lately.

 

[Beck31]

I can't seem to shake this depression funk I've been in lately.

I can symhphathize

 

[midwestyankee]

I can't seem to shake this depression funk I've been in lately.

Maybe you need to get a dog.

 

[Aurelia_Malys]

Stupid people who are pretenders who get upset when you try to have a genuine conversation with them and they act like you are being bitchy because they have no idea what they are talking about.

 

[Loverskitten]

Maybe you need to get a dog.

Have 3 :/

 

[Red Sonja]

Stupid people who are pretenders who get upset when you try to have a genuine conversation with them and they act like you are being bitchy because they have no idea what they are talking about.

I can't fix stupid... but I can tell you that duct tape will muffle the sound.

 

[LadyVer]

Having to run around and spend time to correct someone elses's screwup.

 

[Beck31]

The internet went down for no reason.

 

[Sir_Winston54]

The internet went down for no reason.

There's always a reason. Either you just don't know what the reason was, or your ISP isn't telling you because they think you're like most of their customers and aren't smart enough to need to know why. But there's always a reason, for everything... well, except for certain bits of human behavior.

 

[Aurantica]

Headaches in the mall with stupid Christmas music nattering on and on in my ears.

 

[Loverskitten]

Hey I know, I'll turn my insomnia productive by sitting up in bed and not only watching TV but also conditioning the $1 leather jackets I picked up last weekend. Until I spilled my expensive leather conditioner all the fuck over my bed!!!!!!!! Fuck

 

[seela]

Google skillz: fail.

Also, no one wants to have mulled wine with me.

 

[the captians wench]

Google skillz: fail.

Also, no one wants to have mulled wine with me.

I would.

 

[Beck31]

What pissed me off today? Stuff. Lol.

 

[Loverskitten]

UGH I should have bid higher on a couple things!!!!! I have non buyers remorse, bad.

 

[seela]

I would.

Aww, wenchie.

 

[eglazier61]

The rudeness of some people