Public Education

[Wild Bill]

Let's suppose we replaced mice with mouses, or the plural aircraft with aircrafts. Would they in any way reduce our ability to express the plural? On the contrary, in the case of aircraft above, it would make the language not only easier and more consistent, but more precise and thus capable of even greater complexity.

I find your suggestion to be doubleplusungood!

[Pliny]

And may I add, their ability to read, wirte and understand contracts and defend themselves and their legal rights in a court of law. This right should not limit itself to native English-speaking Canadians, but to all Canadians.

Sure we have official bilingualism, but that might not help a native who's weak in both official languages, or a French Canadian trying to sign a contract in English Canada where government doesn't guarantee official bilingualism in the private sector.

By the way, I'm not a native English speaker either.

I watched the video of Claude Piron promoting Esperanto and hadn't realized there was such a push to have it developed as an international language.

I speak one language - English. So I guess my support of it would be biased.

I think the success of English, where 10% of the world's population speaks it and the demand to learn it is above all other languages, is in it's ability to accommodate and adopt from other languages. French purists for example wish to keep the language from being polluted with foreign terms. I suppose I could be labeled an English purist and demand no linguistic changes be made. This is unreal of course. Languages either evolve or become stagnant and purity demanded in linguistics makes it stagnant and it will eventually disappear.

The general populace has to have something usable in linguistics or they will not learn it. As a form of communication, it is basically a means to convey concepts and ideas. My view of English and it's importance would, if I demanded it, end in it's demise just as the French purists are killing the French language.

English has been free to develop and evolve in areas such as technology without a language police to approve or disapprove of it's general use. It is popular because no authority is demanding purity. I demand only that it convey understandable concepts.

I learned something here and that is that if I had authority to make English compulsorily used and kept as pure as I like it then it would only be a matter of time that it would disappear from use.

Anyway I have to disagree with Mr. Piron in attempting to regulate language. Like my political beliefs, where I believe in the freedom of society to evolve in whatever manner it may without a central authority to engineer it, I think language has to be left to the general populace to use and evolve as they will without an authority dictating how it shall be used. Of course, that does not preclude having a record of it's evolution; an understanding of it's structure and fundamentals.

At least you make no apologies for your English, as does Mr. Piron, I found his apology a bit disingenuous.

Your command of English is exemplary. I only wish mine were as good.

[Pliny]

There;s nothing wrong with the English language. Some words can be difficult to spell, but it can be manipulated to produce music and peotry that are very melodic. I have always been able to write well....but I can't spell. I consider that to be a failing that I have, and I don't blame it on the education system. Heave knows, they tried to teach me to spell.

You should blame the education system it was up to them to teach you and they failed. I would think they didn't teach you phonics. They didn't teach me enough about writing. Now I can blame myself for not being able to learn it or not showing initiative. But why would I not be able to learn it and why would I not show initiative? I think I could learn, I believe I have the ability, and I believe you have the ability to learn to spell, as for initiative what killed it? Did any teacher ever ask you personally why you were having trouble spelling? Did they not notice that other kids also had trouble spelling? They did notice but they decided it must be some learning disability and never questioned their teaching methods or consulted the understanding of the student. It is simpler to label the person suffering dyslexia or ADD or something like that.

[Smallc]

I was never thought to have a learning dissability. Maybe that's part pf the problem. I don't pretend the system is perfect, but overall I think it does a good job.

[Pliny]

I was never thought to have a learning dissability. Maybe that's part pf the problem. I don't pretend the system is perfect, but overall I think it does a good job.

That isn't part of anyone's problem. It's an excuse for failure.

What is a good job?

The teachers' are frustrated, the results are not increasing with the increase in financing it receives, the children who don't learn are frustrated, the parents are frustrated. Is the job to ease frustration? It isn't working.

Whatever we are doing the system is becoming more frustrating for all participants or else we wouldn't have the need to be asking ourselves this question.

The majority of us muddle through the system but it seems the system is becoming more important than the product and the majority of us navigating through it successfully is becoming a smaller majority. Even you, yourself have a problem with it and you have accepted the fact that the problem lies with you. The fact of the matter is that you may have missed an important week in school being laid up with the mumps or the measles and the data you missed may be key to your success or failure. Or maybe your teacher wasn't really interested in making sure you understood your lessons and was just going through the motions of the job. Or, heaven forbid, was more interested in their benefits and rewards and their social status than teaching.

I was pretty good in school until grade 7. It was a struggle after that. I could say it was the fact that I moved to a different province but it wasn't. The system was definitely different. It seems the province I moved to required more of me than the school I left. I was used to being lazy and I fared fairly well. My new school expected more from me getting by was no longer a breeze and I struggled. I did ok the next year but I didn't find it easy. I wanted school to be easy. I got by but I remained pretty lazy and uninterested in learning. I went through the motions of being a student, basically.

So a system that demands we just go through the motions of our roles isn't very satisfying or dynamic.

Someone here has a quote by Mark Twain in their signature, I believe it goes, - "I never let schooling get in the way of my education." and that perhaps is the essence of the problem of education, the fact it becomes a system of schooling and only masquerades as an education.

The importance of schooling is in ensuring that tools for learning are developed. Learning itself is what needs to be encouraged and what is learned is not necessarily what needs to be stressed. Do we need to learn that caring and sharing are important and that relationships with others are important? We should realize that in our daily existence and teaching it is redundant and boring. The fundamentals of reading, writing and math are important and will be used everyday by the person learning them. Beyond that his choices of what to learn should be open to him. Perhaps, as regards education the young should be considered adults and responsible for their own education far sooner than they are but the system demands we treat them all like children in all aspects of their lives until eighteen.

One of the most valuable assets teachers could have but are not taught is how to be a good listener. Most problems students have could probably be resolved if teachers were as good at listening as they were at talking. Parents too could be better listeners. My turn to listen now.

Edited May 29, 2009 by Pliny

[Machjo]

"Velar fricative" I am always happy to learn new words and these were two I hadn't heard before. I looked them up in the dictionary and one thing I make sure to do is look up the root of the word. English is a conglomeration of languages, it's words come from different languages. The derivative of the word is, I find, very important to understanding it and it often gives me further insight into other words that may have origins in the same derivative. Both "velar" and "fricative" have a Latin root velar stems from velum meaning a Veil, covering or sail and refers to the soft palate, fricative from the same root as "friction", fricare meaning to rub.

What you are suggesting is a modernization of the spelling and an update of sounds that letters represent, phonetics essentially. I believe the relegation of our phonetic structure to being meaningless, irrational gibberish in building the English language is not dissimilar to what lost the technology of building the pyramids.

There is a reason for things and a lack of understanding of them makes them appear meaningless if one cares to find out though, it mysteriously develops rational meaning.

I love etymology myself too, but even without it, you still could have figured out the meaning of velar fricative just by reading its definition in the dictionary.

English words do come from verious languages, but they are anglicized inconsistently.

And finally, no I am not suggesting a revision, or as you call it, a 'modernization', of English spelling. In fact, I would oppose it on the grounds that it would cut native English-speakers of the next generation off from the literature of the past. My main purpose in the posts above was not to promote a revision of English spelling, but rather:

1. A correction of the suggestion that English spelling was phonemic, and

2. A correction of the assumption that rational spelling necessarily impoverishes a language. Many languages are phonetic; possibly even most. Does that alone necessarly impoverish them?

[Machjo]

I speak one language - English. So I guess my support of it would be biased.

Precisely why easier second language options in school could be of benefit. You would have benefitted more from fluency in an easier albeit less widely spoken second language than from a failure to learn a more difficult albeit more widespread one. It's of no use to you if you can't learn it.

I think the success of English, where 10% of the world's population speaks it and the demand to learn it is above all other languages, is in it's ability to accommodate and adopt from other languages. French purists for example wish to keep the language from being polluted with foreign terms. I suppose I could be labeled an English purist and demand no linguistic changes be made. This is unreal of course. Languages either evolve or become stagnant and purity demanded in linguistics makes it stagnant and it will eventually disappear.

Totally false. I anything, the maintenance of relative (and I stress relative) French linguistic purity is more likely to help promote the language as as second language, in that it reduces the occurrance of exceptions to rules and so makes the language more accessible to non-native speakers and thus more attractive. The relative success of English compared to French has to do with things other than the linguistic structure of the language itself. In fact, English is among the worst candidates of the ones I know to serve the role of international language from a strictly structrual standpoint. The main reasons for the success of English are:

1. The industrial revolution started in England.

2. The expansion of the British Empire was more successful than the French in part thanks to the industrial recolution.

3. British and later US military, economic and political might, especially after WWII. Many former US pilots became civilian pilots in the new airline industry. The computer and internet began in the US too.

Nothing to do woth any intrinsic quality in the language. As a literary language, English is beautiful, but as a legal language, even native English-speaking scholars acknowledge its poverty in precise grammar.

The general populace has to have something usable in linguistics or they will not learn it. As a form of communication, it is basically a means to convey concepts and ideas. My view of English and it's importance would, if I demanded it, end in it's demise just as the French purists are killing the French language.

English has been free to develop and evolve in areas such as technology without a language police to approve or disapprove of it's general use. It is popular because no authority is demanding purity. I demand only that it convey understandable concepts.

It's precicely this laissez-faire approach to English that have contributed to its having become increasingly ambiguous. I remember reading a good article on that from Japan, discussing how it was extremely frustrating for students to try to figure out the following as examples:

one billion = 10 to the power of nine or twelve?

corn = any local grain or maize specifically? A mean besides on the foot of course

elevator = besides the wingtip elevator, do we find it on farms or in tall buildings?

I remember having to edit an article translated from Chinese about the Chinese agricultural and other industries. It was a nightmare since they kept switching back and forth between US and British English and they couldn't tell the difference. They'd look up the word in Chinese and translate it into English oblivious of the fact that there are in fact many forms of English, divided by region and generation. It makes an interpretor's or a translator's job a nightmare when we're not sure if they're sing an older form of the language, or which regional form, etc. When it comes to business, contracts, etc. precision, not poetry, is of the essence. I'ver head too many nightmare stories of companies in China having to go to court over disputes caused by simple linguistic misunderstandings in the contract.

I learned something here and that is that if I had authority to make English compulsorily used and kept as pure as I like it then it would only be a matter of time that it would disappear from use.

Not necessarily. Look at an average dictionary or grammar book.They are in fact prescribing a certain spelling and grammar, and perhaps even pronunciation. This helps the non-native speaking learner. You yourself said you're unilingual. Trust me. When you're learning a second language, you want to know the rules. For an Arab, Al-siyara is a word he takes for granted. Not for me. I marvel at the technical beauty of the word:

al- = the, assimilated in pronunciation to as-

siyara from the root sayara, he went.

The paradigm i-a-a indicates a noun, a doer of the action, thus a doing machine, a car. Same with Ad-Dabbaba, slight vocalic pronunciation but the pattern still evident, crawling machine or crawling thing, a combat tank.

It often hapens that non-native speakers of a language know it better than their native counterparts since they take little for granted. They're aware of the rules and patterns. Why? Because that's what they look for when learning the language. You can't memorize every word after all, so you look for patterns that could provide shortcuts. Irrational grammar and exceptions are simply nuisances that stand in the way of that. You'd have understood that had you ever learnt a second language, especially outside its linguistic environment.

Anyway I have to disagree with Mr. Piron in attempting to regulate language. Like my political beliefs, where I believe in the freedom of society to evolve in whatever manner it may without a central authority to engineer it, I think language has to be left to the general populace to use and evolve as they will without an authority dictating how it shall be used. Of course, that does not preclude having a record of it's evolution; an understanding of it's structure and fundamentals.

I can agree with you when it comes to mother tongues, but not second languages, and especially not in essential communication. When a pilot is speaking with ground control, I should hope that they all agree on the same words and their precise, techincal meaning. And that takes centralized planning, development, and training. We can't allow chaos in that. Did you know by the way that an estimated 15% of air crashes are caused by miscommunication between pilots and ATC?! When lives are at stake, it's not the time for niceties like the freedom to use language as you wish. This applies to laws, science, technology and any other field where precise communication is essential. We who've done translation and interpretation are much more aware of ambiguities in language than most. Most communication is very ambiguous in English, an you'b be surprised at how much you just guess from context. But between cultures, it's nt as easy and that's where major errors can occur.

At least you make no apologies for your English, as does Mr. Piron, I found his apology a bit disingenuous.

Your command of English is exemplary. I only wish mine were as good.

My English is not perfect either. But I have been to enough international conferences to see just how... non-international English really is. Few speak it beyond the elites, academics, etc. Even in Quebec.

[Machjo]

You should blame the education system it was up to them to teach you and they failed. I would think they didn't teach you phonics. They didn't teach me enough about writing. Now I can blame myself for not being able to learn it or not showing initiative. But why would I not be able to learn it and why would I not show initiative? I think I could learn, I believe I have the ability, and I believe you have the ability to learn to spell, as for initiative what killed it? Did any teacher ever ask you personally why you were having trouble spelling? Did they not notice that other kids also had trouble spelling? They did notice but they decided it must be some learning disability and never questioned their teaching methods or consulted the understanding of the student. It is simpler to label the person suffering dyslexia or ADD or something like that.

We can't blame the school system alone. Sometimes it may be that the pupil comes from a broken home, and it might not always be obvious. For example, a iddle class family always bickering aobut money and abusing their chidren psychologically but never beating them physically. Such a pupil will naturally have a hard time concentrating in school. No matter how bright he is, his focus won't be on university, but on getting out of his house ASAP. For this reason, the school system eeds to be flexible enough to teach pupils what they need to know before leaving school. French as a compulsory second language is a luxury for the benefit of the elites only. As an alternative subject, fine. But it's too difficult as a compulsory one. And this is not because we have poor teachers. Even in Europe and Asia the rate of success in second-language learning is dismal at best and is thsu a waste of time for most.

[Pliny]

I love etymology myself too, but even without it, you still could have figured out the meaning of velar fricative just by reading its definition in the dictionary.

The derivation gives me a broader understanding.

English words do come from verious languages, but they are anglicized inconsistently.

I know of no rules of consistency.

And finally, no I am not suggesting a revision, or as you call it, a 'modernization', of English spelling. In fact, I would oppose it on the grounds that it would cut native English-speakers of the next generation off from the literature of the past.

We agree on that point for different reasons I guess. I suppose a second language would be the solution to maintaining that cultural aspect.

My main purpose in the posts above was not to promote a revision of English spelling, but rather:

1. A correction of the suggestion that English spelling was phonemic, and

2. A correction of the assumption that rational spelling necessarily impoverishes a language. Many languages are phonetic; possibly even most. Does that alone necessarly impoverish them?

On 1. It mostly is. There are exceptions, I agree.

On 2. Language is a means to communicate. If thought transference were possible it would be less impoverishing than language generally but then we would have issues of privacy. One of the main reasons thought transference would be an unpopular form of communication.

[Pliny]

Precisely why easier second language options in school could be of benefit. You would have benefitted more from fluency in an easier albeit less widely spoken second language than from a failure to learn a more difficult albeit more widespread one. It's of no use to you if you can't learn it.

I find I learn what I have to and it is easier if I want to. I don't think anyone who speaks one language fluently couldn't learn another.

There may be internal resistance to learning another, especially if the necessity is not there, or perhaps roadblocks to learning another language are not addressed.

For instance older people say they could never learn another language. They simply don't feel the effort will be of benefit. Agree that older people have difficulty and it certainly will prove more difficult than if you just went ahead and learned it.

Totally false. I anything, the maintenance of relative (and I stress relative) French linguistic purity is more likely to help promote the language as as second language, in that it reduces the occurrance of exceptions to rules and so makes the language more accessible to non-native speakers and thus more attractive.

I struck a cord here, I see. It may seem more welcoming to you and perhaps it is, but the fear of using the language wrongly would be slightly intimidating and to have a language police is a little bit arrogant as well. Not conducive to a good learning environment.

The relative success of English compared to French has to do with things other than the linguistic structure of the language itself. In fact, English is among the worst candidates of the ones I know to serve the role of international language from a strictly structrual standpoint. The main reasons for the success of English are:

1. The industrial revolution started in England.

And...you are saying, the countries with different languages had to invent words before they entered the industrial revolution or is it they needed to learn English first?

2. The expansion of the British Empire was more successful than the French in part thanks to the industrial recolution.

It was indeed more successful. I think the food in Britain had a lot to do with the British expansion and looking elsewhere.

3. British and later US military, economic and political might, especially after WWII. Many former US pilots became civilian pilots in the new airline industry. The computer and internet began in the US too.

Nothing to do woth any intrinsic quality in the language. As a literary language, English is beautiful, but as a legal language, even native English-speaking scholars acknowledge its poverty in precise grammar.

Almost all words in the English language have more than one meaning, especially the smaller ones which have about 20 different meanings. So I agree it lacks precision. Precision that is of necessity in important matters.

If we are arguing a point we must be clear and precise in our definitions and I am not familiar with other languages so I can't say whether English is the worst or not as regards that category. We find out only in our actions if we have understood precisely what we were supposed to do.

It's precicely this laissez-faire approach to English that have contributed to its having become increasingly ambiguous. I remember reading a good article on that from Japan, discussing how it was extremely frustrating for students to try to figure out the following as examples:

one billion = 10 to the power of nine or twelve?

corn = any local grain or maize specifically? A mean besides on the foot of course

elevator = besides the wingtip elevator, do we find it on farms or in tall buildings?

I remember having to edit an article translated from Chinese about the Chinese agricultural and other industries. It was a nightmare since they kept switching back and forth between US and British English and they couldn't tell the difference. They'd look up the word in Chinese and translate it into English oblivious of the fact that there are in fact many forms of English, divided by region and generation. It makes an interpretor's or a translator's job a nightmare when we're not sure if they're sing an older form of the language, or which regional form, etc. When it comes to business, contracts, etc. precision, not poetry, is of the essence. I'ver head too many nightmare stories of companies in China having to go to court over disputes caused by simple linguistic misunderstandings in the contract.

I don't find English to be that diverse, I do find it to be imprecise especially when it needs to be precise.

A slick politician can avoid answering any questions at all when he is asked them. For example, one here said that if he were elected there would be no new taxes. As soon as he was elected he raised taxes. There were no new ones but he raised existing ones. Fraudulent, but he thought it was shrewd and I am sure that those who voted for him thought it was shrewd too - unless they voted because of that one statement, then they probably thought they were ripped off. It was minimally, if not fraudulent, misleading.

There is some regional differences but they are mostly localized. The largest difference, I suppose, is between formal versions of English and American English. Most stay true to the Queen's English but systems of nomenclature may differ for certain subjects or be combined with the primary language.

Not necessarily. Look at an average dictionary or grammar book.They are in fact prescribing a certain spelling and grammar, and perhaps even pronunciation. This helps the non-native speaking learner. You yourself said you're unilingual. Trust me. When you're learning a second language, you want to know the rules. For an Arab, Al-siyara is a word he takes for granted. Not for me. I marvel at the technical beauty of the word:

al- = the, assimilated in pronunciation to as-

siyara from the root sayara, he went.

The paradigm i-a-a indicates a noun, a doer of the action, thus a doing machine, a car. Same with Ad-Dabbaba, slight vocalic pronunciation but the pattern still evident, crawling machine or crawling thing, a combat tank.

Is Ad-Dabbaba specific enough?

It often happens that non-native speakers of a language know it better than their native counterparts since they take little for granted. They're aware of the rules and patterns. Why? Because that's what they look for when learning the language. You can't memorize every word after all, so you look for patterns that could provide shortcuts. Irrational grammar and exceptions are simply nuisances that stand in the way of that. You'd have understood that had you ever learnt a second language, especially outside its linguistic environment.

I can understand that. I never did make any sense of masculine and feminine nouns in French. Most French people just say they know if something is masculine or feminine but there doesn't seem to be a rule they can tell me.

I can agree with you when it comes to mother tongues, but not second languages, and especially not in essential communication. When a pilot is speaking with ground control, I should hope that they all agree on the same words and their precise, techincal meaning. And that takes centralized planning, development, and training. We can't allow chaos in that. Did you know by the way that an estimated 15% of air crashes are caused by miscommunication between pilots and ATC?! When lives are at stake, it's not the time for niceties like the freedom to use language as you wish. This applies to laws, science, technology and any other field where precise communication is essential. We who've done translation and interpretation are much more aware of ambiguities in language than most. Most communication is very ambiguous in English, an you'b be surprised at how much you just guess from context. But between cultures, it's nt as easy and that's where major errors can occur.

I try and avoid guessing from context. Knowing what definition applies in context is best. A problem in ambiguity is perhaps due to thinking one knows what a word means but is unaware of another definition which gives the context a slightly different meaning or nuance.

My English is not perfect either. But I have been to enough international conferences to see just how... non-international English really is. Few speak it beyond the elites, academics, etc. Even in Quebec.

Don't be bashful, your English is very, very good.

Lots of people would like to learn it. If they desire to and need to, they will. They may begrudgingly learn if they are forced to but under such circumstance won't have any desire to use the language beyond the need and will hold some resentment toward it.

[Pliny]

We can't blame the school system alone. Sometimes it may be that the pupil comes from a broken home, and it might not always be obvious. For example, a iddle class family always bickering aobut money and abusing their chidren psychologically but never beating them physically. Such a pupil will naturally have a hard time concentrating in school. No matter how bright he is, his focus won't be on university, but on getting out of his house ASAP. For this reason, the school system eeds to be flexible enough to teach pupils what they need to know before leaving school. French as a compulsory second language is a luxury for the benefit of the elites only. As an alternative subject, fine. But it's too difficult as a compulsory one. And this is not because we have poor teachers. Even in Europe and Asia the rate of success in second-language learning is dismal at best and is thsu a waste of time for most.

Many people come from disadvantaged backgrounds. I don't know the percentages that are successful or not. But many who become successful like to say they triumphed over all odds. Perhaps if parents had better educations than the system provides, which I think emphasizes "schooling" and behavior and relationship training but fails, perhaps there would be fewer broken homes, less bickering about money and less psychological abuse of children.

We have to face the fact we are increasingly discontent with public schools whether we are staff, parents or students and increasing the finances does not seem to be anything but a pacifier to the system not an improvement.

[Martin Odber]

I would just like to know what everyone thinks of the quality of education being delivered in our public schools these days. Please share your opinions whether you live in a city or a small town, with reference to all grades starting at kindergarten.

I don't want this to become a teacher bashing discussion. We all know there are good teachers and not-so-good teachers, much like any profession.

A problem that I have is that it seems that some school divisions are being run like companies, without having the best interests of students in mind.

Our public schools are a mess. Do the things we teach in public school ensure that graduates are ready to make their way in today's world or do they just go through the motions. They are hardly the most advanced in today's world, we are lucky if we are even mildly competitive, why else would we need to brain drain other countries via immigration?

We live in a world that is leaping into this thing called globalization. If we were really on our toes, we would be leaping towards the new Microsoft schools which are leading edge technology. What is likely is that Canada will be the last country to embrace new technologies. We should, and could, be the first.

Don't blame the teachers when our children come up short. Our teachers, work for school boards, who work for the Canadian government, who supposedly works for us. Ours as in yours and mine, our oldthink is what holds our children back, and ours, is the responsibility. Have we pushed to ensure that every single child that leaves mandatory schooling is ready and capable to support themselves in a competitive successful fashion within our society? I don't think so. I think that we just go through the motions of sending them to school with the blind notion that "someone else" will look after it, and then shrug helplessly when they don't.

Our public school's success or failure, is our responsibility. How do our public schools outcomes, measure against the worlds most successful public schools? What are they doing that we are not? What steps need to be taken to ensure that ours are the top rated? Do we even know? Do we even really care?

We could have a referendum to see how many Canadians support putting the required resources into our public school system to make it one of the best in the world. Our public school system process's the largest group of young Canadians, why leave it set up to fail them?

warm regards,

Martin Odber

www.canadianreferendumparty.com

[BubberMiley]

In it's simplest version, 'Numo-' has a different meaning than 'pneumo-'.

Another idiosyncracy in the English language is how possession is always indicated with an apostrophe S, but not in the case of "its."

Edited May 31, 2009 by BubberMiley

[Machjo]

Additionally, you can't tell the difference between pneumo- and numo- in the spoken language.

[Pliny]

Do the things we teach in public school ensure that graduates are ready to make their way in today's world or do they just go through the motions. They are hardly the most advanced in today's world, we are lucky if we are even mildly competitive, why else would we need to brain drain other countries via immigration?

We live in a world that is leaping into this thing called globalization. If we were really on our toes, we would be leaping towards the new Microsoft schools which are leading edge technology. What is likely is that Canada will be the last country to embrace new technologies. We should, and could, be the first.

Don't blame the teachers when our children come up short. Our teachers, work for school boards, who work for the Canadian government, who supposedly works for us. Ours as in yours and mine, our oldthink is what holds our children back, and ours, is the responsibility. Have we pushed to ensure that every single child that leaves mandatory schooling is ready and capable to support themselves in a competitive successful fashion within our society? I don't think so. I think that we just go through the motions of sending them to school with the blind notion that "someone else" will look after it, and then shrug helplessly when they don't.

Our public school's success or failure, is our responsibility. How do our public schools outcomes, measure against the worlds most successful public schools? What are they doing that we are not? What steps need to be taken to ensure that ours are the top rated? Do we even know? Do we even really care?

We could have a referendum to see how many Canadians support putting the required resources into our public school system to make it one of the best in the world. Our public school system process's the largest group of young Canadians, why leave it set up to fail them?

warm regards,

Martin Odber

www.canadianreferendumparty.com

Martin,

You ask how Canadian schools can be competitive?

The idea is to eliminate competition. If there is a difference in quality it must be eliminated. All schools must be made equal. That way no comparison can be made and no comparison should be made.

Unfortunately, we can only make schools or anyone or anything equal to the lowest common denominator and it is done gradually by leveling the playing field and continuing to drop standards. Leveling the playing field means taking from some and giving to others. There is no thought of being the best - that is old think. There must only be thought of how to create "social justice" so that no one is considered better than another and we have all reached equality - at the level of the lowest common denominator of course. It is not possible to raise everything up to the highest common denominator and I think that is obvious - so the highest common denominator must be brought down.

Another unfortunate thing is that Government is not a zero-sum game of mutual benefit. For every benefit they provide they must take the resources from somewhere else. And besides, all they can provide in the way of help is money. In reality, that is the total sum of their "help". All of the "help" that society can provide is available in society already before government intervention occurs. Governments only ensure it itself gets paid and distributes the balance of their revenues where they deem necessary. They will borrow money if they can't take it out of the economy right away and get the taxpayer to pay it back with interest.

Your treasonous talk of "competition" is intolerable. The next thing you will probably be talking about and praising will be profits. Sheesh! We have to rise above these barbaric concepts and the easiest way to do it is to bring down our best. It doesn't cost anything except perhaps a watchdog agency to ensure no one excels and punishing those that attempt it - could even be a lucrative source of revenues for government. Actually, it is the only source of revenue for government but don't tell anyone.

[Pliny]

Another idiosyncracy in the English language is how possession is always indicated with an apostrophe S, but not in the case of "its."

This isn't so much of an idiosyncracy, Bubber. "It" is a pronoun such as "they". The possessive of "they" is theirs. What of the possessive "ours"- No apostrophe. He - his, she - hers. A proper noun shows possession with an apostrophe in order that the spelling is not changed when an "s" is added. Ponies or Pony's for example. "It's" is obviously a contraction since "it" is a pronoun.

[wyly]

This isn't so much of an idiosyncracy, Bubber. "It" is a pronoun such as "they". The possessive of "they" is theirs. What of the possessive "ours"- No apostrophe. He - his, she - hers. A proper noun shows possession with an apostrophe in order that the spelling is not changed when an "s" is added. Ponies or Pony's for example. "It's" is obviously a contraction since "it" is a pronoun.

I absolutely hated grammer in school which if you read my posts is obvious...english has far too many silly rules and is slow to adapt to change, matching the spoken word..

[Pliny]

I absolutely hated grammer in school which if you read my posts is obvious...english has far too many silly rules and is slow to adapt to change, matching the spoken word..

You must really hate it - You don't even spell it right.

I didn't like it much either. I remember in grade five I had to go to a class and take "phonics". On the way there I asked one of my classmates what phonics was? He said he didn't know. We took a lot of things which we didn't have a clue about.

My Grade six teacher did something that really helped my understanding. Every morning she wrote six uncommon words on the board and asked us to define and learn to use them by the end of the day. That little exercise helped me to understand a lot more about learning and the importance of words and I wanted to learn more words.

I still didn't catch on to grammar though. I wound up looking up the basic nomenclature after finishing school and am still not proficient in it. My punctuation especially sucks.

English has some good rules but the problem is that there seems to always be exceptions to the rule. I think this is probably because words are adopted from different languages, so a French word may be spelled as the French spell it.

Anyway, I don't believe we are getting our money's worth in education. but i guess the dollar becomes more and more worthless over time. Until, as Voltaire says of paper money, it eventually reaches it's intrinsic value of nothing.

[Molly]

SLOW to adapt to change?!!!!

The thing that makes it complex and difficult to learn is it's amazing flexibility and it's ever-changing, growing LIFE!

[Pliny]

Good point, Molly. If anything it changes too fast.

[Guest Mirax]

A problem that I have is that it seems that some school divisions are being run like companies, without having the best interests of students in mind.

I completely agree that schools are run like businesses, and I think this is particularly so with post-secondary institutions. I am currently doing my Masters degree right now, and looking back, I think half of the courses I took during my undergrad were all repeats of other courses. I think I learned about Locard's Exchange Principle in four different courses, wrote about the case of Daviault three times, and took entire classes about the same philosophers of law twice. Two courses, identical material. Learning about the same material over and over again is extremely tiresome, and I think it discourages students from moving on with their education. Mind you, I think university is wonderful, and gives people new perspective in life; however, I don't know why they make so many courses repeats.

As for high schools, from my own experience, high school did not help myself (or other students) how to really think critically and write a paper. It seemed like making a creative argument was the most important aspect of a paper in high school, regardless if the argument was absolutely frivolous. I also recall always having a topic chosen for me, yet choosing your own topic is possibly one of the most difficult and important parts of writing a paper. I recall my first year in university was just awful, and the worst part was having to write a paper. From my own experience, universities do not care that much about spelling or punctuation (unless you're majoring in English). They care more about the argument you make, and from what I've seen of current Freshmen, high schools do not really prepare students on how to form an argument. Plagiarism amongst Freshmen is also a terrible problem at universities, which implies students do not know how to cite their information properly.

On another tangent, one thing I love about Canadian high schools are the public speaking competitions. I think teaching all students how to speak in front of a large audience is an important tool they can take away. No matter what they choose to do later on, whether that be post-secondary or working, everyone has to get used to speaking up in public at some point!

Also, hello everyone, I'm new here.

[tango]

Welcome Mirax!

Some information on adult literacy in Canada:

http://www.nald.ca/library/research/booc/s...ry/building.pdf

While Building on our Competencies concludes that Canada still faces major literacy

challenges ten years after the release of the IALS in 1994, the report observes there are

reasons to be optimistic about our skills future. It notes that the majority of Canadians

aged 16 to 65 have average prose and document literacy scores at Level 3, the skill

level established as the minimum requirement for an individual to function effectively in a

modern knowledge-based society and economy.

There was some good news reported in terms of international comparisons. Canadians

outperformed their major North American trading partners, the United States and the

Mexican State of Nuevo Leon. In fact the Yukon Territory, Saskatchewan, Alberta and

British Columbia recorded quite high prose literacy scores that compare favourably with

those of Norway, which had the highest average scores among countries involved in the

2003 survey. These provincial/territorial jurisdictions also scored above the Canadian

average in all four skill domains, setting a standard of achievement for other Canadian

jurisdictions.

Overall, it's not such a bleak picture as some would paint it.

And despite our anecdotal observations, overall literacy is strongly related to age, with more literate adults among successively younger Canadians.

Edited June 16, 2009 by tango

[roof_top_eagle]

Personally I don't want my kids (when I have them) in public education. The public education system doesn't teach the worldview that I believe in. So I'd probably go private school if I can find a good one or home school my kids. This is why I'm starting my own business so that when I get married my wife doesn't have to work once the kids come. I want to be financially independent, debt free and capable of taking care of my family on my own without government intervention or assistance.

The public schools indoctrinate kids with a liberal, messed up word view. I don't want my kids brain washed by the gay rights, abortionist, etc, etc liberal worldview.

[Oleg Bach]

Public education is disrespectful of people in general - I say more education and less manipulating and social engineering in order to weaken and make more stupid compliant people.