A lot of the current education system aims to give children skills that they can apply to the job market as it existed 20 years ago or so. I think children would be better-advised to master more general skills that could be applied to a range of possible rapidly changing worlds: character skills like resilience, flexibility, industriousness, rationality, social responsibility, attention, caution, etc.
Come to think of it, such skills probably represent more reliable “investments” for us grown-ups too.
Can you give examples of curriculum elements that you think are aimed at the world of 20 years ago? The usual criticism I see is that school is barely connected to the needs of the working world.
Not exactly a response but some things from my experience. In elementary school in the late 90s we studied caligraphy. In high school (mid 2000s) we studied DOS.
In the late 80′s, I was homeschooled, and studied caligraphy (as well as cursive); but I considered that more of a hobby than preparation for entering the workforce of 1000 years ago.
I also learned a bit about DOS and BASIC, after being impressed with the fractal-generating program that the carpenter working on our house wrote, and demonstrated on our computer.
They were teaching us how to make handwriting beautiful and we had to exercice. The teacher would look at the notebooks and say stuff like “you see this letter? It’s tilted in the wrong direction. Write it again!”.
A lot of the current education system aims to give children skills that they can apply to the job market as it existed 20 years ago or so. I think children would be better-advised to master more general skills that could be applied to a range of possible rapidly changing worlds: character skills like resilience, flexibility, industriousness, rationality, social responsibility, attention, caution, etc.
Come to think of it, such skills probably represent more reliable “investments” for us grown-ups too.
Can you give examples of curriculum elements that you think are aimed at the world of 20 years ago? The usual criticism I see is that school is barely connected to the needs of the working world.
Not exactly a response but some things from my experience. In elementary school in the late 90s we studied caligraphy. In high school (mid 2000s) we studied DOS.
By “calligraphy” do you mean cursive writing?
In the late 80′s, I was homeschooled, and studied caligraphy (as well as cursive); but I considered that more of a hobby than preparation for entering the workforce of 1000 years ago.
I also learned a bit about DOS and BASIC, after being impressed with the fractal-generating program that the carpenter working on our house wrote, and demonstrated on our computer.
They were teaching us how to make handwriting beautiful and we had to exercice. The teacher would look at the notebooks and say stuff like “you see this letter? It’s tilted in the wrong direction. Write it again!”.
This was a compulsory part of the curriculum.