Reply #64: It's the teachers and the process.

[Gregorian]

First, I want to say that I hate the so-called Socratic method. It's nothing but a tool for weeding people out in the process of getting students ready for the work force. There is nothing wrong with "spoon feeding". I made it through five years of calculus, and even though I am good at math, I hated every second of it, except the lectures. I loved learning.
What I mean is that school is not a place for learning as much as a place for weeding out. That is just plain wrong.

I forgot to add one very important thing- something crititcally missing from not only math, but from most other subjects (technical subjects) is application. I spent years studying mathematical techniques without ever knowing what they were used for. For me, it is absolutely critical that I know what something does. As a result, I will never use calculus. I wasted valuable years of my life, and the university's by not knowing what I was studying for. Sure a restoring force is used to model the way a boat slows down in water. That was about as close as any example to learning what my studies were used for. But that doesn't cut it. In order to really learn, it would take twice as long for students to go through college. But time is money. Ultimately it boils down to population. With this many people trying to get degrees, we cannot take the time to personally make sure they all learn. I'm affraid most of my anwers to problems boil down to that one denominator. Population. We could do a better job, but we don't have the time to teach them all.

I just finished a book where the author told of his experience in a math class. Half the class was failing. Then one day a substitute teacher showed up to teach the remainder of the course. The teacher took it upon himself to make sure that every student learned the subject, even if it meant Saturday classes on the side. And he played volleyball with them after class. He said that if a student failed, then he had failed. The entire class passed, and not only with good grades, but with an enjoyment for math. In fact, the author went on to major in the subject, after nearly failing.

THE BOTTOM LINE- as money becomes more important, so does time. And then we all suffer. Teachers don't have time to teach; Parents don't have time to parent. Society becomes more like a bank, than a place of enjoyment.