School Curriculums

I was chatting with a young lady colleague today who has two little girls and we started to talk, in between working, about the different classes we had at school.

I was surprised to learn that needlecraft, cookery and other household type classes were no longer taught, which I think is such a shame.

Not having any children, I wondered what others thought about school curriculums these days, and perhaps what should still be taught.

Re: School Curriculums

I think the three Rs would be a start,then dometic sciences for girls and woodwork for boys, followed by manners and respect for elders.

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I suppose it's a sign of the times that the relevance of some lessons we took has been superseded by the likes of IT, citizenship and digital photography. There are far more choices available to the kids nowadays than we ever had.

Re: School Curriculums

Subjects will change in school mainly due to technology and social trends. Unfortunately, many of the things which should be taught have been brushed aside, especially by the forces of political correctness and the need to do away with anything considered old fashioned. (The thinking being that anyone 50+ could have never have possibly survived school).

Basic school discipline is the first thing missing. The teaching of respect and punishments around when I was at school meant the things which go on today were unthinkable. As mentioned, basic literacy, writing skills and fundamental numerology are solely missing partly due to the fact they are considered "old fashioned" and technology eliminates the need for them. Exams today are worthless with unlimited retakes by the pupil. Students can never "fail" anything, they are simply "deferred", (in case the word 'fail' upsets them). It is somehow 'right' to swear in class, in some cases bring knives and drugs into school. Anyone who is bullied gets removed from the class whilst the bully gets away with it.

Between the times when I left school and today, someone somewhere seriously lost the plot....

Re: School Curriculums

I totally agree, Annie, but there should be four Rs now, respect being the added one.

I don't know what citizenship means, Paul, so I'd like that to be explained if you don't mind.

Digital photography should not be part of a school curriculum though. If children have absolutely no interest in a subject, then such things shouldn't be forced upon them as their time is wasted.

I hated history and geography at school, but I had to sit through it, bored rigid, and religion was an anathema to me.

The thing is, we do learn more about certain subjects once we've left school, and those are the subjects that we become interested in as we get older.

The only things that I was interested in at school were the Sciences (physics, chemistry, anatomy and such like), English in all forms, and cookery.

Are languages still taught in schools?

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I think citizenship is like the social studies we used to have. And languages, yes, Sally could have done Chinese if she wanted to, but I think French is the only compulsory language.

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We never had social studies either so I don't know what that is. I didn't really enjoy French, but for some odd reason I was good at it in class and came top in exams.

I was, and am to this day, useless at maths. I'm okay with add-ups and takeaways (especially the local Indian) but I never understood the point of algebra, nor metriculation. I'd just sit there with a blank expression on my face, yet I was good in science class with chemistry etc. I've never worked that out!

One thing I'd bet a week's wage on though is, that I bet they don't have Mothercraft classes these days, or sexual learning.

We found it a hoot back then as the teacher was so embarrassed about teaching it that they had to bring in a nurse to lecture us about it! We were only 14 years old at the time though.

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They do have sex education classes, although it's more of a one off lecture in a couple of parts.

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Oh right. We also had to learn how to care for a baby as well, but these classes took place once a week in our final year of school. For 99% of us, we didn't have to think about that until years later though.

We had to learn the biology of making a baby, which I guess they don't really need to know these days.

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It's more aimed at the mechanics of not making a baby nowadays.