SHORT COMMUNICATION 385
Making Schools Interesting
By
Roger Behra
Teachers,
parents, and students know that America´s public schools are not very
interesting places, they are not doing well or what is expected of them. They
are doing a poor job of preparing students for their future in America´s
culture. And it is so unnecessary. The question to be answered is: Why are
America´s public schools performing so dismally?
The blame has
to rest with the people in charge of deciding what is taught and how it is
taught. The decline started when the U. S. government got involved with money
and mandates. It´s had been a dismal and bad situation since then.
Soon,
education policy makers thought that all students ought to automatically desire
an academic education. Courses that would appeal to many students who could not
care less about academics were not considered worthwhile. Those courses were
left out of planning, and that proved to be a big mistake.
The reading
selections that were chosen to teach skills were not interesting to the
students. They were very boring, like correct history and science classes. Mat
curriculums totally ignore beneficial goals and task students with goals that
are beyond a useful developmental level.
Pupils that
attend home schools, private schools, and charter schools generally outperform
pupils in public schools. It must be understood that public schools are the
places where students who do not want to be there are there because they have
to be. They are the ones who drop out of school. Other students find out at
graduation time that they do not have enough credits to graduate. Some changes
must be made, but they are difficult to solve.
Schools must
offer a wider curriculum with the boring subjects eliminated as much as
possible. And the curriculum must be presented in more interesting ways. This
would help make schools a more enticing and fun place to be and officer a wider
range of opportunity for future success. It would certainly be a creditable
start.
R. B.
3-27-14
