Russell Coker <russell@coker.com.au> wrote:
On Tue, 20 Nov 2012, "Trent W. Buck" <trentbuck@gmail.com> wrote:
English lit, now that is a subject that's pure child-minding. Should go back to teaching rhetoric and grammar.
The subject "English" should be about blogging, email, twitter, SMS, and writing technical documents - with probably about that order of importance.
Reading literature is valuable; so is essay writing for anyone who studies the humanities/social sciences. (Even in the natural sciences, beyond a certain point one has to be able to write papers/theses/dissertations).
If we are going to maintain the illusion that school is teaching skills that are relevant to work then we should be able to have schools implement practices that work in a commercial environment.
So... how to spend all day on facebook while pretending to use word? They cover that in the "IT" classes.
That's laughable indeed. I think there's an important role for serious school education intended to prepare people for rigorous academic study at university.