The Mitigated Chaos Plan for School
@silver-and-ivory
…that’s true.
I don’t know what a good solution would look like, but it doesn’t have to involve any more high-IQ individuals than we have now, just a better distribution of resources schools already have.
I want to test solutions to the current system, and to find many different possible set-ups that are different from the one we have now. (They might not scale well, of course.)
Even improvement in a limited geographical area or to some minor aspects, for relatively affluent middle-class individuals, would be really valuable to me.
Roight, let me suggest my plan, which would only help matters that you want tangentially most likely.
Are you familiar with Spaced Repetition? It’s used in programs like Anki. The basic summary is this: your brain flags things as important by whether or not you use them, and forgets them gradually over time. Spaced repetition brings the item up again at a certain point in the forgetting, so that your brain goes “oh hey this came up again, it must be important, I better remember it!”
Gamification is also a thing, and I have a theory that a big part of why people don’t like school stuff is that it doesn’t feel applicable, or that it will ever be applicable. But while I do not enjoy math for its own sake, I feel almost no resistance to doing math when I have to in order to accomplish some other task.
I’d like @argumate to read this post, too, and probably a few of the others as well.
So here’s my proposal:
1. This will be primarily implemented as a computer program. It will be implemented on a custom computer system that is not easily compromised.
2. All textbooks will be presented in both a fuller, contextualized format, and as semi-atomic facts of information, ready for use for spaced repetition memorization.
3. Exercises will be split between grinding and synthesis. Synthesis exercises will sometimes be in the form of game-like programs that have a complex problem which the students must integrate their knowledge of the subject to perform. (That is, students must be able to take the knowledge and use it and apply it, not just repeat it.) Other times, for other subjects like English, they will be items like essays that are manually graded by teachers. Students earn resource points to attempt synthesis exercises through grinding exercises, which are the rote learning component intended to reinforce the knowledge and speed up processing (e.g. of doing math). If you fail the synthesis exercise, you may have to do more grinding to attempt it again.
4. The computer program will conduct a review of all the subjects the student needs to know, based on spaced repetition algorithms and data about the student and their previous performance. This prevents the constant information loss that is pervasive in the American school system.
5. All of this is individualized. Students go at their own pace, and graduate when it has all been completed, or are pushed out of the school system at 21.
6. Homework is mostly rare or non-existent. Instead, students will stay another hour or two at school. Homework is for doing exercises, which we are having them do at school.
7. The school day will be broken up by various social activities to let students’ brains relax in between blocks of studying, which will still be somewhat unified by subject of study to make #8 easier.
8. In addition to grading work, teachers will also act as tutors to individual students. Students will be grouped in classes with students who are in a similar position of progress within the system. Teachers will go around the room answering various questions and helping students with items they are having trouble with. There may be some small lecturing sections, maybe.
The following is less necessary, but additional depending on your balance of Nationalism/Capitalism/Technocracy/etc.
9. Students will be awarded points based on a mix of (about 1/3 each) progress, attendance, and and percentile academic standing within their school. These points can be spent on a very larger variety (over 100) of uniform parts, snacks, media, and other items at participating retailers. This has the virtue of aligning the school’s social hierarchy more closely with the desired outcome of learning & academic performance, as well as giving students practical experience with small amounts of “money”.
10. Research shows that teaching math below a certain age doesn’t actually accelerate learning progress on it much at all, so for very young students, the system will focus on “moral/social” education and socialization and potentially language skills.
