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Originally Posted by duga
I'm not sure if this is divergent or anything, but I've noticed a couple posts about how we are very focused on the "specialness" of kids, or even as adults as mr. dave pointed out. We want everything catered to us as individuals.
This is a very western idea. Aldous Huxley actually brought up a great point, and if you read his book "Islands", you will know what I'm about to talk about. Westerners are all about the idea of "you are a special snowflake...even when you fail at something, you are just special...put your mind to it and do whatever you want". Eastern thought is more focused on society as a whole. Everything you do is focused on how it contributes to everyone else in the bigger scheme of things. This is why Asian children are known to do much better in school. In fact, after living in Asia I can tell you first hand that even if someone does not like what they are tasked, they have the ability to just get the job done with nary a complaint.
Aldous Huxley felt the best kind of society was one that blended these two extreme forms of thought. The individuality of the west and the societal mentality of the east. I tend to agree, especially when it comes to education. I'm not sure of the best way to implement this, but I hope others can see the benefits in attempting this kind of change. Thoughts?
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First of all, Asian kids do not do better at school. This is a myth. They may have longer hours and work harder and achieve well in
their particular education system. They have a very different education system and if you compared it equally do education systems in Western countries they do not necessarily to better. In fact, recently Asia have been seeking out educators in countries like Australia to go over there and share their teaching philosophies. About two of my friends have scored jobs in Asia writing education and curriculum programs.
Secondly, I don't think it's necessarily treating kids as 'special' but focusing on the fact that they are all individuals and have different learning styles. It is a well known fact that the education system favours students who are visual learners by the way it is organised and lessons are delivered. However there are also auditory learners, kinesthetic learners, etc. I did a survey which involved testing people who had gone onto higher education and those who didn't. Most people who went onto university were visual learners, most people who didn't were kinesthetic or interpersonal learners.
I think an integral part of teaching is recognising students differences and seeing them as individuals. Not necessarily seeing them as 'special,' but knowing that they will all learn differently and that as a teacher you have to cater for this. This is another reason why I believe in equity above equality. If you give all the students the exact same equal thing, it's not actually 'equal' because the are all different and they all need different things.