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jcd writes:
"The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the primary backer for the inBloom educational grading and service (which also acts as a platform for third-party applications), is catching flak for its role in encouraging the outsourcing of US Education. The article (cited by RMS today) argues that though the Common Core is a scary new concept that takes power away from state and local school governance, the real danger is allowing corporate enterprises to have so much control over our classrooms. The Washington Post also reports a case where Pearson included corporate logos and promotional materials inside its test booklets."
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Backlash for Gates Foundation's Education Plans
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(Score: 2, Interesting) by Jameso_ on Wednesday February 19 2014, @12:52AM
I used to think that kind of thing might be a good idea until I attempted to tutor a student who was taking an "integrated math" class at a private school. The book, in an effort to give everything "context," had very poorly defined chapters that were an inscrutable morass of different topics, offering no opportunity to solidify one concept before flitting on to the next. What's more, every single problem in the book was a story problem, often making reference to information from previous problems, in an attempt to form some kind of hypothetical real-world narrative out of the concepts.
The kid was really struggling, and I tried my best to help him, but to solve even one problem required explaining so many different concepts all at once that it was impossible to find any conceptual grounding. I eventually had to just tell his mother I couldn't help and suggested they talk to the teacher to see if there was anyone at the school who could try to tutor that mess of a class. Honestly, if I had been subjected to a class like that, I'm certain I would have failed as well.
In short, I found tutoring to be most effective when a specific concept was outlined that could then be practiced until the student felt confident enough in their grasp of it that they would be emboldened enough to try to apply what they'd learned to something more substantial. Mixing everything up can be fun for the kids who already get it, but if someone is struggling, bombarding them with constantly changing topics just causes them to become overwhelmed and shut down completely.