Vern Kays
At 10:37 AM 10/25/1999 -0500, David Beach wrote:
>Bottom line is this folks. When a system is wrong, there needs to be a
>"reset" button.
>
>The disease is the fact that we have let attention spans decline in our
>society. We are all addicts of "brain candy". Those fast-paced programs
>that we can tune out while at the same time watching them. The 15-second
>sound bites that we let pass for news. The brainless, non-educational video
>games we let our children play (using them as a baby sitter) when we could
>be inducing them to be out doing something, reading something, learning
>something.
>
>We have produced a generation of students who are merely reacting the way
>they have been taught to act by the society in which they live. The
>chronological age of students is the same, but their world of experiences
>are certainly different. The problems that we face in any academic field
>still require that a person or group of persons get together, concentrate on
>the problem at hand, and then work together for a solution. What we've done
>is produce a bunch of people to not concentrate and to not be able to break
>the problems they face down into parts that they can analyze and handle.
>
>The best learning in math still comes down to a student, a piece of paper, a
>pencil and a brain in full concentration upon the concepts that they are
>trying to apply to solve the problem.
>
>It's not that students can't learn. It's that we have been extremely
>successful in teaching them the wrong things.
>
>David Beach
>
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