--------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 265 EDUCATOR Ref: DB400047 Date: 07/01/96 From: MATT SMITH Time: 10:28pm \/To: DAN TRIPLETT (Read 4 times) Subj: Re: Discipline DT> School problems go with the territory. Still, I think that the DT> majority DT> of students go to school for the right reasons. True, but the few really bad apples are a great strain on both other students and the faculty...just like K-12! DT> MS>read! Profs _do_ face serious discipline problems. Ask any DT> MS>campus-police chief about how much of his campus's rapes and DT> MS>vandalism are related to intoxication. DT> DT> Now drinking and the problems produced are not a college problem but DT> a DT> societal one -- something you as a lawyer should be aware of. True, but irrelevant to the issue of whether excessive drinking is more a problem for profs than for K-12 teachers. HS seniors are prohibited from drinking on campus or even coming to school intoxicated under strict disciplinary rules and are further kept from doing so by the fact that they live with their parents, but college freshmen the same age have none of these restraints. (We both know that the legal drinking age laws aren't enforced much on campuses.) DT> Joke> Drunk student CAN be expelled and are if they have persistent DT> problem. As far as drunk students in public schools...the same is DT> true...they can be expelled...drinking on campus is not tolerated It takes a whole _lot_ more to get a college student expelled for drunkenness or excessive drinking than it does for a HS kid the same age. (Has any college kid recently been expelled or suspended for just bringing a six-pack on campus, which is the norm if a HS kid is caught with one?) Also remember that the college kid is no longer living with his parents, and is living without their restraint for the first time in his life. --- Simplex BBS (v1.07.00Beta [DOS]) * Origin: NighthawkBBS, Burlington NC 910-228-7002 HST Dual (1:3644/6) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 265 EDUCATOR Ref: DB400048 Date: 07/01/96 From: RON MCDERMOTT Time: 10:56pm \/To: DAN TRIPLETT (Read 3 times) Subj: RESEARCH RELIABILITY DT>Just a thought.....might be of some fun to discuss the reliability DT>of research. As someone who is science-trained, I dispair of "research" regarding socialogical issues such as education... It is EXCEEDINGLY difficult to isolate single factors, and we are instead forced to deal with statistical inferences... As you must be aware, those inferences are often colored by the observers' point of view, background, and whatever ax they happen to be grinding at any given time... It isn't the same as observing chimps in a cage! ;-) DT>There exists an acceptable body of research that helps drive DT>our educational direction. As a confirmed cynic, I would argue that rather than being driven by an "acceptable body of research", we are instead driven by special interests, monetary constraints, public opinion, personal opinions, fads, and smoke and mirrors, to name just a few! DT>Further thoughts? There you go! ;-) ___ * MR/2 2.26 * See the Future; See OS/2. Be the Future; Run OS/2. --- Silver Xpress Mail System 5.4P1a * Origin: The Dolphin BBS Pleasant Valley NY 914-635-3303 (1:2624/302) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 265 EDUCATOR Ref: DB400049 Date: 07/01/96 From: RON MCDERMOTT Time: 10:56pm \/To: MELVIN BILLIK (Read 4 times) Subj: MATT SMITH MB>I have been a lurker for quite awhile, and I have been posting more of MB>late. I am concerned with the derogatory remarks made towards Matt Smith. There is some history to which you have not been privy.. MB>I may not always agree with what Matt says, but I think his posts HAVE MB>been reasonably intelligent and well-stated. There has been SOME improvement in this regard over time.. MB>Most of our posts are anecdotal in nature. Very few of us are MB>pontificating with reams of studies to cite. Matt has had a tendency (marked) of making claims which border on the ridiculous; when called on these, he tends to evade the issue, dredge up ancillary issues, etc... Most here have, as a result, become extremely suspicious of Matt's motives and/or veracity... Many came to consider him excessively annoying, and perhaps purposely so... He HAS improved somewhat, which is why he's still here and not banned or restricted, but his arguments are still extremely thin.... Had there NOT been the prior problems, I suspect Matt would be treated differently; that's a shame, but it's also understandable.... ___ * MR/2 2.26 * I don't hate Windows - It runs great under OS/2 WARP! --- Silver Xpress Mail System 5.4P1a * Origin: The Dolphin BBS Pleasant Valley NY 914-635-3303 (1:2624/302) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 265 EDUCATOR Ref: DB400050 Date: 07/01/96 From: RICK PEDLEY Time: 11:34am \/To: RON MCDERMOTT (Read 3 times) Subj: 'puter-tech curriculm -=> Quoting Ron Mcdermott to Bob Anderson <=- RM> I was suggesting here that working with the CLI (command line RM> interface) is probably pointless since so much is now done RM> using a GUI... The GUI also helps prevent "accidental" damage RM> being done which is all too easy using CLI... Regrettably, no one seems to understand anything about even the simplest things like file and directory structure anymore. I saw the same phenomenon happen with the Mac in '84; a file is dragged and dropped into the wrong "folder" (because there were a bunch overlapping one another on the desktop) and suddenly that file has completely "vanished". A friend of mine teaches in a high school where all the main office secretaries use Macs for word processing. He'd get called to the office about once a week because a secretary had "lost" a file. Since none of them knew what a file is, or a directory, or even what a hard drive is, if a file was somehow misplaced, it was gonzo. Last week I was over at someone's place helping him install my gradebook program under Win 95. He thought a file is a folder, and a directory and a folder are two different things. He thought there is only one directory, Windows 95, on his C: drive, and every- thing he installed was going into that -- somewhere. He'd downloaded a few files by FTP or with his web browser, but he didn't know where they'd gone to. And if he ever finds them he won't know what to do with them since they are archives and he doesn't have the least clue what to do with an archive. And so it goes. The problem is Windows isn't nearly so good as System 7.x at hiding the underpinnings, and when the slightest thing goes wrong, it's like trying to pick up dimes wearing oven mitts; Windows just gets in the way when serious work needs to be done. A CLI does exactly what you tell it to do -- which is why it can be so dangerous :) To anybody who just got his first computer: put away the damn mouse and the stupid desktop with all the clicky pictures, get a book on DOS ("DOS For Dummies" will do just fine), and learn how your machine actually works at the DOS command line level. Then and only then should you use a GUI like Windows, all the while assimilating that with your good understanding of the underlying operating system, so the GUI does what it was originally intended to do: make ordinary computer tasks simpler to perform, NOT reduce intelligent thought and planning to brain stem reflexes revolving around the mouse-click. BA>Wonderful idea. This brings up another point though,programing. BA>The utility of batching in dos is self evident, but what about other BA>kinds of programing.....say in qbasic, or, logo? What MS should do is package a stripped down version of Visual Basic with Win 95, just as they did with QBASIC and DOS. There's no reason kids shouldn't start with VB right now, at the appropriate level of complexity of course. RM> you're going to lose them.... Let them "play" with a GUI.. RM> Any formatting, etc, let them do from the GUI. Forget RM> programming; if one out of 200 goes anywhere with programming RM> it'll be a miracle... This is "old think" Ron. The only workers there'll be in twenty years is "information workers". There may still be relatively few pure programming jobs around (i.e. systems level, from the ground up, "close to the iron"), but there will be all sorts of intermediate programming positions, even if it's just assembling re-usable objects to create a custom application, or using some program to create web pages (I'm using current terminology here solely for illustration; who knows what awaits us in 20 years?). The fact is any kid who learns to program _right_now_ will find himself virtually guaranteed a job if he turns out to be a half-decent programmer. As in any other other field, the cream rises to the top. I know a bunch of guys right now getting into college-level programs, and the information technology programs are bursting at the seams. These are guys who until now had "McJobs", in their late twenties, with no time left to lose. And they are getting good jobs when they graduate. RM> Wordprocessing RM> is big; they're going to need it, and it's easy enough to get RM> them to write a report on what they did on a given day... What they're going to do Ron, is speak into a small microphone, whereupon the converted speech-to-text will be passed through spelling and grammar-checking filters. "Keyboarding" (geez I hate that word) will virtually disappear within five years, except as a backup manual method for phossilized physics teachers ;-) RM> * MR/2 2.26 * WIN95: Start me up,...you can make a grown man cryyyyy! Sure -- make him use OS/2 instead! coffeerp@adan.kingston.net ] COFFEE MUG SOFTWARE ] ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.20 --- InterEcho 1.18 * Origin: CrossRoads * Kingston, Ont. (1:249/1) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 265 EDUCATOR Ref: DB400051 Date: 07/01/96 From: DAN TRIPLETT Time: 11:46pm \/To: MATT SMITH (Read 4 times) Subj: Re: Discipline MS> The problem with intoxicated-in-class college students varies MS>greatly from college to college, but one thing that's true MS>nationwide is that _serious_ campus crime heavily involves MS>intoxicated students (ask a campus-police administrator). The MS>classroom side of the problem can and does sometimes get to the MS>point that the prof will have difficulty teaching, as I've seen MS>happen in several courses. In one a student started a shouting MS>match in class with a prof. Freshmen in college aren't too MS>different from HS seniors, other than for living away from home and MS>having the ability to drink as much as they please and cut class as MS>much as they please while not being subject to either parental MS>discipline or typical HS rules (like attendance). Is it any MS>surprise to you that they are at least as*undisciplined as they were for MS> their HS teachers? *SERIOUS* campus crime? Of course...I wouldn't think that *serious* campus crime would heavily involve the intake of Oreo cookies. If we were to take a look at the *serious* crime anywhere in America I think that drugs would be a significant factor. If you think I am saying that alcohol/drugs on campus is not a problem you are wrong. I would further contend that wherever it is happening (colleges/HS/middle schools...and yes even elementary schools) it should be considered serious. But you can't use a wide brush to paint a finely detailed painting. There are many other factors, both good and bad, that exist in our educational system today. I would argue that the good decisively outweighs the bad at any educational establishment. Certainly this is true of the majority. BTW...it is no surprise to me at all that college freshmen resemble high school seniors. They are after all, only one year apart. Dan * CMPQwk #1.42* UNREGISTERED EVALUATION COPY --- GEcho 1.11+ * Origin: The South Bay Forum - Olympia, WA (360) 923-0866 (1:352/256) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 265 EDUCATOR Ref: DB400052 Date: 07/02/96 From: DAN TRIPLETT Time: 12:05am \/To: MATT SMITH (Read 4 times) Subj: Re: Class Size Over-Rated Well Matt, if your dad saw it in a North Carolina college, the MS>RP> problem MS>RP> is rampant across North America, MS> MS> True. While one of the small private colleges with a big problem MS>with kids coming to class drunk was in North Carolina, the other was MS>up North and mainly took in Northern kids. Please...is this supposed to have significant meaning? Like one college in North Carolina with kids coming to class normal and other class up North and mainly took in Northern kids. What the he11 is that suppose to mean anyway? Matt...what is your message all about? I object your honor! Dan * CMPQwk #1.42* UNREGISTERED EVALUATION COPY --- GEcho 1.11+ * Origin: The South Bay Forum - Olympia, WA (360) 923-0866 (1:352/256) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 265 EDUCATOR Ref: DB400053 Date: 07/02/96 From: DAN TRIPLETT Time: 12:14am \/To: MELVIN BILLIK (Read 5 times) Subj: Class Size Over-Rated MB>Sheila: MB>I don't disagree at all with the points you are making. MB>Keep in mind I said that there is a LOOSE CORRELATION between MB>class size and success. By this I mean there are many exceptions, at MB>least this has been my experience. I point this out because I think MB>at times class size might be over-emphasiZed AS A problem. MB> The _Correlation_ as you put it is anything but loose. As you stated (but I erased opps) that the probability of getting a "problem" student greatly increases with added students which further challenges the classroom teacher. I think a number of studies have been conducted, some bogus, and some highly regarded...concerning the "correlations" between classroom size success. The findings are in favor of smaller classrooms. I hope you read in another post what I said about a saturation point in class sizes. There is a point when classes become unmanageable due to the large numbers. Don't forget the simple wisdom of that Nursery Rhyme of the little ole Woman (teacher) who lived in a shoe (crowded classroom) she had so many children (students) she didn't know what to do. (The kids are all fine now but the teacher had to retire early and now works at Wal-Mart... Dan * CMPQwk #1.42* UNREGISTERED EVALUATION COPY --- GEcho 1.11+ * Origin: The South Bay Forum - Olympia, WA (360) 923-0866 (1:352/256) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 265 EDUCATOR Ref: DB400054 Date: 07/02/96 From: DAN TRIPLETT Time: 12:24am \/To: MELVIN BILLIK (Read 5 times) Subj: Matt Smith MB>I have been a lurker for quite awhile, and I have been posting more MB>of late. MB>I am concerned with the derogatory remarks made towards Matt Smith. The remarks have for the most part been regarding what he has said...and continues to say.....I don't agree that they have been derogatory. MB>I may not always agree with what Matt says, but I think his posts MB>HAVE been reasonably intelligent and well-stated. You must have missed a few then.... MB>Most of our posts are anecdotal in nature. Very few of us are MB>pontificating with reams of studies to cite. Action Research....teachers do it every day...and they (we) are the experts of what is going on in classrooms. Matt has shown some contempt for what teachers do by the very nature of some of his comments. MB>Let's see, must everyone show his/her pedigree before being allowed MB>to post here (or be taken seriously)? Must one be a teacher in order MB>to post? I agree with you here....otherwise it would be snobbish...but one who posts here should have a working knowledge and understanding of educational issues. MB>I would hope there is room for various perspectives and intellectual MB>discussions, without hostile responses. I agree and have probably contributed to some of those remarks...though I don't consider my remarks as hostile but rather....annoyed. MB> MB>Again, I have only started posting recently and I don't want to MB>create a war here (although that can be fun, too, for a brief period MB>of time). Perhaps I'm unaware of some past battles, but it does seem MB>like we can discuss and disagree without being disagreeable. Im not trying to be disagreeable but if one chooses to enter the arena of dialogue here, or anywhere, without sufficient knowledge, get ready to take a few knocks. As for Matt, he make *BOLD* statements regarding education that _Invite_ a response. I think he may even take an extreme view just to get the ball rolling. Thanks for your comments Mel....I think I may have to choose my words more carefully with regard to Matt....that is unless of course he says something stupid again and I have to put him in his place.... Dan * CMPQwk #1.42* UNREGISTERED EVALUATION COPY --- GEcho 1.11+ * Origin: The South Bay Forum - Olympia, WA (360) 923-0866 (1:352/256) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 265 EDUCATOR Ref: DB400055 Date: 07/02/96 From: VIRGINIA BLALOCK Time: 12:54am \/To: ALL (Read 3 times) Subj: Computers I was interested in the type of computers(IBM or compatible, Mac, etc) that you folks are seeing in the schools these days. When I taught(from 1987-1992) it was Apple II E's and GS'. My son has an Apple II E in his classroom and the school only has Apple II's for the kids that I could see. I was wondering how it was for other schools around. ... A full-body mudpack does a corpse wonders. <--virginia.blalock@psl-online.com--> http://www.psl-online.com/member/vblal/home.htm Member of Families Against Internet Censorship: www.rmii.com/~fagin/faic, email faic@rmii.com ___ Blue Wave/DOS v2.30 --- WILDMAIL!/WC v4.12 * Origin: InfoQuest BBS Spring Texas 713-320-9163 (1:106/628.0) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 265 EDUCATOR Ref: DB400056 Date: 07/02/96 From: VIRGINIA BLALOCK Time: 12:56am \/To: DONNA RANSDELL (Read 3 times) Subj: California Class Size Donna Ransdell tells Virginia Blalock about California Class Size on 06-26-96 07:25: > Man! I had enough trouble with 22 kids. I can't > imagine having 33 4th > graders in one class! Getting to every kid is tough > enough as it is.. DR> My oldest daughter just finished 4th grade. She just told me that she DR> had 32 in her classroom this past year. There were four classes of 4th DR> grade in her school, each with roughly that amount of kids in it. I DR> subbed in her classroom last fall - 32 kids in a portable "relocatable" DR> classroom means it is crowded. "Getting to every kid" is even tougher DR> when the kids are crammed together like sardines into a can. Yuk! I taught in a portable classroom for two years and it is not fun to start with! I can not imagine having 32 kids in the classroom I had. ... Any closet is a walk-in closet if you try hard enough. <--virginia.blalock@psl-online.com--> http://www.psl-online.com/member/vblal/home.htm Member of Families Against Internet Censorship: www.rmii.com/~fagin/faic, email faic@rmii.com ___ Blue Wave/DOS v2.30 --- WILDMAIL!/WC v4.12 * Origin: InfoQuest BBS Spring Texas 713-320-9163 (1:106/628.0)