If you could change one thing about school...

[morg176]

If you could change one thing about school what would it be

You can change more than one thing if you like

[Trent]

The curriculum is dictated by politicians. They should have no say.

[morg176]

I would have liked it if English was not mandatory. I hated that subject.

I've often thought (if it would work) that a series of short course/s items would be fun, like learning a software, printinting tshirts, learning to cook or build and make things, subjects that are better in smaller groups (difficult with a group of 25-30 kids) with a ticket (pass/fail) when you are done.

Thoughts

[i_amtrunks]

The curriculum is dictated by politicians. They should have no say.

Or just as bad “education experts” that have never taught anyone anything in their lives. They are the type of people that speak in buzzwords and gobble doom. If you want a prime example I suggest you read a page or two of the new personal development/ health/ physical education syllabus. What used to be a document about teaching health skills and physical skills in stand alone classes. (Drug education, road safety, about the human body and keeping safe with your own body) has been turned into a flowery unreadable “integrated unit”...

Try to read this page without getting bored by all the code and keyword speak!

New PDHPE stage statements.

Keep in mind that this is still significantly better than the old new science syllabus that was so terribly written that the fools that wrote it could not even explain it. It had to be rewritten and tweaked all at tax payer expense (by the same people who got paid AGAIN to fix it (and it’s still not a great syllabus).

[GoktimusPrime]

The curriculum is dictated by politicians. They should have no say.

↑This just so much.

[jazzcomp]

Clear syllabus and reference books for the parents and even the grading system for any subject.

Never tell parents that C(average) is ok/acceptable.

[i_amtrunks]

Clear syllabus and reference books for the parents and even the grading system for any subject.

Never tell parents that C(average) is ok/acceptable.

Grading system would be impossible to implement, sadly the disparity between schools and even cohorts is too high.

As for the average, not everyone can be above average... there is nothing wrong for many students to be at grade level in most subjects. For some kids being average in just one learning area is amazing.

[SharkyMcShark]

When I was in year 12 (2007, public school) they made literally every student in the cohort (started with 140 students in the year) apply to TAFE "just in case".

TAFE is an incredibly important tertiary institute and should not be seen as a "just in case" option.

Additionally, choking up their admin with shit tons of applications for students who had no intent of ever going to TAFE ever doesn't strike me as a particularly good use of the time of literally anyone involved in the process.

I'm not sure if that's a standard procedure across the board still, but I found it incredibly annoying.

[GoktimusPrime]

Syllabi can be viewed or downloaded online.

Never tell parents that C(average) is ok/acceptable.

As for the average, not everyone can be above average... there is nothing wrong for many students to be at grade level in most subjects. For some kids being average in just one learning area is amazing.

I completely agree with i_amtrunks here.

I don't tell parents that any grade is okay or not. Rather I look at whether or not they are achieving to the best of their ability, and if not what areas of improvement there are.

And studies have shown that focusing on student improvement (growth) matters more than focusing on student performance (results). A student who achieves straight A's because they're finding the work too easy and they already know everything is a student who isn't learning anything. This year we've started implementing a new syllabus for Languages in junior high school where we must cater for three different types of language learners:
Type 1: students have not studied the target language (TL) before high school and do not use the TL outside of school (e.g. home language)
Type 2: not the students' home language but they have studied the TL extensively before commencing high school (e.g. in primary school)
Type 3: TL is the student's home language or possibly even native language
Before this year we weren't allowed to separate these types of students at the junior level. Type 1s are the most prevalent so often Type 2 and Type 3 students would be underchallenged (or even just bored in class) and they would ace tests without trying. I used to give the Types 2s and 3s bonus work because they would finish the regular work so quickly, but all assessment tasks and exams had to be the same which was unfair to the Type 1s. Now things are different. For example, my Year 9 class have an assignment that's due next term and I have 3 different variations of this assignment because I have all three learner types in this one class. The task revolves around the same concept and learning goals, but they have been modified for each group.

Also, you know that if every student were to perform above average then that new standard would become the new average, right? I mean, mathematically speaking that's literally what "average" means.
e.g. the average Transformers collection is about 100 figures. If a new poll revealed the average collection size to be around 1000 figures then that would become the new average. If (hypothetically speaking) most collectors had 5000 toys then that would be the new average and suddenly my collection becomes very much below average... yet I haven't "achieved" any better or worse than before. This is why exam marks are moderated and scaled.

When I was in year 12 (2007, public school) they made literally every student in the cohort (started with 140 students in the year) apply to TAFE "just in case".

TAFE is an incredibly important tertiary institute and should not be seen as a "just in case" option.

Additionally, choking up their admin with shit tons of applications for students who had no intent of ever going to TAFE ever doesn't strike me as a particularly good use of the time of literally anyone involved in the process.

I'm not sure if that's a standard procedure across the board still, but I found it incredibly annoying.

I've personally never seen this happen but I totally agree with what you say.