MARK: Still concerned about public education?
FRANK: It’s too politically controlled. Political leaders don’t seem to understand the learning process.
MARK: The focus shifted from the fundamentals of the learning process, to the complications of human behavior. In our day schoolmasters required memory of fact.
FRANK: It’s still that way but little is done to improve pneumonic power.
MARK: I was long out of school before I learned how to memorize.
FRANK: You described that in your essay “How to Make History Dates Stick”, something every student should read.
MARK: Thank you. Better still, teachers shouod be required to read that essay.
FRANK: After I read it, I started associating facts with pictures and it works. In fact, I think children would think it fun if they were required to do the same when preparing for a history test.
MARK: But the heart of the problem lies in the teachers’ neglect to realize that often a child can’t remember because he first can’t even understand.
FRANK: That brings to mind your comment, in your essay”English as She Is Taught”: “Isn’t it reasonably possible that in our schools many of the questions in all studies are servera miles ahead of where the pupil is?”
MARK: Good boy! Too many teachers think just because they know and understand the facts and situations, their pupils do as well – when told.
FRANK: And the results are often humorously reflected in responses to questions as you reported in your essay. Here are some definitions given by students: (1) ABORIGINIES, a system of mountains. (2) IRRIGATE, to make fun of. (3) PUBLICAN, a man who says his prayers in public.
MARK: Those responses were record in a book well documented and written.
FRANK: As you said, a pupil’s ears and eyes can be most deceiving.
MARK: One of the problems is that too many teachers assume their students are on the same intellectural level as themselves. The question remains: how do you penetrate the minds of all students in a classroom? The answer is: you can’t in most cases.
FRANK: That brings is to the problem of dealing with some 30 different individuals in one classroom at one time.
MARK: What do all these kids have in common that would enable the teacher to get through to them to meet each objective?
FRANK: They all have a certain level of skills, like some read faster with greater comprehension. Some have the skills of writing and speaking better than others. All have habits and need habits that would make them better students. And most of all, all students have an attitude.
MARK: So what we are saying is that the learning process to be most effective must deal with knowledge, habits, skills and attitudes.
FRANK: Without out the right attitude, excellent habits for learning and skills to work, a student is likely to learn little.
MARK: That’s it. Things haven’t changed much since my youth.
FRANK: It’s not all doom and gloom. Not today.
MARK: It wasn’t in my day either. We all learned in spite of schools. We learned outside of school.
FRANK: And today it is even easier because we have the internet. Ask any question of a search engine and you will find the answer immediately.
MARK: I wonder what I would have done with my life if I had a computer at a young age?
FRANK: Would that have depended upon “circumstance”?
MARK: Yes. Things have always and will always happen do to circumstance. Now you can go back to sleep, Frank
