This is interesting, just because it illustrates how the world has changed since 1895.
It's a dumb question that implies a conclusion that the text doesn't support. Snopes addresses the falseness of the implication adequately, and we're reproducing much of their reasoning here.
Things have implications beyond their explicit claims.
A non-tech family member will send this in an email chain at least once every six months along with some variant on this message: "OMG THE SKY IS FALLING, OUR EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM IS POOP!?!!" (All caps used for quote truth/ accuracy).
Snopes is TFM for this kind of unlikely forwarded-email fodder. Whoever submitted it was woefully negligent in not checking.
I had never really looked into Snopes before, this just knocked its reputation back a good bit for me.
Read the actual 'claim' statment. The claim is that the exam demonstrates a decline in education, not that the exam is real.
And isn't what you just did with Snopes a pretty good example of not wanting wanting something to be correct and not looking too hard for evidence to the contrary?
Consider also that they talked about all those things prior to the exam. Could you pass it right now? Maybe not. Could you pass it after a few weeks learning about the material? With flying colors.
It’s interesting to read the questions but certainly not at all indicative of any developments in the educational system. You need statistics and creative social scientists to find out something about that.
[0] I personally don’t like rote memorization. I recognize that rote memorization can sometimes be useful – I don’t need a calculator for simple multiplications – but I would much rather just understand something and develop from that understanding a clear picture of which facts are important enough to memorize.
Rote memorization is underrated. Yes, memorization alone is useless, but critical thinking without anything to think about is also useless.
I also think you are misunderstanding the point I’m making about rote memorization. What good does it if you can merely name and define all the parts of speech? You can learn that whole list and all the right definitions without ever understanding anything. You can answer that question in the test completely without knowing anything of worth. There are better ways of testing whether you know what the parts of speech are and whether you can identify them.
No, it means that people forget things that they don't use.
This test is testing specific content knowledge. Learning content doesn't matter. The content of your job or whatever changes depending on what you're doing. Like other people have said, if you were being taught these topics for the term leading up to the test, it's an easy test - there's no thinking involved, just memory.
What matters is the PROCESS of learning, and in that respect, I think the modern methods of education are far better than straight ROTE learning. (Though not optimal by any means)
I bet a fair number of HN readers (the Americans anyway), could pass Grammar, History, and Geography. So remind me what critical thinking Orthography feeds.
I would bet that most people who read this could have answered almost all of these questions at some point in their life. We have to remember that the purpose of education is to teach you how to learn and how to adjust to your current situations. You learn what you need to get the job done and you relearn what you can't remember to complete the job.
EDIT: It's good to see that Snopes already did this. Thank you Snopes and thanks glhaynes for pointing us to it.
BTW, tare isn't a unit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tare_weight
I like how the volume and weight of a bushel of wheat was common knowledge :)
3. If a load of wheat weighs 3942 lbs., what is it worth at 50 cts. per bu., deducting 1050 lbs. for tare?
#1: Not "Parts of Speech" in #2.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Us_declaration_independenc...
Snopes to the rescue once again: http://www.snopes.com/language/apocryph/german.asp
(And speaking of capitalization, I can't beleive Deletionpedia has a whole page about whether "Internet" should be capitalized or not: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_capitalization_convent... )
It's not an issue of importance but of making a generic word into one with specific meaning.
Comparing compulsory education standards to non-compulsory education standards is unfair and unenlightening. The forces affecting the school are so different they can not be said to be the same thing except inasmuch as they share the word "schooling".
I say this as one who is carefully refraining from going any deeper because I have as rich an opinion on the topic as anyone else around here, one not friendly to current practices (to put my cards on the table), but this is a non-data-point, at least without a lot more context, so much as to dwarf this little tidbit anyhow.
It's not much of a test by modern standards - it's more a few quizzes strung together with somewhat generous time limits. Some things stick out:
1) Math section is farming-centric, as people have pointed out; it ends on making examples of paperwork. The first question is obscure terminology for something we cover in second grade or so. No algebra. Especially generous time limit for these questions, though you have to remember your bushels.
2) "fane, fain, feign" Those days had a different fashion in popular homophones. Also, interesting the focus on indicating pronunciation and breaking words down into syllables - I remember doing that well before 8th grade.
3) The geography section mentions the rest of the world, huzzah. ...Well, to test memorization of a few names. Otherwise, a better section than the others.
4) No questions about the Civil War except to describe some famous battles and recognize the year it ended.
Regarding orthography, I find the mention of etymology, and the morphological question (#7), interesting, as these are pieces in a toolkit for understanding previously-unseen words.
The geography section is as much about meteorology as it is about placenames, which is awesome. This kind of scientific whole-world view is amusing contrasted with the Kansas Evolution Hearings.
What isn't as impressive (and has been pointed out elsewhere) is that those are the only science questions.
But the relevance of facts is based on context, and will change through time. Many of the facts tested for just aren't relevant in today's life. It's likely several of these weren't even relevant back in 1895 and were just added because 'they were always asked' or something.
In either case, it does have an effect on whether you know what elementary sounds are. If you missed out on a lot of such mere knowledge, you may also grow up without understanding that the world, and the powers of human beings, can be analyzed in that way. This is likely to have an effect on whether you can analyze at all.
http://libraries.mit.edu/archives/exhibits/exam/algebra.html
I suspect so, maybe in the 7th or 8th grade.
If this is a genuine question then I find it interesting that it was possible to answer back then. Now you'd have to know which months as the length of each month affects the answer.
Additionally, I remember that most tests came with verbal instructions even as recently as when I was in primary school (well recent, 20 years ago). The teacher would dictate the questions which you'd write down on the paper; then afterward you had time to answer them. I think it's quite plausible that a similar system was used back then, especially considering the brevity of the questions. (I don't know how wide spread printing presses were back then, I know that many primary schools in Belgium in the 1980's still either didn't have them or only used them when it was 'necessary').
People had far less to know.
However it is a rather fascinating look at life in the late 1800's, and what the common concerns were.
The section on linguistics; back then there was no large (non-print) media and the US English dialects were more splintered. Additionally English hadn't become quite the lingua franca it is today; (educated) people generally knew several languages in order to communicate with people. If you read books written around that time, it's rather common for the author to quote French or Latin without translation, with the implicit understanding that the reader knows them.
The math questions also provide some really neat insight into what were considered "common practical tasks"...in my schooling most of the word problems were phrased in terms of buying things at the supermarket or for more advanced topics building skyscrapers and bridges etc... Here however it's all about bushels of wheat etc.
Really neat.
What it boils down to is that:
(1) rote memorization is not an indicator of intelligence or skill.
(2) specialty datapoints regarding farm life are no longer required
(3) English grammar teaching is in a sad state. (A known aspect of today's public schools)
For a fair comparison, one should review the 8th grade requirements in a variety of today's schools (I did so once in a cursory fashion). In my opinion, today's students have to take in at least as much information, some of it also specialized, and spit it out.
Arguably today's requirements are not as focused on exact knowledge as late 1800s requirements. I leave that to the philosopher of education to evaluate for better/worse.
What should also be considered is not just the test itself, but how tests were graded - was passing the top 90%? 60%? How lenient were teachers? An issue today is some teachers giving "free As". Did that exist in 1890?
What can also be considered is the difference between Kanas 8th grade and Boston 8th grade. Was there one? What about different schools?
There is not a simple analysis here. There must needs be a careful data-driven reflection examining the subtleties of the educational system before someone pushes out the generalization - "today's students are all worse and we are all stupid". I see many examples of smart people. Admittedly, they anecdotally seem to have "beat the system" most of the time, so, well - there's another facet to the analysis.
Note - I hear occasionally about Dewey & early 1900s educators setting up US education to optimize for factory workers and a compliant populace. Does anyone have any factual data/bibliographic sources asserting/refuting that?
Anyone know if it's online? I have a print copy, but I can't find anything with a quick Googling.
My, how far we've fallen.
Could someone from 1895 have passed an 8th grade test today?
However I do believe that, given a study guide (i.e my notes, and a test book) and a reasonable idea of what would be on the test, I could pass the test--just as I passed many tests during my own educational era. Of course, a couple of days later most answers would be gone from my memory.
I've always been that way when it comes to learning, I don't retain details, I retain general idea's. For mathematics and sciences--problem solving, and for literature and history--that rules exists and many important events have occurred, all of which I can research and reference such material when the need arises. I'll admit, I'd like to able to recall names, and dates, and formulas at will--but frankly, as I obstinately claimed as a child, I've never actually needed such detailed information in real life. Generalizations, or time willing, a quick reference to related material are all you need.
The time difference is the only thing that would hinder me. Heck, try asking a college student in 1895 a super easy question like how many states are in the United States in 2010.
Also, some of the questions are clearly lists that, were this "real", would be taught by rote memorization. The sort of thing you would be able to chant back without thinking if you were in the classroom where the lists were repeated over and over for you to "learn".
Hard to compare when full information is not available. What is NIST standard for a bushel of wheat? What about rate of compounding at a bank (was that 10% apr or 10% per minute)?
This likely would be an easy test for most with today's level of education after a day of remedial education that covers the basics of this test.
The 'theory' or 'principals' of what 'education' should be are a MESS!
One of the posts mentioned Dewey: Yes he wrote:
John Dewey, 'Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education', The Free Press, New York, 1966.
although this is clearly not nearly the 'first printing'! Since my father was in education and had some influence from Dewey, I read that book. Dewey summarizes what 'education' actually is, and, really, is essentially forced to be, all other theories or principles aside, as just:
What the older generations pass down to the younger generations, with a lot of what was wrong and, hopefully, with some improvements.
So, here's an 'application': If have a broad 'public' education system where use essentially just a broad sample of the older generation to teach essentially everyone in the younger generation, then have to expect that what gets 'passed down' will have nearly all that was bad about society in the older generation and relatively little that is new and advantageous!
Here is a telling example: I was a college professor at Ohio State University. At one point I was asked to represent the faculty at a lunch for parents. Yes, many of the parents were quite skeptical of what was being taught or not taught. So, one question went:
"Why are you teaching my child calculus? I've never needed to know it."
I was a bit slow to see all the emotional, social, educational, and rational issues and, not wanting to say something wrong, said next to nothing. In a sense, it can be safer not to argue with 'the customer' or with a poorly informed and angry question. But here is what I might have said:
"We're trying to educate for the future, say, teach things that can be useful at some points over the next 50 years or so.
"Calculus is a pillar of Western Civilization: Although not everyone uses it, without it we would be in deep trouble in strength of materials, design of structures, electric power generation, distribution, and use, electronics and essentially everything involving electro-magnetic waves, engines of all kinds, airplanes, essentially everything in mechanical engineering, nearly all more advanced military technology, and in many subjects from more in math, all the physical and social sciences, statistics, finance, and more.
"We're not necessarily trying to teach what is already in very common usage but what is less well known and can give an advantage over the next 50 years. So, from its track record, calculus looks promising. That is, we believe that so few people know calculus well that more people could get an advantage from knowing it.
"For a specific example, before my graduate studies, I was in a new, rapidly growing company. At one point the Board of Directors wanted some projections of the revenue of the company. Many people could describe hopes, intentions, assumptions, dreams, etc., but there was a lack of anything with a more solid, objective, rational basis.
"While I didn't want to get involved, I thought for a while: What do we know? What do we want to know?
"Well we knew what our (daily) revenue was then. And, from our capacity planning, we knew what our planned, eventual daily revenue would be. So, for the projections the Board wanted, essentially we needed to 'interpolate' between these two revenue figures, that is, say how fast we would grow.
"So what could we observe about what was causing our growth? Well, broadly the growth was due to 'viral' effects, that is, happy customers talking to target customers not yet customers. So, each day in the future, the amount of this 'talking' by happy customers was proportional to the number of happy customers and, thus, to the revenue. And the number of potential customers hearing the talking and becoming customers was proportional to the number of potential customers.
"So, let t be time in days with the present day t = 0. Let y(t) be our revenue at time t. As in calculus, let y'(t) be the first derivative of y(t), that is, the rate of growth in y(t).
"Let b be the maximum daily revenue from our capacity planning.
"Then the rate of growth y'(t) is proportional to the current revenue y(t) and the capacity yet served b - y(t). So for some constant k, we must have
y'(t) = k y(t) ( b - y(t) )
"So, this is a non-linear ordinary differential equation initial value problem. With a little calculus, really just classic integration by parts, we can get a simple algebraic expression for the solution. This solution will have one constant c we so far do not know. But we have reduced the problem of projecting out to the future to selecting just one constant c. And we can estimate c from our growth over the past few months.
"So, on a Friday my SVP Planning and I selected a value for c and drew the graph of the growth. My SVP left on a business trip, and the Board meeting started the next morning.
"At noon I was in my office working and got a phone call to come to the Board meeting.
"The Board meeting was in disarray and no longer 'meeting'. Our two Board representatives from our main investor were unhappy and standing in a doorway to the hall with their bags packed.
"At about 8 AM the graph had been presented to the Board, and the two investor representatives asked how it had been calculated. For the next three hours or so, all the top management struggled to reproduce the graph and could not. The representatives then became angry, lost faith in and patience with the top management, made plane reservations back to Texas, returned to their rented rooms, packed their bags, and as a last chance returned to the offices for an answer.
"I arrived, reproduced a few points on the graph, and the investor representatives canceled their plane reservations, unpacked their bags, and stayed, and the company was saved. It is now a major company you know well and have used often; you value their work highly.
"This success was all because I knew calculus well and was about the only one there who did.
"So, we believe that in the next 50 years, calculus can be an advantage."
Yes, there is some question at how well even this answer would have been received!
Generally, then, in the real world of the broad population, it is difficult to know what to teach, how to teach it, or to get it learned!
Here's my take on the US 'way out': As we can tell, in K-12 and maybe more, the most important educational advantage is the family life of the student. So, in some families, education is understood and emphasized. So, education is really not just from the K-12 classrooms, not nearly!
Broadly, then, the secret to good education is to have parents who care do what they can at HOME. In extreme cases this solution can be just 'home schooling' and, at its best, can totally blow the doors off essentially anything from 'organized' education.
So, as in many things in the US, really good results are the responsibility of each individual, their family, their local community, etc. and much less well served by the county, state, or DC.
Topics with big advantages are essentially necessarily understood by at most only a tiny fraction of the population. Or, if a large fraction of the population understood, then much of the advantage would be gone. So, education with big advantages cannot be from the public school system! Sorry 'bout that!
