Kids acting GROWN??

[ShinoMegami]

Originally Posted by TheHayleyDoll

Actually, video games like "Reader Rabbit" really helped me a lot when I was younger.

Definatelly! But did it teach you your fundamental skills or did a parent? That what I don't like about a lot of these new edutainment games/shows (and the parents utilizing them) is if you sit your kid in front of them they will magically learn with no parental help. I do not deny that they can help strengthen and increase a child's skill and knowledge but without something to build on it is useless.

[TheHayleyDoll]

I'm not really sure, I was intelligent as long as I can remember. Like when I was really little, I had memorized the names of all the kids on Barney and knew the lyrics to all the songs - even if I didn't know what certain words meant. xD

And I went to preschool, so I learnt almost all my skills there.

[ShinoMegami]

Most kids can memorise things. My nephew gets these sight word books (they are stories with words that kids should know on sight by 1st grade) and he can read them... well actually he has memorized them because if you ask him the same words but not in the book he doesn't know them. Apparently that is the same with a lot of kids in his class.

[Silent_Wolf]

Now that's just disgraceful. A kid needs to learn the words, not memorize! I was crap at reading too, but my problem wasn't with learning it; it was how I spoke, I couldn't pronounce my S's or Z's perfectly so I got lopped into a remedial reading program three times a week and got stuck in speech therapy.

[Miranda_]

In primary school, I was fine at first; I was allowed to read my book after I'd done the work before all the other kids in the class. Then I got this teacher who tried to force me to work at the same pace as all the other kids, which was impossible. -.- My parents just taught me at home instead; not official teaching, just got me books on subjects I was interested in and encouraged me to look stuff up.

[Elanorea]

Yeah, I think today's schools focus too much on memorising things. I've had to memorise all the countries in the world and their capitals, Hamlet's soliloquy, loads of dates and years, but I think it's really quite pointless. I mean, even if I know the name of Kyrgyzstan's capital and can recite Hamlet's soliloquy, how useful will it be to me in most situations?
It should be more about communication skills and things like that, not just memorising facts. I'm good at memorising things if I put my mind to it, but I'm not good at much else, and while I can't blame the school system entirely for that, I think I'd be better off if I had been taught differently.

Also, Silent_Wolf, I know how you feel XD. I couldn't pronounce the letter R as a kid, and none of the speech therapy things helped (not that I went to many), so I didn't learn to pronounce it quickly until... second grade, I think.

[Silent_Wolf]

Originally Posted by Miranda_

In primary school, I was fine at first; I was allowed to read my book after I'd done the work before all the other kids in the class. Then I got this teacher who tried to force me to work at the same pace as all the other kids, which was impossible. -.- My parents just taught me at home instead; not official teaching, just got me books on subjects I was interested in and encouraged me to look stuff up.

I can't count how many teachers I've had that did the same thing to me. They were always annoyed with me for getting my work done so fast; I even had a teacher grade me low because of it because she simply couldn't be bothered to check if it was right because she was too busy talking to another teacher who was SUPPOSED to be teaching her own class.

Some teachers are just really stupid.
-

I think history needs to be lopped entirely; I get it, learn history so bad things don't repeat, but come on! After middle school it's pretty darn unnecessary, what're you gonna use it for? Amazing your friends with your incredible knowledge of boring Roman farming facts? More like put them to sleep. You learn the same things over and OVER and it gets monotonous enough that you can do the tests in minutes because you've had it all just pounded into your head for over a decade. Literary history I don't mind, but literal history: It really gets boring, always about WAR and misery and how no empire stayed standing, blah blah blah...

WOAH, off subject.

[Narutoanime4ever]

Originally Posted by TheHayleyDoll

Actually, video games like "Reader Rabbit" really helped me a lot when I was younger. I'm actually pretty smart, I just don't like to show it off. Why use big words that no one understands and you'll have to explain anyway? xD

Anyway, I think it's almost the fact that people are starting to have children when they aren't ready and then have no clue how to raise them. I think if more people were to be having safe sex, it might downsize this issue a tiny bit.

-nodnod- Like you said in the top paragraph, you're smart and you don't show it off. Corretion: Like to show it off. I do, in class, by accident. And...there are to many "accidental" children around. Meaning, that if "safe sex" was practiced more, I don't think we'd have such a big problem.

[Miranda_]

I've seen girls as young as thirteen pushing buggies around or proudly showing off a bump. Whereas I don't believe we should go back to the old days where girls were punished for falling pregnant unmarried, we should not have the modern situation where we've gone to the other extreme and are rewarding these girls. Over here, a pregnant teenager can get a council house and lots of benefits that the childfree never have. We should have a happy medium; ie, they can be given some help, like milk tokens and vouchers to buy baby stuff, however they are not automatically allowed to jump the queue for a council house and are not given hand outs.

Some of these teens just dump their babies on their parents and spend their hand outs on alcohol and cigarettes rather than on their children. In my opinion, they and their baby daddies should be held financially responsible for their offspring; if they complain, then they should be gently reminded that they chose to have a baby, therefore they should take the consequences. And just perhaps, if they'd kept their legs closed or taken contreception, there wouldn't be a baby to cause problems.

Girls should also have better role models when growing up; right now, the only role models a lot of girls have are ones like Lindsey Lohan and Miley Cyrus, who just show the girls that all they need to make it in life is to be sexy. They play with Bratz dolls, which show them the same thing. It kind of reminds me of the Simpsons episode where Lisa disapproves of her talking Malibu Stacey doll cuz it says things like, "Let's bake cookies so the boys will like us!" and "I wish they taught shopping at school!". XD Won't be long I think before there's a talking Bratz doll that says the exact same things.

[spirit_queen]

EWW! I will rise my children to be nerds! XD My older cousin Jill, who actually loves clothes and stuff, agrees. So it's not just me.

Miranda, sadly enough, the stuff you propose might not ever happen. There are far too few people with good sense in this world. -.- This problem will just become worse and worse, probably, before it gets better, because that's just how everything seems to work; it takes a disaster to make the majority see a problem and want to act to fix it, and these days it's all about the majority, whether the majority knows little about what they're talking about or a lot.

As for the education thing, I was always ahead on reading, writing, science and history. Sorry, Wolfie, but I actually like history; what should be done is that history should be an optional course my mid-middle school. And Another thing; we didn't actually get to WWs I and II til High School here. O.o