Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Why should we have to defend teachers?


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Posted by Rick Denney on September 08, 2002 at 14:51:39:

In Reply to: Re: Re: Re: Re: Why should we have to defend teachers? posted by Marc on September 08, 2002 at 14:38:57:

Also, an expert can teach by demonstration while a non-expert can only read the material out of a book.

Lewis described how he learned Greek. His teacher (a private tutor--Lewis failed miserably in schools), put the original Greek in front of him, spent a few minutes sketching out the outline of the material (with Lewis watching him do it), and then left. Lewis had to do it a word at a time, with the outline as a hint, using lexicons and grammar books. As he progressed, the outline became more sparse and the material more difficult.

A teacher has a difficult time taking students where they have difficulty going themselves. This, to me, is the problem with home-schooling--many parents just don't know the subject material very well, having themselves been through the public schools. That they don't know the educational stuff doesn't bother me nearly so much.

There are exceptions, of course--the expert who cannot express their expertise in understandable ways to beginners. But in my opinion these people reflect the poorly rounded education that is common today. No matter how expert in math, the mathemetician should still have learned enough language to explain math in plain English.

Rick "with Richard Feynmann on that subject" Denney


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