Tutors come in a great variety of shapes and sizes. Tutors may be student teachers who seek more experience, full time or part time tutors with specialties in a variety of areas, classroom teachers who seek to supplement their income, retired teachers who want to maintain some involvement in their work, university students looking for a little extra income etc. Each variety can have good and bad tutors, so its best to make a choice about the type of individual you might want and then judge the individual on their merits. |
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
Some thoughts about who your tutor might be....
Education fads turn
RUPERT Murdoch's article ("Let's bring classrooms into the 21st century," 15-16/10) was a breath of fresh air pumped into this under-achieving area of Australian life.
As young teachers in the early 1970s, we were anticipating the arrival of computers in education. Our lecturers told us about individual progression in maths, science and programmed instruction where students could proceed at their own pace.
Classrooms of mixed abilities and all the problems that it caused would be a thing of the past. Teachers would work with individuals or small groups helping them to soar ahead.
Why has none of it come true? What happened? Unfortunately, this time also saw the rise of the radical Left in the teachers' unions with their 19th-century ideology.
Schools adopted every loony reform: ditching of exams, buffet-style short courses in anything you like. Standards, achievement, academic values were tossed out the window. It was do-your-own-thing: conformity was the new evil.
We are only now clawing our way out of that wretched mire and its outcomes of ignorance, illiteracy and innumeracy and we have a long way to go. Now we have computers, mostly being wasted on games or downloading screeds of guff that students hand in as their own assignment.
What a shocking waste. What a lamentable betrayal of the best we could be.
As young teachers in the early 1970s, we were anticipating the arrival of computers in education. Our lecturers told us about individual progression in maths, science and programmed instruction where students could proceed at their own pace.
Classrooms of mixed abilities and all the problems that it caused would be a thing of the past. Teachers would work with individuals or small groups helping them to soar ahead.
Why has none of it come true? What happened? Unfortunately, this time also saw the rise of the radical Left in the teachers' unions with their 19th-century ideology.
Schools adopted every loony reform: ditching of exams, buffet-style short courses in anything you like. Standards, achievement, academic values were tossed out the window. It was do-your-own-thing: conformity was the new evil.
We are only now clawing our way out of that wretched mire and its outcomes of ignorance, illiteracy and innumeracy and we have a long way to go. Now we have computers, mostly being wasted on games or downloading screeds of guff that students hand in as their own assignment.
What a shocking waste. What a lamentable betrayal of the best we could be.
- The Australian
- October 18, 2011
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