In article <a-schmi-1611972156110001 at vortex5.life.uiuc.edu>,
a-schmi at uiuc.edu (aloisia schmid) wrote:
> I am not sure what the answer is. How do you instill a love of learning?
> I don't know but I think that even in the last 10 years, we've gone a long
> way towards losing whatever instilled it in the first place. I'd love to
> hear from people as to how they think it might be possible to make it cool
> to be an intellectual again. How do you make it cool to be well-read, to
> have a great vocabulary? When did being well-eduacted and literate become
> intellectual snobbery? And how do we turn that around?
One thing to consider is relaxing the regimentation of schools and
downplay the conformity that students are expected to attain. Starting in
elementary schools with such an emphasis of behaviorial rules does little
to persuade students that school is interesting. There is simply too much
society expectations of conformity in school. Just as scientists are
interested in exploratioin, so are most small children. Schools seem to
function to take this interest away, not to encourage exploration.
Frankly, the posts on spelling corrections echo this problem. Were the
students with good lab reports praised? Were only the poorer students
chosen for follow up comments? Students of all ages will quickly blow off
comments they are not interested in hearing. Likewise, almost all age
groups still repsond to praise and work harder to get more. Sure, correct
the spelling, recommned remedial work, but most importantly praise the
achievers.
B. Martin
