Education is a hot topic along Americans with debates involving methods of teaching, funding of local school, and possible nationalization of higher education swirling in the environment. While not a complete disaster, currently the United States tests behind most other modernized industrial states (DeSilver, 2015). For a nation that is considered by many to be a world leader in business and technology, this can appear quite strange and be due to some structural issues with the education system.
While I cannot attest directly for other schools, my experience leads me to believe my time in the American high school is relatively typically, and so further analysis could be biased from that assumption. American classrooms are highly collective with subjects and speed being taught at a cohort/class level. The teacher leads the class in lecture and everyone is expected to learn at the same speed.
Fred S. Keller is a professor at Arizona State University and a critic of the traditional teaching style. In the mid 20th century a class using a new method of teaching was conducted as "The kind of change needed in education is...one that will produce a reinforcing state...for everyone" (Keller, 1968). The students, instead of being hand-held, were simply given the materials needed and the objective standards to pass then allowed to attack it at the rate they wanted and/or needed. They could take tests repeatedly and were given feedback immediately. Results indicated that even inferior students using this method could achieve greater than superior students taught using conventional means (Keller, 1968).
Students were not being held back or railroaded over like many are in the current system and testing becomes a positive reinforcement as instead of failure hurting you it becomes a teacher: Exams are typically reviewed sometimes weeks later new material is already being taught. How can a student properly mark proper behavior if the next stimulus isn't until a much later time?
While Keller's method might not be practical for everyone or she group - I personally couldn't imagine being given such freedom in young age as I would simply just talk - it could be implemented slowely as age and maturity increase. Overall, this could lead to better results for the nation overall who's education system almost everyone agrees needs a major overhaul.
References
DeSilver, Drew. (2015). "U.S. students’ academic achievement still lags that of their peers in many other countries". Retrieved from https://www.pewresearch.org/fact- tank/2017/02/15/u-s-students- internationally-math-science/
Keller, F. S. (1968). “Good-bye, teacher...” Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 1(1), 79-89.