I noticed a very busy and interesting #edchat on Twitter this evening. One theme that I picked up on related to the struggle we have in defining the goal of education. I think the question that often comes up is: What are schools preparing students for?
As parents we may often worry about what kind of job our kids will eventually have, and how they will contribute to their community. But how do we balance the messages we send to kids about the importance of learning to learn and exploring topics, and learning to have skills and knowledge for employment? What age/grade is it appropriate to start having those conversations about “the future” without it affecting how students pursue learning, and develop their talents and passions? Is it possible to plan too early, or too late?
SheilaSpeaking 
Nov 25, 2011 @ 18:43:40
Sheila, I left school at the age of 16 (UK) and my father said you have the brain of an engineer and so I became an engineer. But later in life I learned I was a better manager than an engineer. Now I find out that am a better teacher than I was a manager or an engineer.
My message is that you got to start at something but as a young adult do not believe that your first career will be your last choice.
Nov 27, 2011 @ 00:09:14
Thanks for your thoughts and personal reflection on this, Geoffrey. The twists and turns in the paths that our careers can take us on is important to share with our youth, I think. I am not sure they always get the message that not knowing for sure is OK, and that making changes is OK. How do we, as parents and educators, ensure they have lots of opportunities for different learning explorations and experiences so that they can recognize or change to a path that is right for them, with confidence and competence?
When my oldest daughter was given a career planning booklet back in Gr. 7, we decided as a family that it was too soon and too much pressure to be putting that down on paper at that time. She is in university now….and figuring things out with a much clearer understanding and sense of her strengths, weaknesses, and passions. But maybe some are clearer earlier on than others, or are they following the advice of their parents, as you referred to?
PS I think I have told you before that I am married to an engineer who is now a manager but wishes he had trained to be a meteorologist 🙂
Nov 27, 2011 @ 11:26:34
Just wanted to add a link here to a blog post by David Wees that I think relates to my questions:
http://davidwees.com/content/prepare-students-life-not-jobs
Nov 27, 2011 @ 22:43:20
Sheila, your questions made me reflect again on my own experiences and opportunities that I had, and challenges that I needed to face, in my 54 years of being in the work-force. I have just written 3-pages on all the twists and turns that my career has taken to date and maybe I will publish this with your help.
I think as Parents we need to listen to our children’s dream(s) and provide them with all the learning opportunities that we can afford and this starts at their birth.
My 10-year old M.E. daughter is now my second opportunity to shape a young mind. Right now I am dreaming for her! I wish to give her all the learning opportunities to lead a normal social life namely, to eat, to communicate, to dress, to be clean, to learn how to keep her place tidy, to shop for herself, to handle money, etc. So I take her out to give her learning opportunities that I can think up for her. Simple ones like selecting the food she wants to eat by pointing to the pictures in the menu or ones I bring along, to sending her to the server to refill her glass of water or trying to ask for more napkins. Teaching her at every opportunity like when we run out of something at home we need to go shopping for to replenish it.
What did you want to be at the age of 12? I dreamed of being a radio officer on board a ship traveling around the world. I did not get help with this career from my teachers or my parents who just allowed me to dream. I was given a lot of learning opportunities, read books, studied different western countries, visited museums, theatre. shops, being left alone, made wine and beer, traveling, etc. I did learn what I liked and what I did not like. I still have some of the books I read on being a “HAM” operator!
Today, we have more media than just the radio to bombard our young with ideas. Is media bombardment enough? Stick our child in front of a TV and see if they learn about acting. Let them play games on the computer as see how much they learn about strategy.
I know that we can easily rely upon the teachers for school trips to different learning opportunities – farm, museums, theatres, travel, camp, etc. but is this enough? Do we as parents still take our young charges to theatres, museums. libraries? Is it not good to also have a one-on–one discourse with our children when at a museum or after seeing a live show about the learning opportunity? When traveling to other places do we talk about why people live in this village, town, city, province, country?
I can go on with all the examples of learning opportunities that we as parents can give, When you go out to eat even at a McDonalds Restaurant do you see the learning opportunity here? Let us talk about the food we eat at MR how is a potatoe grown to become the french fries? How did we get the name change from potatoe to french fries? How come potatoe is now spelled potato? Take a look around you at the people, Guess their careers from the way they talk and act. Look at what they are wearing and we have a clothing design conversation.
My message from this rambling is that we have learning opportunities everywhere we look but we sometimes do not see them as a learning opportunity.
Career planning at Gr.7 – look at the opportunity not at the chore of putting ideas to paper. Gr.7 maybe to young to sit down and select a career but it is not too young to discuss all the choices one has and that any choice does not have to be your last one. Strengths, weaknesses and passions are starting to surface in a child at the Gr.7 level.
It is getting late and I will continue my thoughts later.
Nov 28, 2011 @ 19:06:07
I left my thoughts at your question on “Career planning at Gr.7”
I would say that as parents we should look at this as an opportunity, and not as the chore of putting ideas to paper. Gr7 maybe too young to sit down and select a career but it is not too young to discuss all the choices one has and that any choice does not have to be your last one. In my experiences volunteering as School Council chair, I can see that strengths, weaknesses and passions are starting to surface in a child at the Gr7 level. I agree that they may not all get the message and I do know that some seem to be very set with their (or their parents) career choice. But we are the parents and we should be used to dealing with the variety of challenges are children provide to us.
Which brings me to yet another question who is responsible parent or government for helping our children chose a career? The educators are just following the curriculum laid down by the Ministry of Education and that is why I say Government. I take a quote from the article by David Wees you kindly provided a link to “Every teacher should realize he is a social servant set apart for the maintenance of the proper social order and the securing of the right social growth.” John Dewey, My Pedagogical Creed, 1897.”
http://dewey.pragmatism.org/creed.htm
Is this still the fact today? What as David Wees quoted “As a result of this new report, which suggests that we need 100,000 new sanitation engineers to help keep America clean, we’ve decided that we need to dumb down the curriculum,” by President Obama.
https://plus.google.com/u/0/109984287766356192435/posts/aEmeCqJszTi#109984287766356192435/posts/aEmeCqJszTi
Is this quote true? Are they not all missing the real reason why we parents support education? Why Educate?
http://halfanhour.blogspot.com/2010/08/why-educate.html
We educate our children in my mind to provide them with the ability to Think for themselves: http://forprogressnotgrowth.com/2011/06/18/why-educate/
Here is what the first sentence in Wikipedia says “Education in its broadest, general sense is the means through which the aims and habits of a group of people lives on from one generation to the next.” So all we should be doing is pass on our habits to our children – Forget That – No Way! It does improve later on with the suggestion that we educate to develop the reasoning ability of our children!
What I am believe, is that we need to create the educational environment that has the goal of creating independent thinking beings not robots. This should not be looked upon for just Economic and Financial reasons but as an indispensable asset.
http://www.unesco.org/delors/utopia.htm
We need to be educated in the broadest sense and it is not just happening within a school as I have worked with brilliant people who left school at Gr 6. Why is Education Necessary? http://ezinearticles.com/?Why-is-Education-Necessary?&id=4110184
Education is as important as the air we breathe and this is a parental responsibility that starts when our child is born and is not to be passed off when they go to a school.
Sheila you started me off on this dissertation – but it is my belief that you got to school to be taught how to reason and the extension to think. You start at the elementary school and progress through the system through high school, college and university just to get a degree. You get a degree to get a job. And now you start looking at your career as your starting career will not necessarily be your last career. This is just like the board game I used to play with my twins called life. If you do not get the degree from high school you do not start adult life at a high level but this does not mean you cannot succeed if success is measured in money terms. But that is another subject for a new blog. “Does dropping out mean you have failed?”
Dec 04, 2011 @ 12:27:18
Thanks for your all your input on this, Geoff. I am still exploring the links you referred to and…..thinking….