Communism in the Classroom

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Even though I graduated high school more than a year ago, I never really thought about some of the unfair ways of teaching that occurred while I was in school until recently. I googled my thoughts and came across an article that talked about this very thing:

http://www.thenewamerican.com/reviews/o ... -classroom

This reminded me of many groups I've been in throughout school where the students all receive the same grade, so the hardest worker receives a worse grade, and the laziest worker receives a higher grade. It also flies in the face of competition and capitalism, things which made our country great.

While researching this topic, I also thought of after school care in second grade. I had to wait after school for two hours every day after school, and I always liked to bring things to entertain myself with, and in the early 2000's, that happened to be the Gameboy Color. A few of my classmates owned one as well, and it seemed to go find until a few kids felt jealous and wanted to play with it. I'm very protective of my stuff, so I told many kids no. This obviously didn't fly with many of the counselors running the program. They ended up making a rule stating that we must share our toys with others or we won't be allowed to bring them at all.

That didn't work out well, either. Many of the kids I was forced to share with didn't respect my property, and one kid almost broke one of my game cartridges. Because of all the fighting over this, the teachers eventually banned kids from bringing them to school. To me, if the teachers had butted out and let the owners decide who they want to share with, this whole problem wouldn't have existed, and if kids got jealous, then so be it. Not everyone is going to own the same items, and no one should be forced to share due to someone's jealousy.

Now that I'm in community college, I don't see this type of teaching and behavior policing among teachers and staff as much, but I know similar lines of thinking are prevalent in universities.

I'm curious whether you guys see this type of behavior in schools and society, and whether or not it's damaging the way younger kids view the world, competition and ownership.

I see, I guess that's why the students here spent the spring and summer waving red flags and chanting "le capital nous fait la guerre! Guerre au capital!"

The share the goodies doctrine is more sentimentality and altruism than it is communism. Communism is Hegelian dialectic on steroids.

ruveyn

That article takes a very right wing veiwpoint. Also Noodlebug do your homework during the after school program and play with the gameboy at home. I don't like all getting the same grade. I think group work works best when each person has to write down there own answers separately as at least then they are writing it. Same grade for tests does not work well. Also same grade provides an incentive from copying from the smartest person to let them copy as their grade will go up likely.

Rather than a gameboy you should have brought a book.

Taking items and not returning them (or letting other kids use them) is theft, I don't care if they give themselves permission, it's theft in my book and they need to stop that kind of behavior.

On the other hand, taking items into class is distracting and teachers have a hard enough time getting the 18 and under demographic to learn anything (especially since many wouldn't be there at all if they had their way). It's a good practice not to bring personal items in to class, in college instructors expect you to pay attention (you won't learn anything if you're busy texting) and the workplace doesn't like paying employees to do anything other than work.

I don't think its unreasonable for instructors to enforce conditions that are more conductive to learning.

Well, the after school care program isn't actually school. It's a place for kids to do their homework or just hang out for two hours while they wait for their parents to pick them up. I personally don't see the issue with kids bringing their own toys to school so they can entertain themselves. Just because other kids might get jealous or distracted doesn't mean that the kid who's entertaining himself should be punished.