Three R's!

Readin’, Ritin’ and Rithmetic. Makes sense that a kid’s basic education should be focused on mastering these three fundamentals, right?

Not so fast.

The world has changed, and our education gurus are behind the curve. I read the other day that a modern, high-tech school has been chastised because their student’s reading and math skills don’t measure up. But measure up to what?

They are judging abilities as if it were 1911, not 2011. Who depends on memorizing the ‘times tables’ to figure out how to do math? Almost no one. We use some machine or device to do math. Who depends on a pen and paper to write? No one under the age of 30, and few of us older than that. And what is correct spelling? Is ‘you’ more valid than ‘u’? Spk better than speak? Luv superior to love? B to be?

It’s OK to have standards. But the standards should be relevant to the real world in which we live. Texting or its equivalent is not going to go away. New devices that foster shortcuts in communicating and thinking will continue to proliferate. 20^th century measures are holding us back. It is a waste of time to judge how well we’re teaching our kids by relying on what worked in the past.

Dinosaurs in the educational establishment should get out of the way. Let the new rulers of the world figure out what the appropriate game is and how to play it. We might even learn something in the process.