Irish schools are in the top 25 in the world....happy news, just for a change

Herb Powell

Naikon wrote: »

These league tables are complete bollix. All the metrics used to determine school status is subjective fluff. The best schools are usually the ones that cost lots of $$$

That's fair ****e talk. Money does not = automatic improvement. I know some fella who went to a fee paying school-he was taught less than I was, teachers skipping classes, half days all the time etc. All these schools seem to do is perpetuate the idea "money makes me/things superior". If a child doesn't want to learn, he is not going to. The trick is getting them interested, not throwing money into the system or sending kids to "the best" schools and hoping things improve

fkt

As long as first years are being taught how to add 2+2 and we're all being forced to learn a pre-historic language that couldn't be more irrevelvant to the real world, it will continue to drop.

Herb Powell

fkt wrote: »

As long as first years are being taught how to add 2+2 and we're all being forced to learn a pre-historic language that couldn't be more irrevelvant to the real world, it will continue to drop.

Maths is something that really does need to be looked at and changed. It's such a jump from primary to secondary, and from junior to leaving cert. I did reasonably ok with jc higher maths, but couldn't handle higher level leaving cert maths AT ALL. Maths needs to be made a bit harder in primary school imo, so that people can actually be ready for the stuff in secondary school. Then again, I despised maths every year in school.

tricks

40 Chinese students joining my course in college for our final year.

Our lecturers warned us that basically, they will make us look like absolute thicks

I don't doubt that

wonderfulname

baltimore sun wrote: »

Ireland's reading score was 496, highest was 539, S.Korea

A point on this, Teaching is a highly respected occupation in south korea, only the top 5% of students are eligible to become one.

Here we used to attempt to lure high achievers into the system by starting them on a higher salary, as of yesterday it doesn't matter if you have a phd or scraped a pass in a lvl7, so the message is why bother?

We place a higher priority on class sizes and a higher teacher:pupil ratio, but its proven that the class size does not matter if the teacher is good enough.

Why not less teachers but better ones? Saves money and gives a better level of education. I'm looking for an article from two years back that backs what I've said if I find it I'll edit it in.

#15

wonderfulname wrote: »

We place a higher priority on class sizes and a higher teacher:pupil ratio, but its proven that the class size does not matter if the teacher is good enough.

You're on the right track, but a bit inaccurate. Class sizes matter when kids are at the junior end of primary school.

As they get older, research indicates that class size is not the defining factor in the outcome.

Chucky the tree

Average wage in 2000 was €32k for secondary school teacher, in 2008 it was €56k. Yet the Unions won't hear of any cuts and have the cheek to come out and claim new teachers are on the poverty line. :rolleyes:

Fratton Fred

So why do I keep being told Ireland has the best education in the world?

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

Fratton Fred wrote: »

So why do I keep being told Ireland has the best education in the world?

Blind faith?

twinytwo

El Weirdo wrote: »

RTE have a different spin on it.



http://www.rte.ie/news/2010/1207/literacy.html

welcome to the the world of the playstation...how many kids under say the age of 17 actually read books anymore?

Mike 1972

Fratton Fred wrote: »

So why do I keep being told Ireland has the best education in the world?

Because if something is said often enough most people will start to believe it regardless of how ridiculous it actually is.

liah

Well, on the bright side Canada is at 6th..





/slinks out... >.>

wonton

I wonder how much kim jung il paid them to remove the word "south" from in front of Korea.

wonton

I wonder how much kim jung il paid them to remove "south" from in front of korea.

Son Of A Vidic

We will keep slipping down and down, but our ability to talk and spell in 'text speak' will outshine everyone.:(

wonderfulname

Corvus Maximus wrote: »

We will keep slipping down and down, but our ability to talk and spell in 'text speak' will outshine everyone.:(

In all fairness written and texted language are kept separate by teens.

On that note currently watching Imagine on Tg4 and there's a banner in the crowd proclaiming "jo luvs JOHN" so we didn't create the shorthand.