USB Flash Drives Review

Just did some testing on old and new USB flash drives.  All drives were freshly formatted as exFAT to ensure maximum transfer speeds.  I only did write tests and caching was turned off.  I will update with more flash drives as I get them.  The test is writing a single 4.21GB file.

Flash drive	total time	MB/s	type
ADATA S102 32GB (old)	00:02:22	29.7	USB3
ADATA S102 32GB (new)	00:03:37	19.4	USB3
ADATA S102 128GB (new)	00:01:39	45.5	USB3
ADATA UV128 128GB (new)	00:05:14	13.4	USB3
Kingston DTSE9G2 64GB (old)	00:04:39	15.1	USB3
Patriot Xporter Rage XT 16GB (old)	00:03:58	17.7	USB2

Comments

The old ADATA S102 32GB drive writes at a steady 29.7 MB/s.  All the new ADATA drives write with large swings in write speed and results in a slower write; maybe to make the drive more reliable?  However, my old S102 has been used extensively and has remained reliable.

The Kingston drive also writes at a steady rate but it is pretty slow.  It has been very reliable.

USB3 may provide faster reads, but the write speed don't exceed USB2 limits except for the ADATA S102 128GB drive.

Most manufacturers don't seem to publish write speeds.  ADATA does and the tests don't come close to except for my old S102 32GB and the new S102 128GB.  I don't recommend the ADATA UV128 128GB as that is slower than my Patriot USB2 drive.

The Kingston DTSE9G2 is not fast, but it is convenient being cap-less and having a nice key ring hole.

Update - 2021-02-06

Kingston DT101 G3 16GB USB3 (old) - 5.9 MB/s

Memory

Last post, we looked a memorization; when we fully memorize something, it goes into long-term memory.  Working memory can be thought of as thinking memory.  When we want to learn or solve a problem, we bring in facts or concepts from our long-term memory and try to arrange them to learn or solve a problem.  I believe my memory, working and long-term, are good; but it takes work to use them.  If I am not concentrating, I can be just as absent-minded as anyone else.  Knowing how your memory works should help you study more efficiently.

Our working memory is very finite; some estimate it to be just a single digit, so 3-9 chunks.  It is difficult to precisely state because the number of chunks changes depending if we are using digits, letters, words, sounds or images.  Understanding this, we can train to increase our working memory; we do this by chunking.  Chunking is grouping separate things together so that exists in one working memory slot.  For instance, trying to remember a phone number.  Living in BC, we have 5 area codes:  236, 250, 604, 672, and 778.  10 digit phone numbers normally exceeds our working memory, but I only need to remember 7 digits because I can think of the area code as 1 to 5.  If the next 3 digits are the same as someone that I know, then I treat that as a chunk; and I only have to remember 4 digits.

Working and long-term memory are theories until scientists find better ways to measure how the brain works at a finer level.  Just speculating here - experts seem to have larger working memory in their fields of expertise vs the novice.  Rather than have more working memory, I would guess that they are able to bring in memories faster than the novice so that it looks like they have more working memory.  In a similar vein, experts also utilize heuristics to quickly eliminate unreasonable paths to solutions; you will see chess masters use faster memory recall and heuristics so that they can play chess simultaneously against many opponents and still win.  We will discuss heuristics in the future.  I suspect they are able to chunk more than the novice thinker.

So how do we go from novice to expert?  Usually it's through repetition.  Most teachers assign only enough homework for students to achieve some proficiency - teachers understand that students take many courses so they assign a reasonable amount of homework.  I always told my students that they have to do extra work to achieve expertise.  Is this going to be "some" or "a lot" of extra work?  Well, it depends on how each students' memory works.  If a person is savant, it might not be any extra work.  I have not been fortunate enough to meet a savant although I had 2 friends in university that were very very good if not gifted in math.

There are many techniques to get thoughts into long-term memory.  Some of them don't work for me, this is how I learn student names in less than a week, sometimes I get it after a single class.  This worked well for my grade 8 computer class - we had 3 terms at Carson and I would get a new class of grade 8's (usually 22-26 students) every term so learning names quickly was important; it helps with class management.

• I take attendance
• Every student gets seated at a computer in alphabetical order
• They get some instructions and are assigned a writing task that takes more than 80 minutes to complete
• I go alphabetically and introduce myself to each student saying their name out loud and looking at the face (making an association) and looking at my class list; I say their name silently two more times
• As I go, I silently repeat all the names as I go; I try not to read the list
• When I'm done, I help any student that needs it then I walk around alphabetically again and say their names out loud and look at their face for confirmation; again I try not to read the list
• I repeat the process again, but I go through the list in reverse alphabetical order
• Then I do this one more time
• Next, I ask the class to sit at tables instead of at the computers for a verbal review of the task.  Students must raise their hands to answer questions and I try to recall their names out loud before they answer
• When the class is dismissed I verbally say their name as leave for a final confirmation

There is a lot of repetition but this works well for me.  It takes more than one class when I have the first class on a Thursday or Friday because there are too many days between classes to refresh my memory using the Spacing Effect.  Admittedly, it is much easier to recall student names when they are sitting at the computer; it takes about a week and a half to recall student names in the halls.  Besides repetition, the tip is not always memorize things sequentially.  Try recalling memories in a random order to confirm that it is memorized.  This is why making study groups is a good idea.

There are other ways of improving memory.  These are things affect the way the brain actually works rather than techniques for memorizing.  Two of the methods that I regularly tell students is sleep and exercise.  Exercise does not have to be weight lifting or running marathons; moderate exercise will do - exercise will deliver more oxygen and nutrients to our brains.  This is one of the reasons why we need to take breaks after working for a while; it literally clears our heads!  Remember, it takes effort to use our memory, so clear the distractions when we study.  And THAT concludes this post!

Memorization

Memorization AKA rote learning or rote memorization has been an evil phrase in education for over a decade.  The paradigm has shifted from memorization to thinking or problem solving in all subjects in BC; this has been motivated by Bloom's Taxonomy where a student moves from simple thinking to higher levels of thinking.  Rote memorization is memorizing through repetition; this is the basic level of thinking in Bloom's.  It's unfortunate that some people (like the BC government) have unilaterally removed memorization without any kind of analysis.  Some believe that the Internet is available, so memorization is not important.  However, if we don't know certain facts exist, we can't possibly know what to search for.  The brain is actually capable of memorizing a lot, some would argue that there is no limit.

If we want to maximize memorization then we would do it formally by taking advantage of the Spacing Effect which was mentioned in a previous post.  This is refreshing the memory at recommended increasingly set intervals.  Bloom's taxonomy states the knowledge (knowing the facts) is the first level of thinking.  The second level is comprehension (understanding the facts).  I would argue, as some people have, that you can't get to the second level if you miss the first level.

I do agree that not all things need to be memorized.  For instance, if we wanted to discuss the possibility of World War 3 occurring, it is not important to memorize the dates of World War 1 and 2.  But it would be necessary to learn why World War 1 and 2 started and ended.  If we wanted to discuss Romeo and Juliet, we don't need to memorize every word in the novel, but we would take notes of the major characters and events.

Many kids learn to read before entering school by having parents read to them at home.  They are taking advantage of the Spacing Effect by making reading a daily habit.  They probably read the same favourite books over and over again, this is repetition at constant intervals rather than increasing.  They are learning the sound and spelling of words (facts).  In order to have a discussion about the story, the child has to memorize the plot of the story.  So memorization is happening, Bloom's level 1.

Now, how can we have an understanding level (Bloom's 2) discussion in an art class if we didn't know about shapes and colours?  We would end up talking in circles trying to come up with definitions that already exist and wasting an awful lot of time.

Similarly, in a music class, do we tell the children to go to the box with strings which could mean piano or guitar.  Go to the cylinder with holes which could be flute or clarinet.  No, we would show them what a guitar and flute are; we are giving them definitions.  Do we tell them to make this sound with the device.  No, we would explain the music staff, how to read the notes, then play a particular note.

So what kind of analysis can be done to determine what needs to be memorized in the curriculum?  From an economics point of view, we can attempt to do a cost benefit analysis.  This means we measure how much effort is needed to memorize something (the cost) vs how much usage we get from the memory in the future (the benefit).

I remember in grade 3 (over 50 years ago) that my friends asked me who my teacher was; I said Mrs. Hodgson.  They all went "ooooooo" and said she was a hard teacher.  Every week, we would learn 10 words for a spelling test.  During the spelling test, she would say the word in a sentence so that we knew the context.  Every week, we would learn a new row of the multiplication table.  I concluded that Mrs. Hodgson was one of the better teachers I had in elementary school.  I can't remember the words that we learned to spell (it would be amazing if I did!), but I gained an appreciation of using and spelling words correctly from then on.  And of course, I use the multiplication table every day.  That means the benefit vs cost of memorizing spelling and the multiplication table is a huge number and growing every year that I keep living!  If it takes 10 repetitions to memorize something and that something is used 1000 times, the benefit cost ratio is 1000/10=100.  I wouldn't be surprised if the benefit cost ratio of the multiplication table for me is over 100,000!

In the BC Curriculum Guide for math from K to 6, memorizing the multiplication table or addition and subtraction of single digits are not in the curriculum.  There are strategies for adding and subtracting, and treating multiplication as repeated addition but that's not the same thing as memorization.  There are many concepts taught from grade 8 and up in math that require quick mental calculations so that they can try to learn higher level concepts such as prime factorization and factorizing a polynomial.  If we can't do the mental calculations, we will overload our working memory and not be able to grasp the higher level concept as easily or at all.  Unfortunately I witnessed students struggling in grade 12 math because they never learned mental math well and YES I offered them help to improve their mental math.

Using another analogue, let's look at reading a sentence:  A geometric series is the sum of the terms of a geometric sequence.  Let's say we didn't know certain words and had to look up the definitions: sum, term and geometric sequence.  This will require temporarily memorizing 4 sentences just to understand 1 and it will probably be hard to make a picture of the concept.  Let's look at another sentence that is longer:  This breed of working dog is medium to large size, and has medium to long tan and black hair, and has ears that are large and erect, and was originally developed to herd sheep.  Because you know all the words, it will not tax your working memory and you should be able to picture this breed of dog, a German Shepherd.

I don't teach English, so I don't know exactly how to interpret the BC Curriculum Guide for English.  Most of it talks about creating stories and structures but doesn't specifically address learning words and spelling.  The closest directive I found is:  Communicate using sentences and most conventions of Canadian spelling, grammar, and punctuation.  Because of lack of specificity, I had some students unable to differentiate:  there, their and they're; or to, too and two.  Writing stories with a limited vocabulary is not teaching students to think at a high level in Bloom's Taxonomy.  Another teacher told me that a student submitted a resume with "hear is my resume."

It's egregious to have an education system that graduates students that don't look intelligent enough.  Education tends to swing with the latest trends without fully evaluating the effects.  It's not hard to do a cost benefit analysis; we see that we are limiting learning at the higher grades by cutting out spelling, vocabulary, and math tables from the earlier grades.  Teachers can only go so far to limit the changes that government wants; so parents need to question and evaluate their child's progress and ask for changes from the government if the progress doesn't meet expectations.  Right now, it might be parents that have to teach their kids the multiplication table, spelling and vocabulary so that their kids have a more complete education.  Sadly, THAT concludes this post!

The Ideal Parent

"It takes a village to raise a child."  Student success relies on teachers, the student and the parent(s) or guardian.  It is possible for a student to achieve success without good teachers or parents, but it becomes significantly more difficult.  The title of this post is likely to get some parents feeling defensive; that is not the goal; it wasn't the goal in the previous posts about the ideal teacher and ideal student.  I doubt many people have formally taken a course on how to be a parent because it's not offered in schools.  I have had parents asking about what to do with their kids in parent-teacher interviews.  If there is something that parents can do to make their kids lives better, isn't that a good thing?  The goal of the ideal parent is not to become the teacher so let's discuss this.

This is important so it's worth re-iterating:  proper sleep is vital to learning well.  Parents need to make sure that kids get the proper amount of sleep and get to school on time.  Unfortunately, it's not surprising to have to wake sleeping students up during class; it's not a good feeling to be embarrassed in class.  If parents are working hard to support their family, doesn't it make sense to also support their learning.  Some parents may not be able to physically take their kids to school, but they should have some way to make sure their kids get to school on time.  Showing up on time makes the student feel that education is important, that the parent cares about education and that it is important to be responsible.

Nutrition is also an important component to learning well.  It starts with a good breakfast.  It doesn't have to be a big production, but it should certainly avoid high sugar content.  The high cost of living and low wages in some areas may make proper nutrition difficult for some parents.  Many schools are able to provide breakfast and/or lunch for students but parents have to ask.  It may be uncomfortable for parents to ask for help, but if it's a choice between a parent's pride and a child's education, I think it should be an easy choice to make.

The ideal parent is not a helicopter parent.  It may seem that being deeply involved in a child's life is a good thing but it can cause problems.  The first is loss of independence which means a loss of responsibility; this can lead to difficulties as an adult where they may feel overwhelmed when taking responsibility.  In the extreme where a parent prevents the child from making mistakes; this can create anxieties for the child.  Quoting Miss Frizzle from The Magic School Bus, "Take chances, make mistakes, and get messy"; it's how we grow and learn.

Homework is something for students to complete.  Parents can help by checking if there is homework and that progress is being made.  Under no circumstances should anybody else complete the homework; this will delay student learning and hamper future learning.  Parents can help by explaining concepts (if they have the background), explaining where to get additional resources, booking extra time with teachers or getting tutors that know how to teach (schools may have free peer tutoring).

Parents want to provide tools for our kids to succeed in education and life such as cellphones and computers.  How do they ensure that technology is used properly?  It has been shown that lack of technology is detrimental to education, but unchecked use of technology can be just as bad.  This is a battle for teachers and it is most likely a battle for parents.  There is no one solution since technology is always evolving.  Is it ever too late to start controlling technology use?  It certainly is easier to manage when they start using technology.  Provided that living conditions allow, technology should be kept in the open areas of the house and not in the bedrooms.  Another option is to limit screen-time by setting hours.  If parents are tech savvy enough, parental controls can be added to cellphones, computers and/or routers; it's still a good idea to physically check once in a while to see that the controls haven't been circumvented.

Lastly, parents who want everything for their children may over-schedule their children.  Children need downtime, this means no screen-time.  Downtime gives children the time to reflect on what's been happening in their life and they may even ask parents questions on how to handle things.  Downtime also gives children time to relax and de-stress.  After-school activities that appear fun such as dance, sports or music is not considered downtime because it can cause stress.  How often do people say "I need some me time" and why do they say this?

Parents and teachers may or may not see education the same way; but if they do, education will be easier for the student to accept.  The only way to find or confirm a common view is by communication.  Hopefully, reading these posts and links will allow both parties to articulate their views in a productive manner.  Being a parent is a big responsibility.  Some parents may need to do more and some may need to do less to find the happy medium.  If we can get children to be more responsible so that parent may have less responsibility, it would be time well spent.  And THAT concludes this post!

The Ideal Student

Time to turn the tables by defining the ideal student.  Of course, not everyone is going to have the same picture in mind, but let's start somewhere.  Saying my kid is the sweetest isn't going to get us anywhere because it's just a persuasive definition.  We must use concrete qualities.

We start with respect.  Respect encompasses many things.  Students need to learn that to get respect, you need to give respect.  So respect starts with showing up on time for class - that goes for teachers as well!  Students being late is a big pet peeve for many teachers that I know - parents can help out a great deal by making sure their kids get to bed earlier so they can arrive on time and are ready to learn.  Here are 2 references on how much sleep do kids need:  Today's Parent and Healthy Children.  Class management is the teacher's responsibility, but students can make this easier or harder; students can show respect by not interrupting when others are talking; everyone deserves their time to participate.  The more respect that is shown; the more time everyone will get to participate.  Respect is something that students are not fully aware of, so it is incumbent on the teacher to explicitly state them.

"You get what you give."  Teachers are like performers.  When performers get feedback from the audience, the performance gets better.  It's the same with a lecture!  If nobody asks a question during a lecture, it's tough for the teacher to be excited and keep going.  It never hurts to ask "why?"; it usually leads to more personal answers rather than something out of a textbook.  Here are some questions to try but make sure that it's applicable:

• "Why are we learning this?"
• "Who discovered this?"
• "What can we do with this?"
• "Is there another way?"
• "How has this helped you in life?"
• "Sorry, I don't understand."

One caveat is to be genuine when asking the question.

The other pet peeve for teachers is cellphones. If the school has a no cellphone policy, then this isn't an issue.  No matter how disciplined we are, a cellphone will likely distract and impact the learning.  Here is an article that states the impact:  CNBC.  Breaking the cellphone habit early will help when we keep a job later - employers don't want to see their employee on their cellphone while on the job!  And for when we get our driver's license, it will also help us avoid distracted driving.

Some students will argue with teachers about marking; this is generally not a good direction (unless it's multiple choice) because this implies the teacher is not correctly doing their job.  It is okay to ask how to answer a question better or what can be done to improve understand or to make arguments clearer.  If your answer is correct, then the teacher will notice their own mistake.  I have had a few professors who have told the class that if they ask for a mark correction that they will re-mark the whole test and the mark may go down.  In reality, for high school, a couple of marks out of probably hundreds of marks is going to be less than 1% and most teachers will boost the letter grade if it is on the boundary.

Of course students have time pressure like everyone else, but ideally work habits need to be consistent.  Students need to start the assigned work as soon as possible after a lesson is delivered.  Firstly, it will verify that the lesson is understood.  Secondly, it will verify that we can apply the lesson.  Lastly it will help with learning/memorizing; it's called the Spacing Effect.  There may be temptation to complete the assigned work, but RESIST; save some it for the next day to utilize the Spacing Effect.  If you complete the assigned work, it is almost as bad as cramming because your memory needs to be refreshed until the lesson is completely learned.  If something is learned, it will always be there ready to use.  If something is crammed, it will always have to be re-crammed in order to use.  It is a fallacy to think that cramming is more efficient than learning; learning will save you more time in the long run.  Also, teachers want students to learn and not to cram.

Being the ideal student is not magic; it's just doing the things that help learning.  If there is difficulty making studying a habit, forming a study group is usually helpful as long as it is not just a social gathering.  And THAT concludes this post!

The Ideal Teacher

Teachers are humans:  they make mistakes, they have limited time; they do much more than stand in front of a class; and they need to live their lives away from school.  Please keep this in mind before we criticize or make demands any teacher!

Let's face it, some teachers spend more time with students in a day than the students' parents.  So, they have a big influence on students.  What qualities do we want in teachers that will make our kids grow up able to do what they want/need to do?  With this knowledge, perhaps we can have more meaningful discussions in a parent-teacher interview.  I have been extremely lucky in my life to have great and inspiring teachers; my wife and kids have not always been as fortunate; this is the impetus for this post.

Starting off with the obvious quality, we'll discuss knowledge.  You can't teach if you don't have the knowledge, right?  That depends.  Elementary school teachers are generalists; they need to know and teach many subjects.  Some elementary schools have specialist teachers that handle gym and/or music (someone has to have first aid in case there are injuries in gym).  Secondary school teachers are specialists; because of the way scheduling is handled, a teacher may end up with a course that they have never taught before.  Teachers (elementary or secondary) that are professional will make a concerted effort to quickly get up to speed and teach the subject matter competently.  Sometimes, they can even present the material with a newbie perspective that will help students because they have just experienced the learning hurdles.  I have witnessed teachers doing this commendably while teaching.  As a parent, I have also witnessed the opposite; one of my kids had a teacher telling students to Google answers for the French class.  My other child had a teacher that certainly had knowledge, but did no teaching in her Mandarin class because all the other students already knew Mandarin and took the class to boost their GPA.  Parents should talk to their kids about their teachers, as most can figure out if their teachers are knowledgeable enough.  So knowledge is a important piece but by no means a complete part of the ideal teacher.

I told my students that I would be always be fair with them.  What does this mean besides the obvious?  For starters, every student should get an equal opportunity to participate; class discussions should not be dominated by a few students.  Marking should be done without bias.  Tests should not have material that hasn't been taught; this doesn't mean that there shouldn't be challenging questions.  Teachers do make mistakes, but how it is dealt with differentiates the ideal teacher.  Poor teachers will be dismissive.  The ideal teacher can make up for it by giving bonus marks for students pointing it mistakes.  Sometimes, I purposely made mistakes during lessons just to see if the students were paying attention.  However, I would not over-do this as it would just seem incompetent.  It is also good to give students a chance to question authority by making a mistake and model the appropriate behaviour for correcting the mistake.  When students get older, many fear speaking in class because they don't want to make mistakes; a teacher can normalize this so that it's okay to make mistakes while speaking.  Teachers must never permit ridicule for mistakes; this is an important component of being fair otherwise student participation will shut down and society will lose future leaders.

What else is important?  Availability.  I don't believe that it's a requirement for teachers be available for extra help, so if they do then consider yourself lucky.  Some teachers may provide extra help through email.  Some teachers may use social media provided that the school board allows social media.  A lot of my colleagues offered their extra time which is awesome.  But students and parents have to realize that if this extra help is not used, then teachers may no longer offer it because their time is valuable too.  And sadly, very few students attend extra help even when they clearly need it.  Also, check if availability means there is parent interview time.  I argue that an ideal teacher will have open and transparent communication of teaching methods; if it can't be done, how will students buy into learning?  I know time is limited for teachers, but it may save time by pro-actively communicating teaching methods rather than explaining it to parents individually.

Another important quality or rather ability is classroom management.  Classroom management does not mean having students sitting in rows quietly reading.  It is making a environment so that the students are learning.  One class could have students talking loudly and moving around and another class could have students working quietly in pairs yet both may be managed properly.  A class may be quiet while a teacher is lecturing with no learning happening because a lot of students are on their phones not paying attention - this is not good classroom management.  Although teachers have the ultimate responsibility for management, this can be aided or hindered by administration or the school board.  The administration is responsible for class composition - with homogeneous class needs it is easier to manage a larger class size; as a class diversifies in learning skills, knowledge and needs, large class sizes will become more difficult to manage.  In the latter case, students and parents can help the teacher and themselves by advocating for smaller class sizes.  Personally, I have had classes of 33 students where learning was happening readily and I have had classes of 24 students where it was "trying" to get some kids to learn.  If a student isn't learning, it's a good idea for the parent to see if has something to do with class composition before blaming the teacher.

Finally, let's consider assessment.  In the previous post, Defining Success, we argued that learning was the goal.  We can't know if learning is occurring unless we have some kind of assessment.  There are two kinds of assessment:  formative and summative.  Formative is feedback for the student and parent that doesn't count for marks - it is supposed to help the student prepare for summative assessment; this could be homework, review packages, drafts, meetings, etc.  Summative assessment counts for marks - this could be a test, project, presentation, essay, etc.  Ideally, a teacher would give students formative assessment before any summative assessment - this should help students prepare and have less anxiety.  A last point on summative assessment would be the policy of retests.  The extremes of yes or no would probably be not productive.  There can be extenuating circumstances where a retest is warranted such as illness, accidents, etc.  Allowing retests on every single test ultimately won't teach the student how to prepare for tests properly.  Please keep in mind that retests are extra work for teachers.  We've all heard students or parents say "this teacher is easy" or "this teacher is hard." - everyone should take this with a grain of salt because ultimately it is relative and may not even be relevant.  We want students to be engaged and learning whether they come into class at a low or high level - students should have their own goals and work at raising their standards; there should be one standard that's attainable by some and not others.  This is the impetus for some schools and school boards to move away from summative assessment.

I know that some of the arguments are brief, but I will go into more detail in future posts.  I have left out a lot of teacher qualities/methodologies, but I believe those are independent of student learning.  I hope this provides information for discourse between teachers, students, and parents to improve student learning instead of people just complaining about a teacher - the goal should be how to improve student learning.  And THAT concludes this post!

Defining Success

Let's start at the beginning.  Students won't know if they are successful until they can define success!  Success will vary slightly as students age and as knowledge and skill increase.  So, what shall success be?  Happiness, friends, obedience, respect, social status, confidence, leadership, attendance, independence, work habits, marks - one class or all classes, life skills, awards, scholarships, top of the class, valedictorian, post secondary education or job entry?  Let me argue that it is learning or even meta-learning (learning how to learn).

Let's discuss the first 10 items.  I would argue these are attributes attained by focusing on the main goal.  If students are doing poorly in school, they may gain one or all of these attributes but it will be difficult to maintain them in the long run.  Students will attain these attributes through various courses; if one is not available, then an elective should be selected to gain that attribute.  Obedience is a red-herring; of course we want students to show some obedience but students won't learn how to stand up for themselves if they are just obedient.  Not all of these need to be attained in school; if the student is involved in after school activities that is an equally acceptable avenue.

Let's move on to life skills before tackling the more controversial items. It's easy to focus only on academics, athletics or arts.  But we don't want people living with their parents until they are 40 because they lack the life skills to live on their own.  It would benefit students to learn how to use basic tools (screwdriver, hammer, wrenches), make dinner, wash dishes, wash their clothes, shop for food and pay bills.  So parents should either teach them at home or sign them up for shop and home economics classes.

Okay, let's tackle marks, awards, scholarships, top of the class and valedictorian as a group.  I would argue that learning will achieve these objectives better than using these objective to achieve learning.  If the parents and student value learning over the marks the student becomes an intrinsically motivated learner.  Using objectives to achieve learning is usually done where parents rewards the student and the student becomes an extrinsically motivated learner.  Or the student is simply motivated by marks; this is also extrinsic motivation.  You will find books devoted to this subject alone, so this will be discussed in more detail in a later post.  Digression:  We live in a instant self-gratifying world of consumerism; IMO - this is partly due to students requiring too much extrinsic motivation; the other major part of consumerism is advertising but that's another discussion.  IMO - we can raise a healthier society that can avoid consumerism if we rely more on intrinsic motivation.

There is another argument to not worry about marks too much.  There is no guarantee that schools or teachers assess at the same level of difficulty (called standardized testing), so a B in one class might not be a B in another class.  Even if the test is identical, there is no guarantee that marking will be similar or even identical.  Additionally, standardized testing is also a controversial subject; it gives the teacher less leeway on teaching what the class needs or relevant.  Again, this will be revisited in a later post.

Let's finish off with some anecdotal evidence (without divulging everything about my family's personal lives).  Personally, my wife and I have never stressed marks with our kids.  We have always stressed whether they are learning and whether they have been putting in the effort.  They have had part-time jobs while at school.  They have been pretty good at most of their classes, received some awards and scholarships but they were not elite academically.  And we have all been happy with this because they turned out to be hard working successful adults.  They have never felt overly anxious or stressed out at school or work.

I give you one more abbreviated anecdote.  I had a parent-student-teacher interview where I told a parent her child had very high marks in my class but that he was coasting a bit to get his work done by taking the easy route.  I said that the child could learn more by taking a risk in doing harder tasks.  The parent started crying because she had been trying to convince the child of the same thing; she finally got someone to agree with her.  So, the point is that high marks doesn't necessarily mean that a student is learning.

My final argument for learning as a measure of success is that we are in an ever changing world; learning is the way to succeed.  Many people don't find a job in their field of study, or they change jobs because they are not happy in their field, or have to look for different job because of an accident or disability.  The only way to adapt is to good at learning.  Learning more is also a way to get a promotion.  I consider myself a life-long learner; I love getting more skills (I recently took a welding course and trying to find a blacksmith course) which is why I'm on my third career.  I hope this provokes some thought or confirms your beliefs.  And THAT concludes this post!