It is often alleged that the education system encourages rote memorization to the detriment of actual understanding of concepts, that it kills creativity, that it only aims at preparing children for standardized tests and that it fails to recognize the uniqueness of each child. (Some examples can be found here and here)

What do you think?

Yes, and further more here in the U.S. the government schools would be happy to steal our childrens' souls though they don't even admit such a thing exists. My wife and I would home school if she weren't ill. I also have little respect for secular universities.

Given:

1. The massive number of children to be taught,
2. The tremendous amount of money it would cost to individualize instruction, and
3. The limited ability of many parents to assist in their children's learning experience;

it is inevitable that a large portion of instruction is "rote memorization."

My recollection of my children's grade school experience is that while there were some things that were presented in a rote memorization format, there was also plenty of opportunity for a kid to use whatever skills and abilities they had to investigate various topics. Now, whether or not a kid would take the latter opportunity is another story. Sometimes they did and sometimes they just sat idly by and waited for the next teacher led period of instruction.

What is it said that youth today memorize? Presidents? Nope. States and state capitals? Nope. Latin forms? Nope. I mean, seriously. What are they alleged to be memorizing?

Without having memorized a bunch of stuff, the child expressing his creativity has virtually nothing to express. Imagine someone trying to do creative mathematics without having memorized his multiplication tables.

gherkin's questions are what I was wondering as well.

It's weird, I was thinking exactly those things, as if he had invaded my mind like some sort of brainworm or something.

Not history, as far as I can see.

In the West, public-funded, mandatory school was first implemented by the Prussians for the purpose of controlling the citizens, and encouraging military participation. The French implemented this same system to counter the teachings of Catholic schools. Everyone else eventually followed suit. Schools basically churn out clones, so there's no desire to individualize. It is only ever going to teach to an 'average' child. Slow or advanced students are usually out of luck, unless a school district has money to provide anything extra.

That's certainly the experience of my granddaughter who is in the 7th grade. She's bored in all of her classes except math. And although she is in the accelerated math class, she is weak in her multiplication facts.

I think that, in addition to lack of content and a dearth of practicing various forms of analysis, memorization also doesn't occur.

Exactly. Except for threats to the planet, the plight of refugees (legal or not, refugee or not), and the need for government control ... of which they have a basic understanding ... as it is repeated endlessly.

BTW, that's from teachers.

History is a patriarchal, European, elitist construct ... and therefore can be ignored.

Both my kids were in "enriched" classes. The real drawback was the teaching of entitlement by some teachers ("I have arranged that enriched kid are excused from homework in their regular classes ... because that would be too much work for our stellar enriched paragons") and the teaching of social justice by some others ("Let's make very educated posters on the need for additional money for education and the protection of a woman's right to choose. You're smart enough to figure out the stuff I'm really supposed to be teaching.")

Well, that will save me a great deal of time.

Can confirm I was not taught to memorize our Prime Ministers. We did memorize the provinces and territories but that's only 10+3

I have reasoned about this before. I'd rather be in a secular university (where I am) where people will present error, but not as if it were the Catholic faith, and at least let me self-define.

It would be a lot more difficult to have to argue with people teaching error and presenting it as Catholicism.

There was some big shot atheist, I don't remember his organization, but he kept thanking some nun at Notre Dame for teaching him how the Bible wasn't true. I know a friend who went to a Catholic university, and came back with so much confidence that half of Paul's letters are attributed to him falsely

I'll stick with my non-Catholic university for now. (Yes, there are good ones out there)

Anyone remember The Game of the States? It was only 48 states and their capitals when I played it.

As already mentioned, the multiplication tables.

Both a function of memorization.

As if I don't already have enough to occupy my mind, I listened to this presentation. As a retired teacher (32 years without a single count of homicide), I am preternaturally suspicious of teacher inservicers. Maybe you should be suspicious of my views as well, but here goes.

The speaker reminds us that we're educating children who will retire in 2065. (If they're lucky, Social Security won't have sucked all their money down an ever-widening rat hole. But I digress.) "Nobody has a clue what the world will look like in five years," saith the sage. That suggests that we should be educating them with something that will be useful throughout their life like, say, multiplication tables.

"Creativity is as important as literacy."

Well, this sounds true, but is it really? What if someone could build a better mousetrap simply by tinkering with it? Did Thomas Edison spend time poring over scientific journals as he created one world-changing invention after another? Henry Ford, who famously said "history is bunk" may have been anti-intellectual, but he sure got those cars moving off the assembly line. Don't get me wrong, kids should be literate, because that opens more doors to them. If nothing else, they can read for themselves that history is, in fact, endlessly fascinating and useful.

I have more, but I'm kind of tired and need a nap.

"High school science students shouldn't be compelled to memorize theorems and chemical equations. They should be allowed to refer the textbooks during the exam"

Thoughts?