Education concepts and applications

¶ … Social Studies

How will the Current State of Education Effect my Future Profession?

According to several sources, the current state of social studies is something less than ideal by most standards that would value a liberal education. Students have been polled about their knowledge of subjects such as geography and history for many generations which offers a perspective not only on the current state of education in the social sciences, but also provides insights as to their evolution over time. One such measure is the Nation's Report Card which represents a series of assessments done on a sample basis that targets a series of student knowledge about specific subjects including geography, reading, math, science, writing, economics, and art (Williams, 2011).

These assessments are designed to be fairly static in order to make comparisons possible between generations of students and is maintained by the National Assessment Governing Board and the entire practice is also mandated by Congress. The current state of education and student knowledge is relevant not only to policy makers, but to most of the public, either directly or indirectly, as well. While there are some sources of optimism that appear in the results of these assessments, there are also many sources of concern in the overall trends that appear in the data.

" ... (the assessment) shows that kids just aren't curious. They aren't reading about these things and therefore they don't have knowledge. They don't work hard enough. Kids know the lyrics to their favorite song but can't for some reason remember who the vice president is. Schools didn't cause the problem, but I think America should be raising standards ... "

-Dr. Driscoll, Director for the National Center for Education Statistics (Williams, 2011)

The current state of education has also made the movement to standardize testing and much of the education system a polarizing issue in many circles. Many teachers will argue that too much of their time is spent preparing kids for standardized reading and math tests disproportionately ignoring other subjects such as history and art. There is also that common argument that standardizing course materials does not allow teachers the flexibility to customize their instruction to tailor it to the students' interests. For example, students may be required to memorize various historical facts for a test, however they fail to put these facts in a context that would make them interesting to learn and as a consequence these facts are often simply forgotten shortly after the test.