United States.....A Third World Country?

I don't know if I would go as far as to say what the teacher said...but I would say that in this day and age there are too many parents that don't push their kids at all, thus the reason we have so many kids on the streets and dropping out of school. Now-a-days, it's almost up the kids to push themselves harder to make it in this world because the fact is, most adults don't care anymore. They're too busy trying to make it for themselves. I'm not saying ALL parents, but sadly there are some like that. My parents being some of them. My mom used to talk a big game, but then again, she was one who suggested I drop out of school, so that I could get a fulltime job to support her and her "habits". It's a sad reality.

I think both statements are true. In some places in the States, our children are way behind and are not learning enough math or science or learning about computers. On the other hand, some children have too much to do. Between school work, soccer, a musical instrument, a and any other after school activity, they are so busy.A happy medium must be found or we will have big problems.Not only do the Japanese and European have on average smarter children. I bet they are happier too.

It won't become a third world country but I do agree our school system is a mess. They are either pushing them too hard or not enough. There is no balance in there. Most seem to want to just teach to make them pass a test (State or SAT type) and the rest is pushed to the side. We need things more standardized for the whole country and make sure the teachers are doing their jobs. Sadly in this area we have a lot of teachers who don't seem to want to actually teach. I agree though education should be important but not at the expensive of their childhood. I think we need to go back to some of the basics in the way we were taught growing up. Teach the basics and the rest will come with it.

We already have a great country here, bush is the only reason our country would become a third world country, Kids and education today are ok.

The teacher was properly just upset about it all. Actually, if I may? I think the funding in for the educational system has its own problems. Then there are lack of support for the teachers (such as aids). I think we really need to open up our eyes because I think we don't take education seriously. I am thinking that some children take on lots of responsibilities outside of school so it makes of stressful situations. I agree, there has to be a weight of fun for children and learning via the schools. I wish one day the schools will have adequate resources to properly teach. Have a nice day. Pablo/Scott

why in the first place.. do we have to compete with one another.. discriminate with one another? shouldn't we encourage integrity? where everyone should cooperate to make the world a better living? sometims i don't understand too.. but .. i agree with u.. children have the right to enjoy their childhood.. we have no right to force them

The education in our system is geared toward sports not education. In Europe they do not have sports in the schools. They have sports clubs like our boy and girl scout's here for those who want to be involved in sports. Schools will axe education over sports and have. Then they don't pay teacher's a decent wage. They expect our teacher's to baby sit the wah wah kids who do not want to learn. Because Wah wah parent's don't want precious Billy touched but he is disruptive and out of control. Bring back discipline you will regain control over education and learning. Homeschooler's are mostly doing better than public school now as are private schools. As to third world nation, sorry but we are already there, people are just in denial about it and it is going to get worse.

I think the question is what are they teaching kids? What about practical education that teaches kids how to live after school is done. The Chinese have 4 times the population we do, so it doesn't matter how many brain-children we turn out off the school assembly line. We will always fall short based on the difference in numbers of kids alone. Education is great and important, but how come so many kids have trouble with their lives after graduation? Education is more than memorizing a bunch of answers, it is about learning by doing with hands on instruction.

Frankly speaking I am not aware of this however I know that China and Japan are growing too fast. Being a third world country is not in your hand. It depends on education system and budget of the country. I agree that children have right to enjoy their childhood but due to increasing competition it is very hard to give them chance.

If the United States is a third world country, there is no wealthy countries in the world. I believe the educational system is much more advanced than other countries. They encourage children to exert their own imagination. Young children nearly have no homework to do unless do some investigation which they like. But the educaiton system in China is opposite. In China, a child who is only in the primary school has to do homework more than 3 hours per day. The weight of his or her shcoolbag near the half of the child's weight. Our government said to decrease the burden of the students everyday, but the children have to do well in the exam in order to enter an important school and then enter into the key university. Then they may have the splendid future.

I really think the problem with education is the fact that people don't realize that it can actually be fun to learn. Learning doesn't take away from childhood experiences, rather it enhances them by giving them a real and true grasp of what is happening around them. I would imagine that the only reason a child would become so stressed over education is because of their parents. My daughter is learning quite rapidly, without stress, and loving every minute of it. She began reading just before the age of four, and is now moving onto addition and subtraction with nary a complaint. I also tutor a group of three children who are also having a blast learning. The second youngest, at seven, decided that he wanted to learn Japanese. Boy was he excited when I brought over a cheap calligraphy set for him to practice with. In any case, I really don't think its the rate of learning that needs to be changed, but the actual curriculum. Learning facts by rote is not going to impress them any, and is most likely to be forgotten after the first test. But learning with life experience is guaranteed to get them interested.

Unfortunately, a lot of what your teacher told you is very true. We used to be in the top ten worldwide in our educational programs. Now we have fallen to below the halfway mark and many countries are way ahead of us. We also have a much higher drop out rate than many of those countries do. For instance, I live in New York State which has very rigorous educational standards, yet our drop out rate is at fifty percent right now. As hard as we push our children, we have yet to meet their needs in basic reading, writing and math skills. In fact, more home-schooled children may be getting a better education at home than they do in our public schools which are woefully underfunded, and therein lies the biggest part of the problem. 'The No Child Left Behind' Act was a good idea, but with no money to back it up, more and more children are indeed being left behind and more and more of our jobs will be going to all those other countries who have a better educational system than we do.

It's not going to become a third world country...everyone immigrates here anyway. (just kidding...) Our public schools may be lacking a nything positive, but there are plenty of private schools, home schools, etc to make up for it.

i come from china.i think usa's education system differs from china a lot.now china is learning something good system of usa's.but i think all country's system have shortcoming.we should learn from each other!

I think that a better idea than to make children grow up faster would be to ensure that they are learning in school. I have found that many of our students graduate from high school without basic skills. For instance, I was helping a college math student with a homework problem today. She had to divide 44 by 2. I just said, "o.k, what is 44 divided by 2." Her response, "let me get my calculator." So, I said...no, you know this one, it's simple math. You do not need a calculator. And she replied with "No. I really don't know. I never had to learn my multiplication tables." I think we should focus on what is already in teh curriculum that students are not learning --for whatever reason.