Alexandria Catholic School - no critical thinking??

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes, memorizing mundane and intricate facts is absolutely essential. Maybe one day they’ll invent something where kids can easily retrieve esoteric information at will, but until that day, rote memorization must be the focus over analysis and critical thinking.

It’s also a binary choice — rote memorization OR critical thinking. I understand why the school chose the former.

I can't think of any good reason for students to memorize mundane or intricate facts like when the Revolutionary War happened, what the Stamp Act was, when the Mexican-American War happened, and who was President during World War II. That's some pretty in-the-weeds stuff, and they could always just look it up on the internet.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes, memorizing mundane and intricate facts is absolutely essential. Maybe one day they’ll invent something where kids can easily retrieve esoteric information at will, but until that day, rote memorization must be the focus over analysis and critical thinking.

It’s also a binary choice — rote memorization OR critical thinking. I understand why the school chose the former.

This reads better as sarcasm, which some may miss. As a humanities teacher, I can say the binary choice is totally false. Kids can't analyze without a factual base, but they won't retain or care about facts they "memorize" for a quiz if no one tells them how those facts mean something or connect.

Ask any senior high school teacher how much kids remember in most subjects from their earlier years, and the answer may shock you. The memorize, quiz, and forget culture is dominant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DD is in 7th grade. Her Social Studies and Science classes are pathetic. Sole focus on rote memorization. Zero application of concepts or critical thinking.

The text books they use have plenty of exercises on both, but the teachers skip right over that stuff and just want the kids to recall/memorize facts.

Is this typical at dmv catholic schools? Or do we just have outlier teachers/school?

Zero application of concepts? Are you certain as that would be pretty hard to do in a learning environment. No discussions, in-class writing activities, experiments?

What school is this, as perhaps there are parents on here who can assist with more information? If you don’t want to name the school you can say one track school, two-track school, three-track school, and perhaps that might clue people who know in to help answer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DD is in 7th grade. Her Social Studies and Science classes are pathetic. Sole focus on rote memorization. Zero application of concepts or critical thinking.

The text books they use have plenty of exercises on both, but the teachers skip right over that stuff and just want the kids to recall/memorize facts.

Is this typical at dmv catholic schools? Or do we just have outlier teachers/school?

Zero application of concepts? Are you certain as that would be pretty hard to do in a learning environment. No discussions, in-class writing activities, experiments?

What school is this, as perhaps there are parents on here who can assist with more information? If you don’t want to name the school you can say one track school, two-track school, three-track school, and perhaps that might clue people who know in to help answer.

We all know it’s the weirdo who gets upset about St Mary’s on the regular.

[Anonymous]

We have many kids today who don’t know the revolutionary War happened before the Civil War. Some understanding of dates is a good thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It might be blamed on the military culture predominate in NoVa. Not a lot of thinking outside the box.

OMG. I hope you don't say such ridiculous things out loud at cocktail parties. No, it has nothing to do with military culture - tell me EXACTLY bow that winds up at a Catholic school in Alexandria. Oh, you can't.

Apparently, you know nothing about traditional parochial catholic schools in America.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DD is in 7th grade. Her Social Studies and Science classes are pathetic. Sole focus on rote memorization. Zero application of concepts or critical thinking.

The text books they use have plenty of exercises on both, but the teachers skip right over that stuff and just want the kids to recall/memorize facts.

Is this typical at dmv catholic schools? Or do we just have outlier teachers/school?

Zero application of concepts? Are you certain as that would be pretty hard to do in a learning environment. No discussions, in-class writing activities, experiments?

What school is this, as perhaps there are parents on here who can assist with more information? If you don’t want to name the school you can say one track school, two-track school, three-track school, and perhaps that might clue people who know in to help answer.

We all know it’s the weirdo who gets upset about St Mary’s on the regular.

Doth protest a bit too much! Interesting that you immediately and automatically assume the OP is talking about st Mary’s when there are at least 4 Catholic schools in “Alexandria.”

You must not have a very good opinion of st Mary’s.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes, memorizing mundane and intricate facts is absolutely essential. Maybe one day they’ll invent something where kids can easily retrieve esoteric information at will, but until that day, rote memorization must be the focus over analysis and critical thinking.

It’s also a binary choice — rote memorization OR critical thinking. I understand why the school chose the former.

I can't think of any good reason for students to memorize mundane or intricate facts like when the Revolutionary War happened, what the Stamp Act was, when the Mexican-American War happened, and who was President during World War II. That's some pretty in-the-weeds stuff, and they could always just look it up on the internet.

It’s not in the weeds at all. It IS history

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DD is in 7th grade. Her Social Studies and Science classes are pathetic. Sole focus on rote memorization. Zero application of concepts or critical thinking.

The text books they use have plenty of exercises on both, but the teachers skip right over that stuff and just want the kids to recall/memorize facts.

Is this typical at dmv catholic schools? Or do we just have outlier teachers/school?

Zero application of concepts? Are you certain as that would be pretty hard to do in a learning environment. No discussions, in-class writing activities, experiments?

What school is this, as perhaps there are parents on here who can assist with more information? If you don’t want to name the school you can say one track school, two-track school, three-track school, and perhaps that might clue people who know in to help answer.

We all know it’s the weirdo who gets upset about St Mary’s on the regular.

Doth protest a bit too much! Interesting that you immediately and automatically assume the OP is talking about st Mary’s when there are at least 4 Catholic schools in “Alexandria.”

You must not have a very good opinion of st Mary’s.

Perhaps they were using critical thinking. Every two months, threads pop up with similar acrimonious tome towards the school. Everyone on this forum is tired of it even those with no connection to the school.

I have no connection to St. Mary's and sometimes wonder if the person is some troll from Macedonia.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DD is in 7th grade. Her Social Studies and Science classes are pathetic. Sole focus on rote memorization. Zero application of concepts or critical thinking.

The text books they use have plenty of exercises on both, but the teachers skip right over that stuff and just want the kids to recall/memorize facts.

Is this typical at dmv catholic schools? Or do we just have outlier teachers/school?

Zero application of concepts? Are you certain as that would be pretty hard to do in a learning environment. No discussions, in-class writing activities, experiments?

What school is this, as perhaps there are parents on here who can assist with more information? If you don’t want to name the school you can say one track school, two-track school, three-track school, and perhaps that might clue people who know in to help answer.

We all know it’s the weirdo who gets upset about St Mary’s on the regular.

Doth protest a bit too much! Interesting that you immediately and automatically assume the OP is talking about st Mary’s when there are at least 4 Catholic schools in “Alexandria.”

You must not have a very good opinion of st Mary’s.

I think very highly of St Mary’s. I think very poorly of the op.

[Anonymous]

My 7th grader in a public school is doing both - why can't they both learn facts and learn how to think critically about those facts and what the implication of them has been?

[Anonymous]

Could also be Queen of Apostles.

[Anonymous]

Sounds like it’s time to change schools. My kid switched for 8th grade and it was a surprisingly great experience. She got used to higher rigor of new school and got to meet students before class increased its size substantially.

[Anonymous]

You could send them to public to learn that we live on stolen land and that gender is a spectrum?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DD is in 7th grade. Her Social Studies and Science classes are pathetic. Sole focus on rote memorization. Zero application of concepts or critical thinking.

The text books they use have plenty of exercises on both, but the teachers skip right over that stuff and just want the kids to recall/memorize facts.

Is this typical at dmv catholic schools? Or do we just have outlier teachers/school?

It's a Catholic school this is at all of them. How in the world did you not know this before signing your kid up?

And you know this how? This was not the case in the Catholic schools I attended, nor the ones my kids attended. So no, is it not true of all. How in the world did you not know this?