We're learnding.
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A little older. I was 11 in grade 6, but I was also the youngest student.
wrote on last edited by [email protected]I'm curious what it is for other countries so off to do a little searching....
Update:
Right, it's better but not wildly so when spread across the EU and lower in some places. This page is from the Irish Central Statistics office with 2023 numbers and puts us at 21% at or below the level 1 (at or below a grade 6 equivalent). On that page (2023 numbers) the US is at 28% so that 54% statistic in the OP smells a bit.
The main difference between Ireland and the US is that we're only 5% below level 1 where the US is at 12%.
For reference, Portugal has 15% below level 1.
Here's the definition of level 1:
Here's the relevant graph with all levels in picture format but you can get the individual numbers by going to the page and hovering over the individual levels.
Japan and the Nordics crushing it to nobody's surprise.
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Question what is considered 6th grade.
It means you can read and understand the instructions on a pack of ramen but can't pick up on nuances, infer bias or apply any kind of abstract reasoning to a piece of text
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It means you can read and understand the instructions on a pack of ramen but can't pick up on nuances, infer bias or apply any kind of abstract reasoning to a piece of text
Before I read the last part of the sentence, I thought you were saying 6th graders couldn't pick up on the nuances and biases on a package of Ramen, and I started to wonder what I had missed.
Anxiety is a hell of a thing.
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As much as I enjoyed Idiocracy when it came out, I wish its proposed answer/crux of the issue wasn’t “smart people should have kids” and instead focused on educating the ones that are already here/brought into this world.
Yeah, the problem with Idiocracy is that it over plays the role of genetics and doesn't differentiate between ignorance and stupidity.
Sure, genetics plays some role, but I've seen some very smart people that came from average parents and some very dumb people who came from smart parents.
Education plays a much bigger role than people give it credit for.
I feel like there are probably some very smart people out there who we don't know about because of their lack of educational opportunities.
Pretty much my whole life (I'm 51) Americans have been talking about how bad our education system is compared to much of the world, yet nothing substantial was done about it. I think the current state of affairs is a reflection of that fact.
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Before I read the last part of the sentence, I thought you were saying 6th graders couldn't pick up on the nuances and biases on a package of Ramen, and I started to wonder what I had missed.
Anxiety is a hell of a thing.
You forgot to put the sauce in, that's why you thought Buldak is not a big deal.
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I'm curious what it is for other countries so off to do a little searching....
Update:
Right, it's better but not wildly so when spread across the EU and lower in some places. This page is from the Irish Central Statistics office with 2023 numbers and puts us at 21% at or below the level 1 (at or below a grade 6 equivalent). On that page (2023 numbers) the US is at 28% so that 54% statistic in the OP smells a bit.
The main difference between Ireland and the US is that we're only 5% below level 1 where the US is at 12%.
For reference, Portugal has 15% below level 1.
Here's the definition of level 1:
Here's the relevant graph with all levels in picture format but you can get the individual numbers by going to the page and hovering over the individual levels.
Japan and the Nordics crushing it to nobody's surprise.
wrote on last edited by [email protected]FYI, Portugal has a massive disjunction in educational and reading level between people who grew up before the Revolution that overthrew fascism and those who grew up after.
Fascism definitely kept people ignorant: mandatory education back then - and Fascism lasted until 1974, so we're not talking about the first half of the XX century - was only 4 years, which is just about enough to learn to read and that barely so, and access to anything beypnd that was nearly impossible for most people as the country was very agrarian and dirt poor.
I'm Portuguese and some of my older aunts are functionality illiterate, whilst most of my generation in my extended family (so around 14 people in our 40s and 50s) have degrees - which shows the veritable chasm in the availability and quality of Education before and after the Revolution.
The point being that minus that bulk of illiterate and near-illiterate old people who grew up during Fascism, the picture for Portugal changes a lot and, frankly, any 1st World country which is close to present day Portugal without having a whole generation that lived under a dictatorship which denied Education beyond the very basic to most people, doesn't really have an excuse for it.
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Yeah, we’ve noticed. Not that Europe is far behind I fear.
Literacy is definitely declining; people just don’t have the attention spans they used to. Between Twitter, TikTok and other brain rot, reading a book or simply a longer text just isn’t something a lot of people do.
I've noticed that, when confronted with longer text, many people just use an LLM to summarize it now.
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If all natural-born citizens has to go through the naturalization process before getting the right to vote, trump would never have been elected.
Not just because they don't know the 100 (I think they changed it to 120 now?) questions, but also because they would not pass the:
"Have you ever been a member of
any totalitarian party?
Have you ever been a member of a
terrorist organization?
Have you ever advocated the
overthrow of any government by
force or violence?
Have you ever persecuted any
person because of race, religion,
national origin, or political opinion?" Questions(Fun fact: They can revoke your citizenship after the fact if they catch you lying, or if you do any "terrorist" activity within 5 years of naturalization. Jan 6 riotor types would never pass this. As a naturalized citizen, I'm kinda dreading this since last November)
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FYI, Portugal has a massive disjunction in educational and reading level between people who grew up before the Revolution that overthrew fascism and those who grew up after.
Fascism definitely kept people ignorant: mandatory education back then - and Fascism lasted until 1974, so we're not talking about the first half of the XX century - was only 4 years, which is just about enough to learn to read and that barely so, and access to anything beypnd that was nearly impossible for most people as the country was very agrarian and dirt poor.
I'm Portuguese and some of my older aunts are functionality illiterate, whilst most of my generation in my extended family (so around 14 people in our 40s and 50s) have degrees - which shows the veritable chasm in the availability and quality of Education before and after the Revolution.
The point being that minus that bulk of illiterate and near-illiterate old people who grew up during Fascism, the picture for Portugal changes a lot and, frankly, any 1st World country which is close to present day Portugal without having a whole generation that lived under a dictatorship which denied Education beyond the very basic to most people, doesn't really have an excuse for it.
That's an absolutely fascinating insight. Thanks!
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You forgot to put the sauce in, that's why you thought Buldak is not a big deal.
Spice is life
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Can we fix that by abolishing the department of education?
It's only gonna get worse, isn't it?I'm not disagreeing with you (I don't know enough about the department's operations), but I can understand why people are unhappy with the ED (Department of Education). It has existed for almost 40 years, and has spent tens (sometimes hundreds) of billions of dollars annually.
The result: Well, most Americans' reading level, as highlighted in this post. Also, a shocking number of people can't even name a single country in Africa – a big continent with more than 50 countries to choose from.
Also, college borrowers in the US owe ~$1.5 trillion to the ED.Should the ED be abolished? Honestly, I'm way to ignorant to even make an educated guess. But after so many decades, hundreds of billions of dollars spent, and $trillions of debt owed by students, it doesn't seem unreasonable to think that something should at least change.
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Easy, just take the elevator to the 7th floor/grade/level whatever you call it in Europe.
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The podcast called Sold a Story talks about how the school systems adopted a curriculum that doesn't teach kids how to read. They are more like mimicking literacy. It gives appearances they they are reading but they aren't comprehending.
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That's an absolutely fascinating insight. Thanks!
Some years ago I saw some graph that showed the proportion of people in each country of Europe whose maximum formal education level was Primary Education, Secondary Education and Tertiary Education an Portugal had lots of people with only Primary Education, then few with up to Secondary Education and then lots again with Tertiary Education, and having that gap in the middle is quite unique in Europe.
The difference between the importance of Education for the Fascists (earlier, none at all, later just about enough to make them cheap factory workers) and for the post-Revolution governments (which were all leftwing), is like night an day, and Portugal definitelly shows how it's possible to invest in Education and undo many decades of severe under-Education of the population though you can't really undo the damage to the older generations (even with Adult Education, which was available if you lived in cities, but only used by a fraction of those who could've benefited from it).
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Question what is considered 6th grade.
Question what is considered 6th grade.
This is a statement, telling the reader to consider, or be skeptical of, what the common understanding of what 6th grade is.
Question: what is considered 6th grade?
This asking the reader what most people think 6th grade is.
So, how did you read the comment?
It isn't a question; it's a statement in both sense of the word. -
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I dare not find out what my reading level is, for the same reason I dare not find out what my IQ is. I don't gain anything by knowing it, and knowing that I'm stupid will only worsen my self-esteem issues.
I feel better assuming I'm roughly average for both measurements.
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Which means 54% cannot write a competent book report hitting the major plots and themes.
wrote on last edited by [email protected]And forget about picking up on allegories.
Lord of the Rings is a story about a long hike gone wrong. It has nothing to do with East/West dynamics, the question of power, masculinity, or the simple things of life.
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Where exactly are the Jews advocating for cutting educational resources? Jews in general perform far better on educational metrics than most other groups, and their whole religion is based on reading, study, and debate.
wrote on last edited by [email protected]the Jews(Israel) advocate for Zionism which I'd argue is equivalent in danger to some fundamentalist Christians seeking white nationalism.
Ironic
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I genuinely do not understand why people do not like reading. Im not a super nerd and only read a few books a year but I look at the hours i spent reading those books as some of the best entertainment i've had all year.
It's a time commitment I'd rather fill with masturbation and videogames.
