Posts by Carol Johnson4

No more excuses for anyone stuck in quarantine. Just throw on a mask and get out there. Funerals, voting, prom... even hitting the grocery store if you need to.

Michelle Nelson4 said:And there's a massive issue right now. One that's actually easy to fix—if the professor just refuses to grade anything they can't read, then boom, problem solved. They might as well start printing the answers in block letters.
Besides, anyone who's seen how kids write in elementary school these days knows why. They don't use pens constantly, so they lose the skill. I haven't seen worse handwriting in my life; you can't even connect three letters without lifting the pencil off the page.

I honestly can't wrap my head around professors who just let them pass tests like that. I doubt high school would allow it. They're doing the kid a huge disservice, though maybe they figure nobody cares about handwriting anymore.

But I'm with you on this last part. This new style of writing is just jagged nonsense. Luckily, once they get past second grade, nobody forces them to follow perfect letter formations. But it still has to be legible... It really does. 😁

Susan James said:I honestly think they should just start with 5 or maybe 5.5. It would make things so much smoother from the get-go!
It’s about more than just keeping seven-year-olds from getting bored in class—though let's be honest, once they hit that age, school can start feeling a bit like a repetitive grind if there isn't enough stimulation. It also tackles the massive shortage of early childhood educators and the fact that so many neighborhoods in the US don't have any preschools or even pre-K programs available at all.

I honestly feel a little bit of regret about the whole situation. Looking back, I really think my kid got more out of preschool this year than they will from three years of elementary school—and that’s not even touching on the language development side of things.

Honestly, *Idiocracy* is such a fantastic movie. It’s especially spot-on for people who seem to crave spending 99% of their waking hours staring at a screen.

Does anyone actually know what was cut from the curriculum versus what’s already been taught?

Michelle Nelson4 said:Exactly. Kids should probably start at age five and a half in a preparatory program, gently learning print letters and numbers up to 20, then move into the standard curriculum once they hit six and a half.

Honestly, I don't see much of a crisis regarding messy handwriting. Let's face it—about 99% of our adult lives involve typing on a laptop rather than using a pen. Some people will always fight that reality and try to downplay how little handwriting matters these days... but soon enough, we'll likely see college exams being taken entirely on computers (or just selecting A/B/C/D options), which solves the whole issue of professors not being able to decipher a student's scrawl. Of course, there will be plenty of complaining and hand-wringing about how "this is all sooo bad" and how everything needs to be done exactly the way it was back in our day.

This kid claims he’s going to be a programmer, so why bother learning to write? He also thinks mastering English is enough since he’ll be working with foreigners, so why worry about his native American language? 😁

Setting aside the fact that nobody knows what skills will actually matter to him in 25 years... there's also the issue of how much handwriting development affects overall cognitive growth.

Isn't it a problem when a seventh grader takes an exam and the teacher can't even read the answers?

Susan James said:Exactly.
The fall weather is totally messed up anyway; I'm still wearing sandals while my parents saw cherry blossoms blooming in their garden yesterday.
So, the timing of the curriculum is off regardless.

rowdypanther12 said:And it’s the same thing every single year—teaching from outdated nature books. It feels pretty pointless.
Local geography and the seasons😁

That would be a total waste of time. Who actually needs an agricultural calendar in elementary school these days? When to plant this, when that ripens? Or testing kids on what clothes to wear in summer versus winter? If I’m cold, I put on a hat and a scarf, even if it’s spring.

rowdypanther12 said:It wasn't overcrowded at all; kids have been mastering writing skills for years without any issues 😁 if they struggle with something, it's usually reading, but that doesn't mean we should scrap writing altogether 😂
I’d much rather they skip relearning the number four during spring than get rid of writing 😁

Or just nature—life in the fall. 🙄

urbantinker8 said:Back in the day, the lower elementary grades were always a chaotic whirlwind of coloring and drawing.🙄
But at least they were actually learning how to write.
Honestly, stripping written letters out of the first-grade curriculum feels like a total crime against education.☕

I mean, kids just don't get that sense of tangible progress anymore—so many of them have been stuck writing in block letters for a year or two now—and they end up incredibly bored, or worse, it’s just fundamentally bad for their fine motor skill development.

And that's not all. Kids just don't have the patience to sit at a desk and actually write or read anymore. They'll only focus if something is incredibly, mind-blowingly engaging. Anything else? They're squirming after thirty minutes tops.

It felt totally overkill to have kids learning all those print uppercase and lowercase letters in the first semester, only to switch to cursive in the second. When I heard they were cutting some of it, I honestly hoped they’d just scrap the print stuff and jump straight to cursive. But nope. :rolayz: What’s even the point of practicing lowercase print? And why spend an entire year drilling those letters just to ditch them completely by next year?

This would actually be perfect for this upcoming school year, the final year before kindergarten.

So, even more work to do at home. Outside of school hours. Next up on the list: freelance writing tutoring. :nemamprikladansmajli:

Linda Price5 said:🤣

There was a time when copying problems into a notebook was standard practice, and nobody thought twice about whether students should be working directly out of textbooks or workbooks. Nowadays, parents act as if it’s some sort of tragedy that children actually have to pick up a pen and write.

🤣 🤣

We are incredibly lucky that elementary school is compulsory; otherwise, we might be dealing with eleven-year-olds who can barely grip a pencil, which would be nothing short of a civilizational disgrace.

🤣 🤣

What shocks me is how they stop teaching handwriting skills starting in first grade. And I don't mean through mindless copying. 😁

Take science class, for example. It varies by teacher, sure, but in my experience, you just finish a worksheet and call it a day. Meanwhile, every textbook ends with review questions. It’s the perfect setup: go home, find the answers in the text, and write them in a notebook. At least then they’d have an actual science notebook for once.

Don't even get me started on English. My kid is in third grade and hasn't had a single assignment where he had to write anything out yet. Anything at all.

I know a kid who just started high school. By the end of elementary school, his handwriting was such a mess that his teachers basically had to ask him to translate his own tests. I can't wait to see how he survives high school. 😵

If this new curriculum reform means less writing, I'm definitely not looking forward to it.

Anyone else eyeing this textbook?

I can’t get over the ridiculous amount of photos and drawings showing candy, cakes, pastries, pizza, sugar packets, chocolate, soda, lollipops, and all sorts of baked goods.
Sure, there are some apples too.

Look, textbooks are being made in an era where everyone is screaming about how childhood obesity rates are at an all-time high. Is it really asking too much to want the perception of "food" to change just a little bit, even in a math book?

Elizabeth Davis said:E
Look, this has nothing to do with me personally. We've never even spoken. It just caught my eye that he's been getting slapped with XY bans on threads about various Xperia models.

Let's be real, those bans lasted exactly 16 minutes. Except for this last one. 🤷

deidre66

I know filing a report doesn't mean an automatic penalty. I honestly assumed there wouldn't even be a warning, let alone anything serious, especially since we're talking about protected users who keep doing the exact same thing.

Post links to examples of what you're complaining about. The admins aren't living in your head, so they might not get exactly what you mean.

Also, it wouldn't hurt to fix how you respond to our feedback. You guys work for us, not the other way around—something regular users remind you of all the time.

Moderators don't get paid for this. Regardless, that shouldn't stop them from being responsible. Just give some actual examples of where you think they're failing at their jobs.

Adam Parker2 said:GENERAL OBSERVATION:
While this forum has a duty to protect personal data, the issue arises when certain moderators prioritize protecting the "feelings" of posters and their supporters—being overly sensitive toward anyone sharing a "difficult situation"...

Good grief—is this a medical clinic or a public forum?

Something that might hurt an emotional poster during a tough time isn't necessarily universally offensive.
Plus, there are ultra-sensitive individuals facing hardships who aren't being aggressive jerks about it.

There are far better ways to redact private info than just dumping a bunch of vague, incoherent facts that leave you scratching your head.
It’s honestly ridiculous to expect people not to react to that.
By penalizing or deleting sensible posts, isn't the message essentially: "smart people should leave, while the fools should rush in"? Correct me if I'm misreading the situation.
Such a practice is unacceptable. Where does that leave the overall quality of this forum?

ps:
The post above is meant to be general.
I won't be commenting on my own lack of specifics, nor will I mention those women, the nonsense, or Nicholas King.
I wasn't addressing the banned user, nor am I seeking a comment or a reply,
but her praise for the moderator only reinforced my opinion of her.

Back when I was a moderator on the unknown forum, I had to tell users multiple times to skip threads that were just "dumping nonsense meant to insult their intelligence," to use your words. I don't find any of this funny. If you think a thread is just trolling, why even bother wasting your time on it? 🤷

Spamming a few posts to try and prove some "absolute truth" isn't going to help the discussion, and I don't see the point in it. Plus, it just drives the whole thing off-topic.

rustydrifter10 said:If you actually spent some time reading our moderator posts, you'd realize that's exactly what we're working on right now. 😳

😳
My bad.
Guess I've been too busy with our own business. 😍

I'm out.

I love seeing how RID is restructuring itself. Honestly, it was high time they took decisive action. Props to the women leading the charge. 😍

Just a suggestion... Personally, I think it would make sense to create one PPDF specifically for toddlers and preschoolers, and another one for school-aged kids.
Teenage angst and nursery tantrums have absolutely nothing in common. Splitting them up by age might make sorting through topics a lot easier.

The main part of the PPDF could then cover general parenting issues that apply to all ages, even those involving adult children.
🙂

The ads don't bother me since I don't even see them, but those white gaps where they shouldn't be? That's annoying.

I wouldn't buy a Nokia. 😁 I can barely afford my phone, let alone a subscription.

Nicholas King said:Ovo tvoje je komentar na rečenicu "Furthermore—and I really think this bears repeating—one’s reputation can play a massive role when it comes to how bans are handed out. It isn't always a purely objective process, I guess; there's often an underlying bias based on how a user is perceived by the mods.".

Which, I suppose, hasn't actually been written yet.

Well, whatever—it’ll turn up eventually, I suppose. 🙂

🤣

Yeah, fair point. I need some coffee if I'm going to pay attention.

See, now this would probably tank my reputation. 😁

Timothy Palmer4 said:It’s something like this:
I'd like to propose adding a reputation meter directly beneath every user's name, allowing members to vote on one another... it’s a system that works quite effectively over at sites like Reddit.
The idea is to give people asking questions a clear sense of how reliable their interlocutor actually is. If someone consistently remains polite, avoids unnecessary conflict, and offers genuinely helpful advice, they’ll earn a high reputation score, which naturally builds trust within the community. Implementing this would also help curb the massive amount of pointless bickering that tends to derail almost every thread after just a few posts, making the reading experience much more pleasant for everyone else.
Additionally, I think issuing bans should also factor into a user's overall reputation score.

Interesting.

So if you have a good reputation, you get more leeway than those who don't?

Some are more equal than others, I guess. 🤷

I'm with Michelle Alvarez8 on this one. Everything she said sounds pretty damn reasonable and logical to me.

😁