[hotpotamus]

They say that, but how many times do they need to lesson plan if they teach the same subject year after year? And doesn't the curriculum rather decide the plans anyway? We had scantrons and other grading tech way back when I was in school or even just having the kids grade each others work; there are strategies for that as well.

My cousin is a teacher and manages that job plus a couple side businesses plus 3 kids. Somehow he finds the time.

[Konnstann]

scantrons and grading each other's work only makes sense if your assignments are multiple choice, which is probably the least effective way of teaching in my opinion. As soon as the assignment requires any essay portion where you can get partial credit that breaks down. Curricula change every year, and relying on whatever standardized test your students are required to pass to develop your plans is a good part of why US education is lambasted elsewhere in the developed world, I'm glad your cousin can run 2 side businesses while teaching but I'd rather pay teachers more so they could put the effort into the kids, because there's a staggering difference between the ones that phone it in and the ones that don't.

[hotpotamus]

I think it's entirely possible that the belief in education is one of the many beliefs that I've lost as I get older. Or perhaps like people say they believe in god, but not organized religion, I don't believe in organized education. That reflects my own experience I suppose; I wasn't much of a student, but once I actually got put into a position where I needed to learn things (a computer infrastructure/software engineering type job), I learned them well enough I suppose.

One takeaway from the covid lockdowns I took is it seems that to a first approximation, school is where children go for babysitting and perhaps learning happens there somehow. That would reflect my memories (plus it was a good place to score drugs).

I didn't think much of the system at the time, and even less upon reflection some years later, and it's not a system I'd want to put kids through, but I seem to say that about an increasing number of aspects of the modern world, so it's likely I'm just some sort of antisocial malcontent.