Ken wrote: ↑Sat Mar 22, 2025 11:55 amAnd I didn't ask about credentials. I asked about science training.
... in other words, a credential.
Which we could be formal or informal. How much science background or experience of any kind do the teachers in west Texas Mennonite schools have? Any at all? Do they even teach science?
What kind of inane question is that?
And, in any event, we didn't see a measles outbreak in the population as a whole. We saw a measles outbreak in a small isolated Mennonite community in West Texas.
Incorrect. You should go read up on the myriad of news reporting on the issue.
No, Ken is quite correct. I am a teacher, and I have no state issued credential. My daughter, who teaches ESOL in a public school DOES have one, issued by the state of Virginia.
I have training, and plenty of it. I have never had a credential.
Last edited by ohio jones on Sun Mar 23, 2025 10:06 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Reason:coding
Perfect storm of the biggest measles outbreak in years.
... because of the state of science education of 0.1% of the population, which is incidentally better than state of education of the rest of the population (when measured with things like basic literacy, basic math, and so on)?
Yes, but the state of science education in our communities is poor to nonexistent in many cases. Only the really large schools do a good job. (Shout out to Josh G. here) I am a science teacher in a conservative Mennonite school, for the last five years. I go to conferences whenever I can. I have taught "breakouts" at a few of these. We need to face the fact that we cannot teach science simply by having a teacher, recite a textbook. In conservative, Mennonite schools lab facilities ranged from fairly good in many, really large high schools, to completely non-existent, with a homeroom teacher attempting to teach science. While they make a valiant effort, seldom ever is the job particularly good..
I have been a houseguest in a number of Mennonite homes, and typically when they find out I'm a teacher I wind up getting shown various problems that they are having difficulty understanding. I have seen at least two cases where teachers in conservative Mennonite schools were unable to teach their 10th graders how to do the falling bodies, acceleration problem correctly. Now this may not seem like much, but it's likely indicative of the rest of the curriculum they are getting. My answer this is we really need to up our game, I would start sending some of our teachers over the summer to get further education, a local community college is programs in general biology, general physics, and perhaps a little bit of chemistry would go a long way.
At the middle and high school level, a teacher with at least a fair when do you want to eat your thing?, post high school background, would go a long way towards getting us up to a level where we're really teaching science. The lack of understanding of how science works, along with an over-reliance on the Internet, likely is the cause of many of these problems. I do not permit my students to do papers or assignments relying solely on online sources. My opening tirade when school begins is one on the unreliability of online sources, many do not appreciate the fact that anyone can put anything on the Internet, true or not. While we do an excellent job with basic reading skills, basic math, skills, and many of our students write quite well, science education is where we really do not do a very good job in general.
Most plain schools don’t go past 8th grade.
The barely-conservative schools have bought into the worldly concept of higher education. The counter I have to your arguments is that plain people consistently show higher rates of basic literacy than (for example) high school graduates from Baltimore. If you can’t read, advanced science is irrelevant.
Perfect storm of the biggest measles outbreak in years.
... because of the state of science education of 0.1% of the population, which is incidentally better than state of education of the rest of the population (when measured with things like basic literacy, basic math, and so on)?
Yes, but the state of science education in our communities is poor to nonexistent in many cases. Only the really large schools do a good job. (Shout out to Josh G. here) I am a science teacher in a conservative Mennonite school, for the last five years. I go to conferences whenever I can. I have taught "breakouts" at a few of these. We need to face the fact that we cannot teach science simply by having a teacher, recite a textbook. In conservative, Mennonite schools lab facilities ranged from fairly good in many, really large high schools, to completely non-existent, with a homeroom teacher attempting to teach science. While they make a valiant effort, seldom ever is the job particularly good..
I have been a houseguest in a number of Mennonite homes, and typically when they find out I'm a teacher I wind up getting shown various problems that they are having difficulty understanding. I have seen at least two cases where teachers in conservative Mennonite schools were unable to teach their 10th graders how to do the falling bodies, acceleration problem correctly. Now this may not seem like much, but it's likely indicative of the rest of the curriculum they are getting. My answer this is we really need to up our game, I would start sending some of our teachers over the summer to get further education, a local community college is programs in general biology, general physics, and perhaps a little bit of chemistry would go a long way.
At the middle and high school level, a teacher with at least a fair when do you want to eat your thing?, post high school background, would go a long way towards getting us up to a level where we're really teaching science. The lack of understanding of how science works, along with an over-reliance on the Internet, likely is the cause of many of these problems. I do not permit my students to do papers or assignments relying solely on online sources. My opening tirade when school begins is one on the unreliability of online sources, many do not appreciate the fact that anyone can put anything on the Internet, true or not. While we do an excellent job with basic reading skills, basic math, skills, and many of our students write quite well, science education is where we really do not do a very good job in general.
As a teacher in conservative Mennonite schools for nearly 20 years, I concur. I think we're making progress, but it's difficult.
JohnH wrote: ↑Sun Mar 23, 2025 11:08 pm
Most plain schools don’t go past 8th grade.
The barely-conservative schools have bought into the worldly concept of higher education. The counter I have to your arguments is that plain people consistently show higher rates of basic literacy than (for example) high school graduates from Baltimore. If you can’t read, advanced science is irrelevant.
That is a pretty low bar to compare against the one of the poorest big cities in the country.
A better and more realistic comparison would be against public school districts with comparable demographics (White, middle class, etc.) so that you are comparing schools and education and not poverty rates.
How would 8th grade educated plain Anabaptist kids compare against the kids at the typical middle class white suburban high school in a standardized test of literacy and math proficiency like the SAT or ACT? Or subject-area IB or AP tests? Probably not as well as you think.
1 x
A fool can throw out more questions than a wise man can answer. -RZehr
... because of the state of science education of 0.1% of the population, which is incidentally better than state of education of the rest of the population (when measured with things like basic literacy, basic math, and so on)?
Yes, but the state of science education in our communities is poor to nonexistent in many cases. Only the really large schools do a good job. (Shout out to Josh G. here) I am a science teacher in a conservative Mennonite school, for the last five years. I go to conferences whenever I can. I have taught "breakouts" at a few of these. We need to face the fact that we cannot teach science simply by having a teacher, recite a textbook. In conservative, Mennonite schools lab facilities ranged from fairly good in many, really large high schools, to completely non-existent, with a homeroom teacher attempting to teach science. While they make a valiant effort, seldom ever is the job particularly good..
I have been a houseguest in a number of Mennonite homes, and typically when they find out I'm a teacher I wind up getting shown various problems that they are having difficulty understanding. I have seen at least two cases where teachers in conservative Mennonite schools were unable to teach their 10th graders how to do the falling bodies, acceleration problem correctly. Now this may not seem like much, but it's likely indicative of the rest of the curriculum they are getting. My answer this is we really need to up our game, I would start sending some of our teachers over the summer to get further education, a local community college is programs in general biology, general physics, and perhaps a little bit of chemistry would go a long way.
At the middle and high school level, a teacher with at least a fair when do you want to eat your thing?, post high school background, would go a long way towards getting us up to a level where we're really teaching science. The lack of understanding of how science works, along with an over-reliance on the Internet, likely is the cause of many of these problems. I do not permit my students to do papers or assignments relying solely on online sources. My opening tirade when school begins is one on the unreliability of online sources, many do not appreciate the fact that anyone can put anything on the Internet, true or not. While we do an excellent job with basic reading skills, basic math, skills, and many of our students write quite well, science education is where we really do not do a very good job in general.
Most plain schools don’t go past 8th grade.
The barely-conservative schools have bought into the worldly concept of higher education. The counter I have to your arguments is that plain people consistently show higher rates of basic literacy than (for example) high school graduates from Baltimore. If you can’t read, advanced science is irrelevant.
We have three high school in southern PA that are plain. All have decent to very good science programs . Even Nationwide schools go to 10th. Or 11th. The fact that our students read at a high level is well known, and has nothing to do with science education. We can walk and chew gum at the same time.
If you use your definition, only the OOA are plain. If that is where you want to be, a good start would be disconnecting from the internet.
JohnH wrote: ↑Sun Mar 23, 2025 11:08 pm
Most plain schools don’t go past 8th grade.
The barely-conservative schools have bought into the worldly concept of higher education. The counter I have to your arguments is that plain people consistently show higher rates of basic literacy than (for example) high school graduates from Baltimore. If you can’t read, advanced science is irrelevant.
That is a pretty low bar to compare against the one of the poorest big cities in the country.
A better and more realistic comparison would be against public school districts with comparable demographics (White, middle class, etc.) so that you are comparing schools and education and not poverty rates.
How would 8th grade educated plain Anabaptist kids compare against the kids at the typical middle class white suburban high school in a standardized test of literacy and math proficiency like the SAT or ACT? Or subject-area IB or AP tests? Probably not as well as you think.
The problem with education in Baltimore is not the schools. It is the fact that much of their intake consists of single parents children who have simply not been taught any form or discipline whatsoever.
having seen the science at two CM schools... I completely agree that its badly lacking. Math, English and Writing in my opinion seems better compared to the average school out there.
Don't go to a CM school for chemistry or Bio though...
JohnH wrote: ↑Sun Mar 23, 2025 11:08 pm
Most plain schools don’t go past 8th grade.
The barely-conservative schools have bought into the worldly concept of higher education. The counter I have to your arguments is that plain people consistently show higher rates of basic literacy than (for example) high school graduates from Baltimore. If you can’t read, advanced science is irrelevant.
That is a pretty low bar to compare against the one of the poorest big cities in the country.
A better and more realistic comparison would be against public school districts with comparable demographics (White, middle class, etc.) so that you are comparing schools and education and not poverty rates.
How would 8th grade educated plain Anabaptist kids compare against the kids at the typical middle class white suburban high school in a standardized test of literacy and math proficiency like the SAT or ACT? Or subject-area IB or AP tests? Probably not as well as you think.
Why would I compare to white and middle class? Some of the people I go to church with aren’t white. Some are black American; some are Hispanic or whatever you classify Brazilians as. Some are not middle class but are relatively poor (such as myself). (Our demographics are roughly the same as the surrounding county and the nearest city.)
Judas Maccabeus wrote: ↑Mon Mar 24, 2025 7:25 am
We have three high school in southern PA that are plain. All have decent to very good science programs . Even Nationwide schools go to 10th. Or 11th. The fact that our students read at a high level is well known, and has nothing to do with science education. We can walk and chew gum at the same time.
If you use your definition, only the OOA are plain. If that is where you want to be, a good start would be disconnecting from the internet.
There are lots of plain groups that don’t go past 8th grade; I am in one of them and I’m certainly not Old Order Amish.
A trait of groups becoming less conservative is they embrace higher education both in adopting high school and then, eventually, college and seminaries.
Most ultra-conservatives I'm familiar with go to 9th or 10th, with some going only to 8th. I've heard of 11th rarely. It greatly amuses me when I hear that "Our students get out at nth, but our curriculum is better than the public schools. Their education is as good or better than public high school graduates." Um, science? Math beyond algebra? Sure, I'll grant we have a higher floor. No one is left behind. We also have a lower ceiling, and I'm fine with that, but don't claim that the upper quartile of students has the same education as they would have received in public school.