Annotations

  1. “Children, full of questions about things that interest them, are learning not to ask them at school. Against a background of tests and targets, unscripted queries go mainly unanswered and learning opportunities are lost.” This is so true as young kids we tend to have so many questions about everything, and the silliest questions too. But we’re taught to listen to the teacher and learn about what they are talking about.
  2. “In a finding critical to tackling the stubborn achievement gap between poorer and richer children, disadvantaged children had the strongest connection between curiosity and performance.” We see here that the most curious kids have a better performance level in reading and math. I know many of my peers who tend to not question anything. I wonder if this could be led to something else like a political uprising.
  3. “Teachers who concentrate on developing focus and good behavior because of the links to good academic performance, now need to take on board that developing curiosity could be even more important.” I feel like this does not fall on teachers, the teachers have been probably taught this as well, they were also the students sitting on the mat listening to a story. But Curiosity should not be suppressed and that should be very important regarding many aspects.
  4. “When you visit schools in many parts of the world it can be difficult to remember they are full of active, intellectual children because no one is talking about their inner mental lives. How well they behave, and how they perform seem much more important to many people in the educational communities. Often educational bureaucracies have shunted curiosity to the side.” Our mental lives as students are suppressed and this correlates with our curiosity, I feel like curiosity is one of the most important foundations of one’s life. How can a person stop being curious about something, there’s always so much more we can learn about. Let’s look at a group of students who go above in beyond with their thoughts and not how well they look put together.

  5. “What children love is to copy what adults are doing with objects. What people and objects do makes them curious about their world. “School kills curiosity. When do children get to ask questions about things that interest them? As soon as they are at primary school they have to shut up and learn. It’s not the fault of teachers. They have so many targets to meet.”” The experiment beforehand is so captivating, I believe we are the “microwave” generation, we want everything done for us in a matter of seconds. Curiosity is being killed, makes me feel like a robot in this world. We as students and teachers should start to reprimand curiosity in the classroom and our lives.