By Brady Gibbons
There’s been an argument over the years whether school has changed at all. Has the teaching changed? Has the student life changed? Has the classroom changed?
Teaching is constantly evolving and changing from previous years. Back in the day teachers could whoop you if you misbehaved, but now they have to severely watch what they say.
Back in the day teachers would focus more on lectures and students would listen for hours. But now most of the lessons are more student interactive and more written work instead of note taking.
Technology has changed a lot over the years as well. Most students have chromebooks now and most of the work is done on them. Back in the day it was all paper; it was rare that people would use computers.
School also became mandatory in 1918. Back in the day you didn’t have to go to school because most people had to work.
Some skills taught back in the day aren’t taught now like cursive writing, which isn’t as important as it used to be.
Many old people talk about having to walk to school for long distances saying things like “I used to walk 10 miles to get to school every day” while new young students if they don’t drive they have alternative ways of getting to school like bikes and scooters.
There’s also schooling for people with disabilities. Now everyone has a right to fair education, but back in the day, if you had a disability you couldn’t go to school.
Most people find school boring and a chore and they have kids saying things like “school is like jail” and “I wish I could drop out” or graduate early. People in the early 1900s saw school as a privilege and were happy to go to school.
Safety was a big issue in school in the 2000’s back in the day you could smoke in school and pretty much do anything. Lunches were unhealthy or cheap but thanks to president Obama school lunches focus more on health.
Instead of focusing on making people factory workers, there are a lot of new classes and classes that focus on health and computers. In the early 1900 all you had was the basic classes. We have electives at the high school which was unheard of back in the early 1900s.
There is no segregation in schools anymore; people of all races and genders can all be in the same classroom with no issue. But it was a big issue back in the day but many historical figures fought for segregation to be abolished such as Martin Luther King Jr, Rosa parks and Thurgood Marshall.
In most schools you can do independent studies because of covid-19 and thanks to technology it is possible to go to school without actually going to school and still graduate.
The argument that “school hasn’t changed since the past years” is wrong and it has a lot. Their main argument is that the classroom setting is the same. But most classes now have changed their design from straight line rows of desks to groups of desks and even getting big tables for people to sit at. So school has changed a lot over the years.
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