The Problem With Schools

Lately I have been looking at the school system. Mitt Romney visited our school the other week, and he failed to mention anything about the education system. I thought that was a little strange considering he was in a school, and apparently so did everyone on the Facebook world. There were posts left and right about his lack of discussion on the education system. Anyways, every Sunday I meet up with a bunch of other high schoolers and we talk about issues like this. Last Sunday while we were talking about school, the topic of learning came up. That really got me to look at the teachers that I have currently, as well as past teachers, and critique them in a way. In my view, the teacher needs to create new level of thinking in a individual. Personally, I really like learning but some teachers can make it very difficult to do. I cannot stand lectures, because they can't make me think in a new way. Listening to the teacher can make me learn of course, but it is through interaction and discussion that a student can actually learn. Discussion can create new ideas that can morph into a great learning experience. I understand that different teachers have different teaching styles, but lecturing a class of teenagers on something they don't understand can make learning very difficult. Everyone knows what it is like to listen to an hour of constant lecturing, but who can really efficiently learn from that? Plenty of people have supported this idea of mine, and a lot have also retorted it. "You better get used to the idea of lectures because when college comes around you are going to need to be able to learn from it." Yes, I understand that college classes have hundreds of students and teaching them can be difficult unless it is through lecture, but for now, I want to see more teachers really opening up their classrooms and letting ideas flow through it. Great ideas come from what other people say, and how can one think great things if they are only listening to one person? Not to mention that person is more than double our age. Let me focus on learning now, and then sharpening those ideas in college. Listening to others is a great learning tool.