The US textbooks try to explain simple things in more detail, and increase the complexity as they progress.
The reason for it, I think, is the difference in education systems. In the US, the point of education system is to teach students, as well as possible. In the USSR, the point was to get rid of weaker students and have only very good ones left, who would understand the subject no matter how hardcore the approach to it is. It might be more psychological rather than intentional, but in Soviet times it was a general sentiment: if you can’t do it straight-away, you are simply not good enough and should do something else. The US system tries to improve students and then select the best, the Soviet system tried to select the best and then improve them. The US system tries to make geniuses out of average students, the Soviet system tried to select geniuses disregarding average students.
Why I’m a Public-School Teacher but a Private-School Parent
Last week, I observed a high-school English class on a campus without bells. The school didn’t need them: Every student showed up for class promptly, and they remained attentive until the last minute—without packing their books early or lining up at the door. San Luis Obispo Classical Academy (SLOCA) is a private school in Central California that promotes “personal character” and “love of learning,” and the tangible difference between this environment and that at the public high school in the area was stunning to me—even though I’m a veteran public-school teacher.
.. The biggest visible difference is that, at SLOCA, personal engagement is “cool.” And any interruption is going to annoy everybody—not just the teacher.
.. I am, however, concerned about the general culture at public schools—at least at the ones I’ve seen—of disengagement and compulsory learning. So when it comes to my daughter, I opt to invest a little more—to ensure she’s immersed in a community where it’s acceptable, and even admirable, to show natural enthusiasm for knowledge. I trust this particular private school, one that was created by like-minded parents, will best set her up for success.
.. “At SLOCA, the kids really want to learn, and they want to be focused,” he told me. “At [the public school], some kids don’t, and that puts a damper on things. And then the teachers unfortunately focus on [those kids].” He used the word “damper” again when I asked, hypothetically, what would happen if a SLOCA class were infused with 10 additional disengaged students. And that same word came up yet again when I asked him about ways in which public schools should handle the distracting “cool” kids who pollute classroom environments: “There’s no way to change that. You’d have to take them out of the class, but you don’t have the right to segregate them. Who gets to decide who’s putting the damper on [whom]?”
Charles William Eliot: President of Harvard
The Puritans thought they must have trained ministers for the Church and they supported Harvard College – when the American people are convinced that they require more competent chemists, engineers, artists, architects, than they now have, they will somehow establish the institutions to train them.
.. As businessmen became increasingly reluctant to send their sons to schools whose curricula offered nothing useful – or to donate money for their support, some educational leaders began exploring ways of making higher education more attractive. Some backed the establishment of specialized schools of science and technology, like Harvard’s Lawrence Scientific School, Yale’s Sheffield Scientific School, and the newly chartered
.. An opinion had long been gaining ground that it would be better for the community and the interests of learning, as well as for the university, if the power to elect the overseers were transferred from the legislature to the graduates of the college. .. The effect of this change was greatly to strengthen the interest of the alumni in the management of the university, and thus to prepare the way for extensive and thorough reforms.
Big Data at College: Spotting Academic Trouble
Tools developed in-house and by a slew of companies now give administrators digital dashboards that can code students red or green to highlight who may be in academic trouble. Handsome “heat maps” — some powered by apps that update four times a day — can alert professors to students who may be cramming rather than keeping up. As part of a broader effort to measure the “campus engagement” of its students, Ball State University in Indiana goes so far as to monitor whether students are swiping in with their ID cards to campus-sponsored parties at the student center on Saturday nights.