@Zawash -- all true. And yet, just because Calvin and Hobbes and Bill Watterson are/were awesome, it doesn't make IP and copyright rules any more sensible.

My opinion: those respectful and well-done parodies and homages (say, Pants are Overrated's Hobbes and Bacon) are fair use. The person/people that drew Calvin peeing on things? Fair use also. There is a big difference between "tasteless" and "should be illegal".

Selling car decals with those images is different, because then you're treading all over the "not for profit" element of fair use. However, tracking down tons of small-scale infringers on that, or even worse, average people who simply buy the decals/shirts/whatever and likely don't know or care to know about IP and copyright laws is ... a losing battle at best, and punitive towards *fans* of the IP at worst.

There are many many examples of going to idiotic (IMO) lengths to protect IP. Disney suing local bakeries for drawing some character in icing on top of a kids birthday cake. Metallica suing Napster, University internet hosts, and even individual downloaders of their music. Teachers being sued for playing a clip of a TV show, movie, or song as part of their lessons. Etc. etc.

At some level, copyright is a good thing. Or at least a necessary evil. But the litigious zeal with which IP and copyright are "protected" these days seems like we've lost sight of the "art before commerce" element that is a huge part of why Calvin and Hobbes was so awesome. And why IP is something worth protecting (within sensible limits).

I'm going to drop this into *Education, as it's an outstanding feat for the music teacher who taught this class..., each child seems to play their part so effortlessly. If only all students were taught like this.

Also, this reminds me very much of "Songs of Innocence and Despair" by The Langley Schools Music Project. A music teacher in the 70's taught a bunch of popular rock songs to a group of Canadian elementary school kids, then made a record. The songs are at once beautiful and heart-rending. Well worth seeking out.

I was spanked in Texas for getting flipping off the music teacher.

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>> ^Porksandwich:

Does Finland schooling system provide anything but education and the facilities and meals related to keeping a large group of people for hours on end?
Do they do tutoring?
How do they handle discipline?
Do they offer sports teams and fields, etc as part of the school budget?
Uniforms?
Field trips?
Music/band?
Im hoping to hear from @CreamK on this.
Like I've always felt in the US that the sports programs and all the cost associated with them plus the competition they spawn within the student body and against other schools is not beneficial. Basically you end up with a small group of players who get the school to bend over backwards to make things possible for them and everyone else loses out on it, in fact they often have to pay for tickets to even see the events their parents tax dollars make possible.


There's tutoring for students that are falling behind, it's personal one-on-one and there's a multiple programs to help students who have problems, like specail ed or for troubled teens. I actually went on one these troubled youth programs. I never had any learning problems in school, in fact i was always so much ahead in classes that i got bored and started to get in to problems and skipping A LOT.. But when they finally managed to get me in to this special class, i've never enjoyed school that much.. I did two years of math in half a year and got free choice of what to do instead of math.. I either got a free hour or i picked up another subject like literacy and the best part of it was that i choosed what to do..

Discipline is there, you got many levels of it. Mostly it's handled in conjunction with parents. Detention, personal tutoring or changing to a smaller group, workshops where you can fix bikes and learn sciences with more hands on approaches etc. Mostly it's not a punishment as such but personalized programs to tailored to fit for the needs. Expulsions are very rare, in my school years i heard of two incidences and both were changed to smaller group where they both stopped skipping school in two weeks time. Those smaller groups consists of one teacher per 5 students or even less..

No sport teams are provided by schools, they are handled by sport teams junior programs. There is of course 1-2 hour classes per week for sports but it's more to do with learning to enjoy excercise than competing.

No uniforms or mandatory dressing codes. There is the basic decency expected when it comes to dressing and one peculiar code is that you are not allowed to wear a hat in class... Those baseball caps can hide your eyes... I know, it's a bit strange..

Field trips: yes, there are both provided by the school and then longer ones where the students do bake sales etc to gather money and those are voluntary.

Music is a subject and schools can provide the means to do them more in your own free time. The bands are not a part of schools but usually every city has one or to schools that concentrate more for those programs. It means a few extra hours but provide a good base for secondary musical education institutes where you can enroll at young age. Those institutions are publicly funded too and work in conjuction with all levels schools and they continue seamlessly to provide education for music teachers and professionals up to master degrees. You can go to those schools when you're grown up too and they have a tuitions, in the range of 100-200€ per class. So once again, money is not a hurdle for education.

It's been a years when i was in basic school, i graduated in 1989 and went to secondary school in 1991. That was about the time when the education reform was moving to that state too so i had to mixed field of teachers. Some were not up to job and some were just wonderful personalities. Now adays it's up to standards too and in fact, i'm enrolling in one next fall to finish up my graduation..

The downside of Finnish system is that you can not even get a job as a cleaner without finishing some sort of courses for it.. So even for basic shitty jobs you need a basic education in that field... But since those are basically free of charge (some require a 100-200€ fee, not a problem...) everyone has a chance. Also when you get a better job the companies often provide the follow-up studies that fit to that job description. The cost of those are divided by the goverment and the companies.

I first heard of Billy Bragg in the 80s, my music teacher told tales of this mad English guy who got up on stage with an amp, an electric guitar, and half sang half screamed really subversive folk songs.

He seems to have calmed down a bit since then.

Dude, enough of the creepy ex-girlfriend routine. So I booted you from my Facebook account. Who cares? Get a life.

>> ^blankfist:

"In addition to 'teaching', an educator also needs to be a leader, a negotiator, a salesman, a disciplinarian, a politician, an administrator, a motivator, a receptionist, an advocate, a librarian, a manager, a public relations agent, a psychologist, an entertainer, an accountant, and for some students, a parent. If you are a music teacher, you get even more hats - arranger, copyist, bus scheduler, event planner, fund raiser, critic, graphic designer, contractor etc. (Running a high school band is like running a business, complete with a board, fundraiser income, expenses, employees, audits, etc.)"
lol

"In addition to 'teaching', an educator also needs to be a leader, a negotiator, a salesman, a disciplinarian, a politician, an administrator, a motivator, a receptionist, an advocate, a librarian, a manager, a public relations agent, a psychologist, an entertainer, an accountant, and for some students, a parent. If you are a music teacher, you get even more hats - arranger, copyist, bus scheduler, event planner, fund raiser, critic, graphic designer, contractor etc. (Running a high school band is like running a business, complete with a board, fundraiser income, expenses, employees, audits, etc.)"

lol

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:

In addition to 'teaching', an educator also needs to be a leader, a negotiator, a salesman, a disciplinarian, a politician, an administrator, a motivator, a receptionist, an advocate, a librarian, a manager, a public relations agent, a psychologist, an entertainer, an accountant, and for some students, a parent. If you are a music teacher, you get even more hats - arranger, copyist, bus scheduler, event planner, fund raiser, critic, graphic designer, contractor etc. (Running a high school band is like running a business, complete with a board, fundraiser income, expenses, employees, audits, etc.)


And yet I wonder why these super geniuses settle for teaching instead of using just some of the myriad of skills you listed and become the next big inventor, or the next great physicist, or the next big whatever. Yet instead, even with those over-qualifications (if we're to take your word for it), they choose to work so much harder for fewer rewards (again if we're to take your word).

Sounds totally legit.

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:

I know you grew up in a region of the country that does not have high educational standards (and cruel stereotypes that reinforce these low standards), so I don't doubt that you've had more than your fair share of bad teachers.


Emphasis mine. Trolololo. Actually this is classic elitism. To you my geographical location, specifically that I grew up in the South, makes me inferior in every respect to people like you who grew up near richer Metropolitan areas. I know you're trying to goad me, but I also think you really believe some of that. It's the priggish nature of the elitist.

You can try to disassociate yourself from the Southern school system because of how people like you look down on them, but at the end of the day that system is still a product of your ideal one-size-fits-all Prussian school model no matter the location. To mock any part of it is to mock all of it.

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:

I grew up in middle class Southern California, with teachers that were paid fairly, schools that were well funded and parents that involved themselves in the academic lives of their children. (3 of the biggest factors in student achievement). Out of the 40+ teachers I had from K-12, I can think of two that were bad.


Still, here in Los Angeles the charter schools and/or private schools tend to perform the best. Even with all the unions and heavy spending that goes on, the public schools just cannot outperform the charters/private schools. That's got to sting a bit for those in support of public schools and teacher unions.

How hard could it be? You show up and communicate information within your field of expertise. The students take it all in. Job done.

It's not that simple.

You would have a very different perspective if you ever tried teaching yourself.

If you were responsible for educating 200 - 300 students with different learning styles, different motivating factors, different attention levels, different levels of discipline, different levels of comprehension, different types of psychology, different levels of intelligence, different levels of interest, different levels of sanity, different stages of physiological development (AKA puberty), etc. you'd get it.

In addition to 'teaching', an educator also needs to be a leader, a negotiator, a salesman, a disciplinarian, a politician, an administrator, a motivator, a receptionist, an advocate, a librarian, a manager, a public relations agent, a psychologist, an entertainer, an accountant, and for some students, a parent. If you are a music teacher, you get even more hats - arranger, copyist, bus scheduler, event planner, fund raiser, critic, graphic designer, contractor etc. (Running a high school band is like running a business, complete with a board, fundraiser income, expenses, employees, audits, etc.)

The 'teaching' part is the easiest part of the job. If there weren't so many responsibilities outside of the actual 'teaching', you and chilaxe would have a point. And, I haven't even mentioned dealing with administrators and parents, which is an art in and of itself.

I know you grew up in a region of the country that does not have high educational standards (and cruel stereotypes that reinforce these low standards), so I don't doubt that you've had more than your fair share of bad teachers. If anything, I think you have first hand experience of what happens when public education is neglected and underfunded. If you get the cuts you want in education, you will be saddling future generations with the same substandard education you experienced growing up. Is that really what you want?

I grew up in middle class Southern California, with teachers that were paid fairly, schools that were well funded and parents that involved themselves in the academic lives of their children. (3 of the biggest factors in student achievement). Out of the 40+ teachers I had from K-12, I can think of two that were bad (one was a morbidly obese right wing history teacher that spent as much time praising Reagan and Capitalism as he did teaching history, the other was a self-loathing Science teacher who seemed to fear any kind of social interaction). I can think of 14 that were exceptional teachers and human beings - I'm still in touch with a few of them. The rest were competent at their jobs, if not particularly memorable.

I got good grades and received a half scholarship to a prominent west coast university (fight on). Since then I've had the luxury of being able to play music for a living (and occasionally teach or compose). Public education did me a solid.

PS: I like when you share stories from your life with me. I find it much more moving and persuasive than being called a statist idiot.

I see that moving your head like a retard directly corasponds to a better sound.

good song and sounded nice , I really hate the ritualistic pomp and bullshit latched onto this probably pushed onto the kids by there music teacher or parents.

to be clear im not against stupid faces people make when concentrating or ticks people have that are uncontrollable , its stuff that's perpusfuly done and passed on or encoraged because it "shows you have emotion when playing" ( which is bullshit they may or may not and even then I don't see how that matters so long as they are making the desired sound that individual wants to produce)

Why is it more classical instruments like piano , guitar , violin that you get more of this retarded acting a specific way shit ? its like people don't believe the instruments sound can stand up for itself and they have to attach a bunch of wankery to it as if that some how makes it better or more important or more valid than another human activity.

I mean juses Christ why stop at classical instrments lets inject some wankery into everything , want to pore a drink lets make over the top hand movments and add extra finishing tilt when you stop poring , Oh wait people do do that when they pore wine but not all drinks only drinks that are conciderd to be "posh" drinks what a load of shit.

Reminds me of a performance of Oliver that I was in back in elementary school. I was in a scene with a friend of mine, and we were looking at a painting. My line was something like "Do you notice that there's an uncanny resemblance between that boy and my daughter" at which point our music teacher, who was on the piano, played a dramatic "dun dun DUN" -- which was completely unrehearsed. My friend and I held it together for about a second, but as soon as we made eye contact we both completely lost it. We were laughing hysterically for about a minute or two before we were finally able to resume the scene.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'Tchiakovsky, Smash, Violin, scary, angry' to 'music, teacher, music teacher, Smash, Violin, scary, angry, high school' - edited by yoghurt