TV REVIEW : America’s Problem: Non-Thinking Students

In “America’s Kids: Teaching Them to Think,” airing at 10 tonight on Channels 7, 3, 10 and 42, host Barbara Walters promises to take viewers “on a search for solutions to one of the most pressing problems in American education.”

To some extent--marred by a few weak segments--”America’s Kids” succeeds in the search.

The show is a follow-up to an earlier ABC documentary titled “America’s Kids: Why Do They Flunk?” That program showed students’ horrifying lack of general knowledge; “Teaching” argues that children are inadequately prepared to think and reason on their own.

While making their case about the need to stimulate the development of critical thinking skills at all age and grade levels, director Roger Goodman and Walters all too often reach for the simple statement followed by an equally simple, quick sound bite.

An example: Reporter Greg Dobbs says “And even our first-rate national defense is at stake; new recruits have to tackle technology in almost every military job.” Jump to a sound bite of Adm. William Crowe saying, “We demand thinking people today throughout the force. I am not confident that our educational system . . . is going to meet that challenge. . . .”

End it, move to another 30-second segment. Back to you, Barbara.

“America’s Kids” does much better delineating three major problems--labeling of students as “slow,” rote learning and poor home influences--that affect children’s education right from the start, showing how these stunt the development of thinking skills.

Finally, “America’s Kids” gets to the meat of the show, the promised solutions, hopscotching across the nation to examine successful school programs.

Among the good programs that can easily be put in place without spending more money are cooperative learning, where students in small groups team up to help each other; having children write and edit their own stories, and contracts between parents and children spelling out what each must do to promote learning

Other ideas covered: Santa Monica’s attempt to phase out the “tracking” of groups of students; offering “opportunity” classes for small groups of students who study different subjects with the same teachers up to four hours a day, and a Rochester, N.Y., high school that concentrates on giving students the attention and guidance they may not receive at home, with teachers acting as personal counselors.

Overall, “America’s Kids” is worthwhile--at least as a starting point for examining solutions to our nation’s education problems. It’s too bad the producers didn’t think a little harder about how to better use their air time--by concentrating even more on the solutions.