Why School Lessons *Should* Be Boring

5 Comments »

1. “Oh well we were just pretending it was about learning the whole time, but really it’s about getting you used to being bored.”

   That’s not only horribly disingenuous, but backwards.

   There are much more effect methods of teaching kids how to be content while bored (Zen Buddhism for instance!) and passing off bad teaching as this is ridiculous.

   The point of school is either to learn, or to be prepared. To excuse one for another and teacher neither appropriately is fucking insane; yet also a reality.

   I can’t wait to get out of high school. How come colleges don’t claim to be preparing you for the monotony of the real world?

   We should be taught to make the best of our lives and live in a world we love, not learn to be dominated by our cruel circumstances.

   Comment by Nagrom Dnalrehtus — 4/19/2006 @ 11:57 am

2. Morgan,

   Thanks much for the reply. I think you are spot on in an ideal sense, i.e. the way it should be. But what I’ve found is that many people with great gifts are unable to attain much in the world because they are unwilling to trudge through the mundane in order to acheive anything.

   The fact of the matter is that many things that are difficult to attain are so simply based on it being so tedious to make the journey. Not because it’s extremely difficult, or because it takes creativity.

   As such, for people to be unprepared to stick with tasks that are not interesting to them will almost certainly cripple them. I know several people who fit this bill, and I’m one of them.

   So while it’s true that we shouldn’t be teaching boredom tolerance in place of truly important things, it should definitely be learned in addition to the actual lessons. Homework is a perfect example. It’s amazing to me how important it really was. I’ve never been good at it (I never cared to be bored), and that mentality has hurt my professional life to a small degree. It’s overcomable through talent and motivation, but it would be better if I didn’t have the handicap.

   Anyway, thanks for the comment.

   Comment by Daniel — 4/26/2006 @ 3:14 am

3. But, Daniel, I will guess (and it’s not really a guess) that when you took classes you were not satisfied to know how to crank through the methods to get to the answer. You wanted to know WHY things worked as they did. True understanding of WHY things work (even on a basic level) is very important in effictively adding the techniques to your mental toolbox. It doesn’t do someone any good to be able to multiply numbers correctly (or compute integrals or solve differential equations or …) if they don’t know WHEN multiplication is the appropriate operation to use or WHICH numbers to multiply.

   It is true that there is MUCH value in repetitive tasks. But it is not enough. Rote memorization is useless without some understanding.

   Comment by Carl M — 4/29/2006 @ 4:10 pm

4. I’m not claiming learning shouldn’t teach underlying concepts, etc, or even that it should lack interesting material. Quite the contrary, actually.

   I’m simply saying that an education should also include a workload that requires consistent, high-quality output, even if some of the work required is monotonous. The reason for this is that it mimicks the real world, and those who are not prepared to do this will be at a disadvantage.

   It’s really a seperate point from whether or not the education is also interesting and involves the teaching of underlying concepts.

   Comment by Daniel — 4/29/2006 @ 6:02 pm

5. I knew you weren’t making that claim, and I agree that the teaching of underlying concepts is a separate issue. I happen to think that education is incomplete without both. In any case, as long as I’ve known you, you’ve wanted to know WHY and not just HOW. That’s admirable.

   I agree completely that education should include an expectation of consistent, high-quality output, even if some of the work required is monotonous. But, the fact that this reflects the real world is not the main reason I think this (though that is a good point). Those who become exceptionally skilled at a particular physical task (tennis, golf, table tennis, whatever…) do so in part by repetition. They repeat the CORRECT movement so often that the body develops what is called muscle memory (though this term is not technically correct). The idea is that the body (as a unit) learns to do things right automatically — WITHOUT thinking. The same is true of certain mental tasks. We all know that 5×7 is 35. And, most of us have simply memorized this fact. We do not have to work it out every time. If we worked it out every time, we’d make mistakes every once in a while. If we have correctly memorized it, we will get it right every time.

   I realize that most who will read this do not know me, so I feel the need to emphasize the fact that I am a mathematics professor who ABHORS memorization of mathematical facts and techniques. It is USUALLY far more efficient to learn and understand the underlying concepts rather than try to memorize the enormous number of tools, techniques, and facts. However, there is a basic CORE set of tools and facts that should be both understood AND memorized. For example, we all understand that 5×7 means 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 or 7 7 7 7 7 and we could work out that the total is 35 either way. Nonetheless, we have the fact that 3×7 = 35 memorized. Why do I (the guy who generally ABHORS memorization) think that it is in fact VERY important that we all memorize the basic multiplication table?

   Well, I think that one of the most important basic mathematical skills is mental estimation. If we took frisbees and packed them as closely together as possible without overlapping them, how many could we fit on a football field? OK, this is probably not something that any of you will EVER have to estimate, but we all estimate things every day. Being able to make these sorts of mental estimations requires that we have some basic facts within reach. If they are memorized, it is much more likely that we can do the estimation in our head with relatively few errors.

   Of course the answer to the question I asked depends on some things that were unspecified. How large is each frisbee? How large is the football field? (Most of us probably know the length of a football field … what about the width? Are we to include the endzones?) Just for fun, assume that we are using a disc with a diameter of 1 foot. Get a “ballpark” estimate for the number required to cover a football field (including endzones). Got it?

   OK, now, estimate the number of people who could stand on a football field (including endzones). Let’s assume we’re packing people in there pretty tight. Think world record .. not comfort. Did you change anything in your estimate? The number of people is probably a bit less than the number of frisbees, but it’s the same order of magnitude. Are you surprised at the number of people who can stand on a football field? Are you impressed that you could get the rough estimate in your head? Thank your grade school teacher who required you to memorize the multiplication tables.

   Comment by Carl M — 4/29/2006 @ 9:33 pm

RSS Feed For This Post...
This Post's TrackBack URI

Leave a Comment...