Growing up in basic education, we have all complained about what we’re learning and if it is ever going to help us in the real world. Learning things in elementary school such as learning to read, write, create relationships were essential for our development and basic cognitive skills. But what about when we get older? What does learning about Hamlet or derivatives have to offer us in our adult lives?
Today I am going to discuss information that was posted on HuffPost.com, and how the information on the article is true and what it means. To sum up the article, it speaks about some topics and subjects that students would actually benefit from learning in school that would help them in their everyday lives, once they are out of basic k-12 education. The first topic the article speaks about is learning how to file taxes. Filing taxes is something anyone can do starting from the age of 16 when they first get their job, but they probably have no clue how to do it. The article brings up the fact that students and everybody should be able to file their own taxes in confidence without having to worry about hiring someone else to do it for them. Taxes are something we cannot escape (unless we are looking towards some jail time in the future), so therefore why is it not something everyone is taught? Knowing the differences between the certain forms, what they mean, what we do to get the most possible back on our tax returns, nobody knows this information fresh out of highschool. It is self taught.
Another topic the article mentions that you wouldn’t think would be something beneficial to you is CPR and first aid classes. We have all seen the basic scene of someone choking as a restaurant and everyone frantically looking around for a doctor or anyone certified in CPR and it is very rare that you find someone who is in those situations. What if that fear was eliminated due to the fact that everyone around us would have the training to be ready for situations such as this. Not only would this allow people to be ready for situations in need but “teaching medical care could promote compassion, a skill that any high school grad knows is sorely lacking in the teenage population” (huffpost 2). Not only will it teach it life skills but it teaches interpersonal skills, which is something students will need in the workplace once they get older. The article also speaks about the idea of building a resume. Having skills such as CPR and first aid training adds so much to one’s resume, giving them a better opportunity to get into better schools and get good jobs.
Another thing mentioned in the article is sex education. Although we think that we have gotten the basic understanding of it from what we were taught in the one semester of health we get in high school, it is not enough. For me personally, during my health course (whihc only lasted about 3-4 months), we learned more about drugs anmd how to stay healthy and spoke about sex health for about 1 week. The United States is leading with the highest rates of teen pregnancy in the country, 57 per 100 15-19 year olds become pregnant every year. There are many people who have no idea about planned parenthood, brith control options, contraceptives, safe sex habits, etc and it is very aalrming. The goal of high school is to educate students AND keep them safe, would teaching them this not keep them safe? Not only would it teach them how to prevent pregnancy and lower the number or teen organs in the United States, but it would prevent students from also getting any sort of STDs or STIs. In most cases, there are students who don’t even know that there is a difference between the two and do not even know how one can be contracted. They don’t know the ones that are curable, they do not know the ones that are easily spreadable, they do not know treatment plans if they are to ctagc something. These diseases and infections are sometimes deadly, we need to be educating our students about them to keep them safe, healthy and alive. It is not plausible to simply preach abstinence while in school as well, teenagers are teenagers, they are going to do it regardless, so we might as well teach them how to do it safely.
There are so many other subjects that can be taught in schools that many students would benefit from but these two are ones that are most talked about and least talked about, yet two of the most important things, in my opinion, that NEED to be talked about.
Work Cited:
Boboltz, Sara. “7 Things We Should Start Teaching in Schools ASAP.” HuffPost, HuffPost, 7 Dec. 2017, https://www.huffpost.com/entry/things-schools-should-teach_n_4576389.
This was very interesting. I have always thought about this while I am sitting in class. Especially when tax season comes and I have no idea how to file them. I think it can be hard though because there are industries that rely on Americans not fully understanding tax codes and how to properly file taxes.
I completely agree with you. The government definitely does take advantage on our lack of knowledge on taxes but I do not think that us being educated and future generations being educated on taxes will be detrimental to the government and or the economy.
I really enoyed your post and founf it interesting thatb 57/100 15-19 year olds become pregnant. I never thought of that number as being so high and I was shocked by the amount of teen pregnancies there are. I also agree with you that schools need to start teaching students skills in highschool so they can be ready for the real world. Schools don’t pressure students enough on how to save money and how to do certain things once we are adults and independent. All of these things are self taught and we need more exposure to them. To conclude, I thought these topics this week were great and I can’t wait to see what else you write about!
Thank you. for this first week I wanted to really force a point about the important life skills that aren’t taught to us in schools. Some people may say it’s soemthing we figure out as we get older but these skills and situations do apply to us while we are still in high school so it’s important for student to be taught about them. I thought that including these pieces of info would let people know how important this topic is.
I think about this as well. Many students will not use topics like stoichiometry, periodic trends, calculus etc. but, they are left with that knowledge and know nothing about how to balance a budget or a checkbook. I still don’t know these things and I honestly don’t know if or how I’ll ever figure them out. This is definitely a topic that can can be build upon but you may need to take it in the direction of public policy for it to remain an ongoing civic issue.
That is something I was worried about. I am not quite sure how to turn this into a public policy but I think that there are definitely some sort of laws or rulings even if it is just local government. I could look for news articles on those sort of things