School

[Ape]

Yea, i hate the whole project thing. I refuse to do 90% of projects. If it has anything to do with me presenting it infront of the class, screw it. Presenting a project infront of the class isn't going to help me learn the subject, and we have a public speaking course, so if i wanted to speak in public, i'd take that.
I also refuse to do anything on posterboard, but i guess thats because you usually have to present those. But still, i'd rather write a few pages of random stuff rather than glue peices of written pages to a peice of cardboard and hold it up for everyone to see.

[Elfie]

ApeKiller said:

Yea, i hate the whole project thing. I refuse to do 90% of projects. If it has anything to do with me presenting it infront of the class, screw it. Presenting a project infront of the class isn't going to help me learn the subject, and we have a public speaking course, so if i wanted to speak in public, i'd take that.

It's not for the sake of your learning. It's for the sake of you not failing in life. Public speaking is going to be necessary for whatever you end up doing, so you should really get used to it and acquire these skills before it's too late.

[piñata]

Really, Elfie, that's kind of a sweeping generalization. What if he wants to be a janitor? They tend to fly under the radar. Or what about a web designer? He'd never have to leave his house, why would he need public speaking?

[Elfie]

First, job interviews. You are actually guaranteed to need public speaking at least for that.

Second, getting along with people. I mean, yes, hermits don't need public speaking, but other than that, it's rather important.

Third, and probably most importantly, schools teach you how to function in society, and that's not always through the actual material you learn. Am I ever really going to have to be able to go into great detail about Marie-Antoinette's contribution to the French Revolution? Doubtful. But it taught me how to learn, which, oddly enough, is something a lot of people can't do. You don't take Linear Algebra because you need it to get from point A to B; you do it because it forces you to tackle problems in new way, something you might never learn to do.

Public Speaking is part of that learning how to function in society thing, and even to anti-society folks, you should at least learn how to play the game so you have the option if being a rebel gets tiresome.

[Ape]

Elfie said:

First, job interviews. You are actually guaranteed to need public speaking at least for that.

Actually, no. There is a mandatory class here, called something along the lines of "job skills". In this class, you learn all of this. Job Interviews and all. Career Skills is for public speaking, and nothing else. The same thing should apply to history.

Elfie said:

Second, getting along with people. I mean, yes, hermits don't need public speaking, but other than that, it's rather important.

I don't know, i can stand up infront of the class, present a project, and still hate everyon there. I could also not do the project, and now that i have more free time, have more of a social life with friends. And i'm not sure how speaking in front of the class can be associated with getting along with the people your speaking to in the first place.

Elfie said:

Third, and probably most importantly, schools teach you how to function in society, and that's not always through the actual material you learn. Am I ever really going to have to be able to go into great detail about Marie-Antoinette's contribution to the French Revolution? Doubtful. But it taught me how to learn, which, oddly enough, is something a lot of people can't do. You don't take Linear Algebra because you need it to get from point A to B; you do it because it forces you to tackle problems in new way, something you might never learn to do.

Right, i don't have any agruments with that, but i still hate anything requiring me to stand in front of the class and hold up a peice of cardboard.

[SuperBassX84]

I need to stop by here more often.

In response to DA's post from a month ago...DA, whenever you think you've got it tough, think, again, about the teachers. Teachers have to be to the school up to an hour before the students sometimes. They often live much further away then the students (in my HS all of a dozen teachers lived in town). Many times they don't leave until long after the students have left. Then they have to go home and prepare for the next day. And YOU'RE bitching about homework?

By the same token, I do agree that projects and, most especially, long-winded typed reports are useless, or very nearly so. For instance, my Senior paper in HS. We were told months ahead of time. Ok, that's fine. However, we were given required dates for EVERYTHING. Something like:
January 26th - Have your topic ready
February 4th - Have your thesis statement ready
February 18th - Have your citations ready
February 22nd - Have your bibliography ready
March 3rd - Have your introduction ready
Etc.
Etc.

Personally, I find that both irritating and counter-productive. When I write a paper, I take a few hours or days and I sit and do everything then. Why? Because then the material is fresh in my mind; I don't have to go back and review the work I did 2 weeks ago to remember what I wrote down. I failed or did horribly on a number of papers in that format. I'm in college now. They don't care about when your notecards or citations or introduction is done, so long as they have the damn paper in their hands. Guess what? I've done a lot better with long-winded reports.

And Ape, being able to speak in front of people is not a subject that one can relegate to a single class. It is a skill that has to be not only learned, but practiced. Repeatedly. One class is not going to make you good at speaking in front of people, whether it be a job interview, a seminar, or an AA meeting.

PS - I finally read Devo's full post. Very nice work, Alternate Tony.

[Ape]

Oh, ok, so why don't we practice history in math class? Because the subject is "regulated" to history class. So why isn't public speaking regulated to a public speaking class? I mean, i signed up for history to learn about history. I signed up for public speaking to speak publicly. I DIDN'T sign up for history so i can speak in front of the class. It has nothing to do with the subject, and if it did i wouldn't take the class. A history teachers job is to teach history, not to tell people to hold up a peice of cardboard. Maybe that teacher feels that we 'need' to teach how to speak publicly, well i didn't sign up for that, so i refuse to do it.

[SuperBassX84]

Ah, but here's the thing. History class you will most likely not use again, unless you go on Jeopardy. Public speaking is an everyday thing. Many teachers realize this.

And by the way, I've had teachers give me lessons not specific to their "assigned subject" on a random basis, so yes, it does happen.

[Disgruntled Misanthrope]

Actually, history trivia is something I'll use later in life to make people feel stupid, purely to exercise my constant thoughts that I'm better than everyone else.

As for public speaking, it's really not terribly difficult, at least for me. I have a tendency to avoid eye contact, which is a problem... but if you get nervous, all you need to do is imagine everyone in the class on fire. It always works for me.

[Elfie]

I enjoy public speaking, but that's just me.

[Lady Enelya]

I'm in a boarding school! grrr

I go home at weekends but because I have means I get to go our in the evenings! Otherwise it's a 15 minute hike down a winding dirt track down a cliff face to get to the main road and the bus stop -> yuck

Thank god for my car!
::strokes car loveingly::

[Ape]

Very old posts, but i feel i have to make a point anyways.

How the fuck is presenting a project going to help you with interviews? I have absolutely no problem sitting down with a couple people and for an interview. No big deal. I get asked questions, i answer them, thats it. However, standing in front of a large group and presenting a picture i drew on a posterboard will NEVER be used in real life. No matter what. I don't care what i do, i will never have to do THAT. And even if i do ever have to present something, it will be to a boss or a couple of bosses. Never a large group of people. So forcing people to do that is useless.

[Predator-Fan]

elfie said:

piñata said:

Just do what I did at your age... refuse to do homework on principle.

How'd that end up working out?

Really. this I need to know.....my grad year and I am in collage now.....I really need to know this.

[piñata]

I barely scraped by in most of my classes... a D is a passing grade, but it's not all that impressive. I was over it anyway, so meh. But yeah... if you want to "succeed", then don't do what I did.

Obviously the quotes mean that my definition of success is different from that of most potential employers.

@ape: I just thought of something. If you wind up working at any sort of even remotely modern corporation, a time will likely come when you have to hold up a piece of cardboard and talk about it in the boardroom. Keep that in mind when selecting your jobs, I guess.

[Ape]

I refused to do homework on principle throughout the 2nd half of my high school career as well, unless I had time to do it during studyhall...which didn't happen often considering the fact that I sat with an extremely hot freshman in front of me and a rather sexy junior to my right. Not to mention the scantily dressed slutty chick a couple rows away, and there was the huge-breasted girl whom I was to self-concious to pursue, but was still distracted by anyways.

It worked fine though, considering homework at our school only made up about 10-15 percent of our grade. I just got A's on all my tests and quizzes and got a decent 2.8-3.0 GPA. *shrug*

@pinata: I'd be getting paid for doing that though.

I don't really have any problem being in front of people any more. Though if I were still in high school I still wouldn't do projects of that sort (for the same reason i didn't do homework.)