Have you ever noticed that everybody has certain subjects they just hate. Ask them "What subjects in school did you like?" and part of that answer is almost certain to be "Well I liked this but... I just hated math, English, history..." or some other subject. I was always under the impression that the reason people don't like these fields of study was because they had bad teachers. These teachers just didn't teach them to enjoy the subjects. This is true to an extent but, there is more to it. I think I have found another layer behind this mentality of being mortified by whole fields of study.
Lacking a proper name for it, I shall call it the "Mentality of Relativity". Now what in the world do I mean by this? Well, relativity simply means that we humans like to know how the things we put into our minds relate to us. No one wants to fill his/her mind with useless mental garbage. We require a reason for needing the information. My mind struggles with the idea of why I hear people tell me they don't like history. Really? You don't like history because you don't think it relates to your life? Yet you are okay with filling your brain with anything from Twilight to Southpark? I really had problems with Christians telling me this...I mean after all, the first 2/3rds of the Bible have a LOT of history in them. The reality of it though is that it is all about your mindset; hence the "mentality" word. When we mentally decide something is useless to us we want nothing to do with it. Even if something is entertaining then it has some value to us, but if something is neither practical nor entertaining why should we waste our gray matter? This is a very legitimate question that almost all high school students ask their algebra teachers after all.
Suppose we were to change the way we teach history, math, English etc. to kids (and adults for that matter) and we added extra stress to how the subject relates to them. Would we would have better results? When we teach that the reason we study history is "so we don't make the same mistakes of the past." that's fine, but how many people regularly read about World War 2 and say to themselves "Next time I take over a country, I won't exterminate the Jews." No, of course not! Very few of us will ever have major political issues like that confront us in our lives so that lesson becomes useless. History in fact is more than that. It is the story of mankind. It teaches us where we came from and why we do the things we do. It explains traditions and why certain cultures act differently from one another. On top of that the people we read about show us over and over again that they had the same emotions, ideas, fears and dreams that we do today. Sure their worlds were a little different, but the personalities of people are always the same. When you read a good book or watch one of your favorite movies the things you remember are the moments when you see the humanity of the characters. They overcome their trials and inspire us to be the best we can be. This is the true story of history. Man's eternal struggle with facing this world and historians were the guys( and sometimes gals) nice enough to write it down for us.
| My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, Commander of the northern Armies, faithful and loyal servant to the true emperor Marcus Aurelius, husband to a murdered wife, father to a murdered son, and i will have my revenge, in this life or the next. |
If we really want to be our best we should at least examine why we irrationally hate specific types of learning. I for example have always hated math, but I am trying to look at it with fresh eyes and understand a lot of people love it. Who knows, maybe I am missing out on a great world because I never had someone teach me how it could be useful to me. More importantly though, whatever it is you love you must learn to teach it to others in a way that they grasp it not only with their minds, but also with their hearts!
-Jason
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