There are Some Things Kids Should Just Know

Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Miscellaneous Stuff Schools

schoolbusThe words to the national anthem, that’s one. There is no scenario possible in which a home grown American boy should not be able to come up with the words. If he’s a singer, he has double indemnity.

In light of Jesse McCartney’s historic meltdown over the weekend, The Mother has been pondering what, exactly, our kids should know.

The school’s exit exams are failing us. No one has asked me about the finer points of a Shakespearean play since high school, although the knowledge occasionally comes in handy in crossword puzzles. Ditto the finer points of history, which tend to show up only as the really hard questions on cheesy game shows.

Even balancing a checkbook is apparently a lost art. If the big financial houses (and the government) can’t do it, why should we expect it of our children? It will only make them exasperated for life, increasing their lifelong intake of Xanax.

After pondering these essential questions, I have come up with a list of things that I believe are essential human knowledge. No child should be left behind.

1) How to sew on a button.

Really, it’s not that hard. In, out, in, out. I know they don’t stress home ec anymore, especially for the boys, but it’s either that or a lifelong tendency to spend a fortune on alterations.

2) How to boil water.

Home ec territory again. It’s not Rocket Science, but being able to feed yourself is definitely a plus. Not to mention that the basic concept of what makes water boil is the key to everything from meteorology to hot air balloons.

3) A second language that isn’t html.

The rest of the world think we Americans are snobs because we think everyone should speak English.  (The French really are snobs, because they think everyone should speak French, but switch to English  if it isn’t spoken perfectly).

4) How to play pool.

Newtonian physics in action. Plus a really good way to earn pocket change in college.

5) Basic statistics

Mean, median, standard deviation, and standard t-tests. Since 90% of statistics are made up on the spot, it really helps to be able to figure out which ones.

6) Circles and triangles.

While your kids are running circles around you, teach them pi. Build it into their brains. They need these for everything from sewing to landscaping.

7) Basic evolutionary theory.

Absolutely essential to understand the battle of the sexes, and, let’s face it, that’s what teenagers do for their entire existence.

8) Mythology.

And not just the Christian kind. All the way back. Really getting this is the key to understanding literature (and probably politics).

9) Adverbs.

Pet peeve territory. The loss of adverbs in the English language makes our kids sound stupid. Teach them to speak “well”, and “good” things will happen.

10) The difference between real science and pseudoscience.

No explanation required.

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22 Comments

Wendy

Wednesday, 14th October 2009 at 11:25 am
 

I hadn't heard about this meltdown. I can understand, after one of my cousins was asked to play guitar & sing a song he knows well at my grandfather's graveside. He performs frequently & knew the song by heart, but he got flustered and sang the first verse twice (kind of). You would think, though, that Jesse McCartney would be past nerves – I mean, that's kind of his JOB. Or it was, LOL.

My daughter was just required to learn this for a grade. She's eight years old. I'm so glad we're in a good school district now.

My husband is licensed professional engineer and is responsible for projects at work worth many millions of dollars. He can't balance the checkbook. The last time he tried (at his own stubborn insistence) he spent six hours pounding on the table and muttering the f-word before he surrendered. His dad has an MBA in finance, but did he teach any of his kids ANYTHING about finance? NO. As is apparent by their collective ignorance of finance even as they all approach their 40s.

You must have been subject to a lot of really ignorant people. We have strong beliefs, but I haven't seen anything in science that contradicts my beliefs. Do I think it's likely people descended from frogs? I really don't. However, I will also say that I think Genesis likely describes the beginning of Jewish history, not human history – and there is evidence of that in Genesis itself. So. What God did in his spare time while he was fooling around with creation… what processes took place while he was doing it… or how long those metaphorical 7 days really were… I don't know any of that. I know the Bible is vague enough to allow for a lot of scientific learning (how great is that?!) – and I believe that relatively speaking, we're still pretty ignorant as humans. There is a LOT we don't know and can only postulate about.

So to cling to a narrow and literal interpretation of a book that wasn't meant to be taken literally, in large part – if you really think God is all powerful, why would you put Him in that little bitty box? Or think that He would ruin all the fun for us by explaining everything? Why make us intelligent & curious & then take away all impetus for advancement? That doesn't even make sense.

And to keep your kids ignorant of all learning based on that box you've put God in all by yourself – well, that's just silly. If God meant for us to sit in the dirt with sticks & not ever figure anything out for ourselves, He wouldn't have made the world so interesting & diverse, or ever let us get past the frog stage, or made us smart enough to learn anything on our own. And that would be a terribly pointless existence for all parties concerned.

My faith was never as strong as when I took science classes in college and realized what a delicate balance we live in – from the molecular level to the planet itself to the stars – and impossible it seemed to me that we got here by accident. I'm not saying belief is a requirement for scientific research – but for people of faith to eschew learning is beyond me. What are they afraid of? Anyone of faith who tries to ignore science has a very shallow belief.

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Wendy Replies:
October 14th, 2009 at 11:31 am

Forgot to mention – that table pounding and curse shouting incident – was while using QUICKEN. He wasn't even balancing by hand.

ROTFL

I don't know anyone my age who knows how to balance by hand. That's how I did it until I was in college – by which time I had already been responsible for a checking account for three years (and for keeping it balanced! By hand! Gasp!).

My mother-in-law thinks I descended from apes (one generation ago), and doesn't hesitate to allude to it. I don't know. I look at how ignorant her own children are of so many basic things, and I think maybe my dumb west Texas hick family did me a few favors. She decided her kids were too important to learn all these basic things you're talking about… and they suffer for it. I think her son was smart & lucky to marry such a useful wife. Ahem.

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TheMother Replies:
October 14th, 2009 at 1:48 pm

There are, seriously, chimps who are smarter than some people I know.

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TheMother Replies:
October 14th, 2009 at 1:47 pm

Wendy, I hadn't intended to open a debate about evolution here. I did that once before when the Texas school board was at it again (Texas Enters Enlightenment, Sees Shadow, and Ducks Back into Dark Ages). This one here is just a flip comment about how evolutionary biology explains your husband's frustration when he can't balance his checkbook (cavemen are supposed to be able to handle all of the family's needs).

None the less, YES, I have known many, many super ignorant people. Most of whom seem to BE on the Texas school board.

I don't have a problem with faith, in general. I don't have it; I find my "god" in those miracles of nature that you mention–I don't require a book to delineate it for me. But I have no problem with those who do, as long as they keep their noses out of science and politics.

It sounds as though you would love St. Augustine's philosophy. Way back in the 4th century, he said "In matters that are so obscure and far beyond our vision, we find in Holy Scripture passages which can be interpreted in very different ways without prejudice to the faith we have received. In such cases, we should not rush in headlong and so firmly take our stand on one side that, if further progress in the search for truth justly undermines this position, we too fall with it."

I wish more people did.

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TheMother Replies:
October 14th, 2009 at 2:36 pm

Oh, and while we're at it, Mr. Deity had a conversation with PZ Myers today:

http://www.mrdeity.com/Resources/deity_season3_09...

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Wendy Replies:
October 16th, 2009 at 11:25 am

This URL got truncated – the episode links don't follow the format I see here, so I'm not sure where to go exactly. This morning I have 11 minutes before I have to put this computer away and get with it, but I flagged this website to look at again later – it looks interesting.

I'm glad no one went off on the tangent & started arguing evolution. At least you were able to follow my train of thought. Sometimes I go following trails in my own mind & then when I comment (I'm thinking of real life here, not necessarily commenting to blog posts) not everyone can see how it's related.

The one religious argument I see a lot that I have a tremendous problem with is the argument that the earth is only 6k years old or whatever. I don't understand why people will claim to have this all encompassing faith in an all powerful God & then say "it's impossible that the earth is hundreds of millions of years old". Who are they to say? Why would God explain everything to a people who were so simple as to still need a complicated set of laws just to keep them from self-harm?

(I love how so much of old Jewish law is actually prohibitions against harmful things – like fooling around with dead bodies – or intended to encourage the propagation of the species – like the rules about when you can or cannot sleep with your wife, which optimizes sex to happen a lot around ovulation.)

I also love myseteries such as the book of Job that mention animals now extinct. In north Texas (Granbury) there exist preserved dinosaur tracks next to human footprints.

A few years back I saw mention of a genetic study (which I haven't looked up myself) that showed genetic mutations among Jewish people that don't exist anywhere else. I could imagine God playing around with the creation of people, and he's looking at the Neanderthals and saying, "Nooo, this isn't going to work long-term…" etc., and then saying, "Now I will make a people that are my people." Why not? It could have happened with Adam & Eve or the flood or as late as Abram – in all of these places in Genesis there are verses that don't exactly make sense with what I was taught as a child. I'm still working that over in my mind.

It's preposterous to say, "I will open myself to belief in God but close my mind to everything else." I also like to think that God would be very disappointed with this, to have made man with so much potential – but to watch people refuse to enjoy his creation because they can't reconcile the obvious in their own minds. It's like saying, "I believe in trees but leaves don't exist. I know this is true because I refuse to look up."

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TheMother Replies:
October 16th, 2009 at 1:42 pm

We used to spend long hours at Glen Rose–back when it was Glen Rose State Park; now it's "Dinosaur Valley State Park."

It was from those T.Rex tracks that Horner calculated that T Rex wasn't really that lumbering, slow monster that conventional wisdom thought he was in my childhood. Horner measured the distance between the tracks, calculated weight, and made comparisons to modern upright birds (ostrich, rhea, emu). He determined that the T Rex who left them had to have been RUNNING. This was way cool stuff back in the 70s, before the guys who CGIed Jurassic Park put the running T Rex in everyone's head.

My favorite part of Glen Rose, though, was the Creationist exhibit just outside the park's boundaries. They did claim that the world was only 4000 years old. THe tracks, you see, were left by their god to confuse people and test the faith of believers. ACK.

I'll post the video at the end of today's post. It, like most of Mr. Deity, is hysterical.

BTW–the reason there are so many autosomal recessives in the Ashkenazi Jewish genetic code is from millennia of inbreeding, not from some divine plan–unless one wanted to postulate that having children who died at early ages from wild biochemical mishaps was just one more test for God's poor "chosen" people.

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Helene

Wednesday, 14th October 2009 at 4:44 pm
 

I hadn't heard of the JM meltdown but then again all I watch is PBS and The disney channel.

I couldn't agree more with you on many of those things, esp how to boil water!! My husband can't boil water to save his life….the first time I asked to make mac-n-cheese out of a box for the kids, he googled "how to boil water". I had a good laugh at his expense but then I felt bad for him that his parents never taught him how to cook. Or do laundry. Or sew a button. HTML is his 2nd language even though his mom is German and speaks it fluently. He never quite picked it up. But ask him how to write code and he's your guy.

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Momisodes

Wednesday, 14th October 2009 at 5:00 pm
 

I just searched for the clip from NASCAR this weekend. Yikes. Definitely something every kid should know. Especially when asked to sing it at a huge event.

I'd like to add- Writing in proper English. Cuz writing like this is annoying. IMHO.

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Dr. Grumpy

Wednesday, 14th October 2009 at 8:10 pm
 

I want to return to using the word "says" instead of "goes"

"so then Dave goes 'Hey what are you doing?' "

Drives me nuts.

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Becca

Wednesday, 14th October 2009 at 11:10 pm
 

I totally agree! The history and adverb issues are my biggest pet peeves. I do not understand how people go to school and learn nothing. Oh wait, now I remember, they are taught by underpaid teachers with books that are about to fall apart. And… they are taught what the county wants children to know. Thank the Goddess that C and I at least have some extra knowledge to impart!

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sara

Thursday, 15th October 2009 at 3:11 am
 

Oh #11, how to take responsibility for their actions and not blame others.
#12 how to graciously apologize
oh..I'll stop there! I agree with your entire list.

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The Dental Maven

Thursday, 15th October 2009 at 11:07 am
 

Let's codify this list and distribute to all elementary teachers.

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stepiphany

Thursday, 15th October 2009 at 11:38 am
 

I don't know who Jesse McCartney is, but I love your list. I had no idea there are adults who don't know how to boil water! I do know that having graduated from a Christian school, I could have benefitted from more geography and evoluionary theory. I very much concur with the sad state of adverb use in this country, and of grammar in general. No wonder so many kids never learn a second language. They don't even have a good grasp on their first one!

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Stephanie Barr

Thursday, 15th October 2009 at 9:09 am
 

I don’t have an issue with anything on your list, but I think it’s incomplete.

In addition to sewing on a button, repairing a seam seems useful.

Boiling water is all well and good, but what if you need to eat? There should be a handful of rudimentary meals anyone should be able to cook, including eggs and, say, spaghetti.

History should be included, if not all the finer points. And I don’t mean the big dates or anything, but the changes that had a profound affect on our society and why. Those are frequently glossed right over.

Rudimentary algebra is the keystone to using math in the real world. It’s at least as important as statistics (which is so frequently misused, it makes my head hurt).

Ditto, volume/area understanding of polygons, not just circles and triangles. Geometry is our friend and all around us.

Science is bigger than evolution – chemistry and physics in the real world are unforgiving. You should know, without having seen it on Mythbusters, that you can’t lower 300 pounds of shingles with a single pully if you weigh 165.

Beyond adverbs – grammar. You shouldn’t be able to throw it out the window until you have demonstrated a capability. Lack of effective communication skills is a good way to stay on the fasttrack to nowhere.

Critical thinking – for heaven’s sake, learn to ask the right damn questions or you’ll be a lemming!

Laundry/basic cleaning – I was amazed in college how few people knew how to run a load of laundry or realized that toilets weren’t self-cleaning.

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Liz

Thursday, 15th October 2009 at 2:49 pm
 

I would add "what the constitution ACTUALLY says" and how to tie an array of knots. Great list!

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Dr. Grumpy

Thursday, 15th October 2009 at 5:00 pm
 

Boiling water is so critical. Without ramen and Mac & cheese I might have starved to death is college and med schoot.

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Lawyer Mom

Thursday, 15th October 2009 at 6:24 pm
 

Excellent list. I would only add "spelling" and pronunciation. The other night on the evening news a reporter said "such and such had so many face-its" instead of facets. Then there's forMIDable when it should be FORMidable, the extra syllable people inexplicably insert into realty and realtor. Okay. Sorry. I'll stop now.

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Dr. Dad

Thursday, 15th October 2009 at 11:23 pm
 

How about a certain past President's use of "new-cew-lar" rather than "nuclear." And my pet peeve (for you scientists out there): datum is the singular of data. Stop saying "This data shows…"
Love the list Mom. Liz has definitely got #11–kids should know how to tie knots.

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Wendy Replies:
October 16th, 2009 at 11:37 am

Dr. Dad – everyone in Texas pronounces it that way. I should say – everyone I know who speaks with a Texan twang pronounces it that way. I've heard it pronounced "new-cew-lar" by a host on CNN. Most Texans didn't hear the difference until Bush got ridiculed for it & they got all self-conscious.

I'll take a slightly dumb president any day over one that believes he is superior to everyone else – although I don't believe for one minute Bush was dumb. If you make the mistake of confusing twang with lack of intelligence – you'll find yourself living in a country where the Patriot Act happens. Bush & Obama are two sides of one coin. Bush sneaked things in because people were busy making fun of his pronunciations and not listening to what he actually said. Now we have Obama appearing to do the opposite – but he's really only furthering the loss of freedom Bush started. With Obama we're too busy being enthralled with his charisma and beautiful speaking skills to listen to what he actually says.

Both are equally dangerous.

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The Mayor

Saturday, 17th October 2009 at 4:54 am
 

Adding to the list: doing laundry, cleaning, how to graciously accept when things don't go your way, getting up to an alarm clock without hitting snooze.

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Stephanie B

Sunday, 18th October 2009 at 10:06 pm
 

I read this the other day and listed out some additions, but my comment was too long and disapppeared again without warning and I was sick so I'm not doing it again.

I agree in principle.

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