reminds me one of xkcd comic: http://xkcd.com/610/
"That's Why You Don't Have Any Friends."
81–90 of 206 posts
Re: "That's Why You Don't Have Any Friends."
#82The author's observation about high school is exactly why my kids, by default, will be home schooled. If they decide they want to go to public or private school at some point, I'll let them. Unlike a lot of kids that end up getting bullied, they'll know that their attendance is completely optional. I'm not looking to shelter them from the real world, only the fake miniature society that exists at school.
On the home-schooling argument. I'm not saying you shouldn't home school your kids, but in my opinion avoiding bullies is not the best reason to do so. I can understand that people want to protect their kids, but I think it's much more effective to teach them to deal with it rather than just avoiding it.
I think it's incredibly short sighted to think that bullying just stops once school ends. People just learn to deal with it through years of practice. Learning to deal with crap like this is an incredibly valuable life skill and if you don't learn it at school you're going to have to learn it later in life. Sure, kids can be a lot more cruel than adults, but delaying the inevitable solves nothing.
I went to a state school in the north of England which could be described as 'rough' at best. Like many geeks I never really fitted in and was the subject of some fairly severe bullying at times. Like most people that were bullied (and anecdotal evidence would suggest that most people were bullied at one time or another) I got through it and never looked back. As soon as I gave up trying to fit in (and even started going out of my way not to fit in) people respected me a little more for it and life got easier.
Not that I want to tell people how they they should raise their kids here. I don't even have any kids of my own. But having been a child for a number of years I feel somewhat qualified to speak on the matter.
Re: "That's Why You Don't Have Any Friends."
#83Nice, that will help him alot. As somebody from Europe, we always see these typical American High Schools and think it can really be like this. Sure they overdo it in movies but I have read a fair amount of blogpost and reddit comments that discribe the same problem. There is grouping and groupe think too in Schools here but not in the same extrem way. It could be selection bios on my part but lets look at the diffre…
I was talking with my neighbor (a second grade teacher) about this over the weekend. I think there are two problems: first, everybody is lumped into the same groupings, so the "advanced" kids are bored and the "slower" kids are lost. That leads to conflict on its own, but then we make it worse by expecting everybody to go college track with one other option: drop out. For many kids, the college track education is wor…
I think the modle put forward by Khan Academy is promising. Keep people together but let them work there own pace and stop with grouping by age.
I don't think they have a well written document about all there concepts but you can pease it together with these videos. http://www.khanacademy.org/#talks-and-interviews
Im talking physical school not internet education.
Re: "That's Why You Don't Have Any Friends."
#84The author's observation about high school is exactly why my kids, by default, will be home schooled. If they decide they want to go to public or private school at some point, I'll let them. Unlike a lot of kids that end up getting bullied, they'll know that their attendance is completely optional. I'm not looking to shelter them from the real world, only the fake miniature society that exists at school.
It doesn't necessarily help. I speak from experience: I was homeschooled and it was terrible. I didn't learn the 101 little tricks to make interacting with frustrating people that little bit easier, I didn't learn to empathize with people less smart than me and I didn't develop the social intelligence that I believe is vital for long-term success. Any time I had to interact with anyone I felt terrible and awkward and…
> I was homeschooled and it was terrible. I didn't learn the 101 little tricks to make interacting with frustrating people that little bit easier, I didn't learn to empathize with people less smart than me and I didn't develop the social intelligence that I believe is vital for long-term success.
See, I went to a public school and didn't learn that stuff either. Bonus, I got beat up routinely until high school.
Re: "That's Why You Don't Have Any Friends."
#85I'm about as asocial and celebratory of diversity as they come, and I love this essay, especially the conversational style. But I'd be careful not to take this argument too far into sophistry. In school people clan and desperately look for some identity to copy. This leads to all the terrible social behavior you see in most secondary and high school in the U.S. Somebody calling you "weird" can really be a badge of ho…
Yes, except that teenagers don't know who they are yet. They have to experiment, trying out various identities and behaviors until they figure out what fits them and what doesn't. So defining themselves in terms of others, whether by similarity or by difference, is to some degree inevitable.
They do need to be encouraged to grow out of it, though, so your point is very valid.
Re: "That's Why You Don't Have Any Friends."
#86Wow, that was a little long-post, but I enjoyed it a lot.
It remembered my school days, I used to be interested in computers and physics and math.
Usually others seek me because they needed help on homework.
Yes you feel yourself a little weird, but then you grow up, and you realize that weird is also cool. If you enjoy being weird.
Let's be weird, if you want to.
Re: "That's Why You Don't Have Any Friends."
#87Nice, that will help him alot. As somebody from Europe, we always see these typical American High Schools and think it can really be like this. Sure they overdo it in movies but I have read a fair amount of blogpost and reddit comments that discribe the same problem. There is grouping and groupe think too in Schools here but not in the same extrem way. It could be selection bios on my part but lets look at the diffre…
Does this mean that if kid is underachieving in Elementary school he is screwed up for life? I've heard that similar system is in Germany. And at very early stage in someone life he could be relegated to be second-class citizen.
Re: "That's Why You Don't Have Any Friends."
#88reminds me of this:
http://www.viruscomix.com/page500.html
Re: "That's Why You Don't Have Any Friends."
#89Nice, that will help him alot. As somebody from Europe, we always see these typical American High Schools and think it can really be like this. Sure they overdo it in movies but I have read a fair amount of blogpost and reddit comments that discribe the same problem. There is grouping and groupe think too in Schools here but not in the same extrem way. It could be selection bios on my part but lets look at the diffre…
I'm from the UK and I have the same reaction to most of these stories. Can it really be that bad? Is the American school system so dramatically different?
I went to a high school which was not split by grade. I was called a "geek" or "boffin" (basically the regional equivalent of nerd) because I was often top of the class, or made fun of because I have mild scoliosis. I managed to keep a good group of friends though and I mostly just told the bullies to fuck themselves and got on with my life.
I think there were people who were unable to deal with bullying, and that mostly comes down to a lack of social skills, rather than any extra persecution that they suffered because of their intelligence or appearance.
I would guess it's selection bias.
Re: "That's Why You Don't Have Any Friends."
#90reminds me one of xkcd comic: http://xkcd.com/610/
Haha, xkcd FTW!