The Essential vs. the Non-Essential

Does an animal have a nose or a snout? Is it really so essential and important to insist on the exact word when it comes to school-aged children? The child correctly identified the part of the animal’s face, but didn’t give the “right” term.  Instead of snout, they wrote nose... points deducted... disappointment... a bad grade... and to top it off, other kids laughed at them…

I'm still thinking about whether our school system really provides what helps our children grow, what they need for their lives. I feel like nothing has changed since the times when I was sitting beside those desks. A bunch of information I no longer remember, so many hours wasted with my nose in books just to prove to someone that I can memorise meaningless theory and get a university diploma. I remember how our marketing professor at university kick us out of the exam just because we forgot to list 2 bullet points out of 20… and we were already out the door… new date… I don’t understand, what was the point of that? What was that supposed to teach me about marketing in real life? If I don’t know something, I’ll look it up. What skill or knowledge did that give me? That I can cram some textbook into my head? Or was it just about the importance of the professor, who was boosting his own ego and showing his power this way? I don’t know…

More and more, I find myself thinking that schools where our children spend so much time should be places for creativity and personal growth. They should give children the space to express their thoughts and, at the same time, help them understand the basic values of life, values that should, of course, be supported by the family. Where in schools are children actually taught how important human values are? Where is it ever said what kind of generation we want our children to grow into? What human values does a Slovak person actually have? Every nationality has its specifics. What values do we, Slovaks, have? Maybe that would be an interesting discovery. Honesty, justice, morality, family, kindness… :) ?

Where do kids have a subject called preparation for family life? What does marriage actually involve? How important is the development of their own personality, and how to search for and find their place in this world? How to choose a profession and how important it is for their own life?

Nowhere… this information floats somewhere in space-time, and we leave it up to the parents, some of whom deal with it, others don’t, because they don’t find it important…

And then we have a generation of confused people, who often don’t know what to do with themselves, and the number of psychological clinics keeps growing regularly… but hey, what is important is that the child can rattle off theory, get good grades for memorised knowledge and correct terminology. But whether the child retains that knowledge and whether they use it in practice, only time will tell…

And yet it would be enough to separate the essential from the non-essential…

Speaking for myself, out of those 20 marketing bullet points, I didn’t use a single one. So I believe that the difference between a nose and a snout won’t be all that important for life either…

Have a beautiful day full of meaningful experiences… :)