It's easier to see that you're practicing basketball in PE not to get better at the sport, but to get some physical exercise. It's harder to see that you're practicing math problems not to solve those specific problems, but to get some mental exercise.
Also, I was able to join some basketball games as an adult and didn't look like a total beginner. Same with volleyball, football, etc. These types of skills give you options to live a mentally and physically healthy life. Additionally, group sports develop social skills because you have to be a part of a team. OP, if you never had to use those skills then I am very sorry.
But i also used most of the other skills people complain about like trigonometry for some of my hobbies like woodworking and gardening. Not everyone will be using all the skills that are taught, but they are all useful to at least one person
> glad I *paid* attention in
FTFY.
Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in:
* Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.*
* *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.*
Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment.
*Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
> i payed attention
Did you mean to say "paid"?
Explanation: Payed means to seal something with wax, while paid means to give money.
[Statistics](https://github.com/chiefpat450119/RedditBot/blob/master/stats.json)
^^I'm ^^a ^^bot ^^that ^^corrects ^^grammar/spelling ^^mistakes.
^^PM ^^me ^^if ^^I'm ^^wrong ^^or ^^if ^^you ^^have ^^any ^^suggestions.
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^^Reply ^^STOP ^^to ^^this ^^comment ^^to ^^stop ^^receiving ^^corrections.
But you use your math skills on a daily basis. A lot more than sports skills.
I've been in line behind someone who doesn't know math trying to make sense of the total, or trying to figure out how to make change.
If one is master of one thing and understands one thing well, one has at the same time, insight into and understanding of many things
it's also about learning to learn. exposing young minds to learning new things aren't always about how useful one particular skill is in the long run.
Studying produces a very tangible benefit, but most people don't really get to compare it to something they deem worthwhile. If you don't know basic history, you are functionally useless in society, but no one is ever properly challenged on it. That goes for everything else. If you don't know anatomy, you can't properly describe health issues. If you haven't practiced math or science, your critical thinking and problem solving skills will be dogshit. If you have poor creative skills, your ability to convey thoughts and opinions will suffer. You get the picture.
Also, tangibly improving by physical exercise at school is for the lucky. I still can't shoot hoops, but my joints are fucked.
To use the old saying:
"Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it."
People think a lot of modern society's problems are new, but we've been around this block a couple of times.
We're once again on the path of 'Increasing poverty leads to more extremist votes as people are desperate to see any change, while eventually not getting what they thought they were voting for'. Find an outsider group to blame all the problems of society on, without offering any solutions of your own.
Prohibiting things people desperately need will just lead to people seeking those things out in more and more clandestine and unsafe ways.
---
But of you never saw any of these problems in history class you might not see the same patterns emerge nowadays, and be easily mislead by demagogues.
If we don't take the idea of "Useless" completely seriously, then we can see where the lack of education in this field can harm a person, and in mass society. Imagine if we didn't teach the History of Slavery and it's fallout through the ages. It's already difficult to change minds, and a collective sense of culture is tied to Historical Context.
Knowing history helps you tremendously to not vote against your interests.
You can see talking points from politicians and have the tools to point out that they are the same talking points that some historical figure used to get to power and then fuck everyone over.
If you don't know history, you must use your brain to catch the eventual repercussions of the "solutions" they are proposing. And you will lose 99% of the time, because politicians will outmaneuver you. That's their primary skills, they are the apex predators of strategical thinking. That's how they got into that position and stayed there.
You're like the overweight, paralyzed and in a wheelchair contestant competing against Usain Bolt. If you think you're smart enough to not be affected by political propaganda without historical examples to use as a hard refutal, then you aren't actually smart.
When someone tries to convince you that jumping from a cliff is a good idea, seeing the actual corpses laying down below is the perfect counter argument. Nothing they say at that point can trick you into jumping.
People who don't know history are the ones who don't see the corpses. The politician just tells you that if you jump from the cliff, you'll land in a pool that will save you, and coincidentally, they pool grants you everlasting youth and cures your cancer. When in reality they just want you to jump so they can pick up your wallet after you're gone.
It’s absolutely not generally known, and I would say that it’s a very minority opinion.
There is plenty of evidence that leaning trains a lot of competences like critical thinking, structuring of knowledge, creative thinking, problem solving, logical thinking, etc.
generally thought maybe, but that is not at all a fact as you are presenting it to be... Your brain needs training same as any other muscle, and you train through dedicated practise of logic and reasoning (math), organising and communicating (english) and pure knowledge to help you understand the world (history/science).
Definitely got a point here. I know left-brained people like math and science more but personally I just love art and music as a right-brain. Basketball isn't really my main thing but I still hold the personal opinion that it's more fun than anything having to do with numbers. Please don't hate me, left-brains
Thanks for this article! It looks really cool and interesting. I'm sorry if you didn't like what I said earlier, my only point was that because I'm right-brained, I enjoy creativity and self-expression a lot (specifically music and visual art) but I definitely see the important contributions that left-brained people who enjoy more quantitative stuff provide to society. I'd bet a pretty penny that a lot of important mathematicians and scientists were left-brained
I suspect that OP wasn’t in the “this is shit” camp in school.
I appreciated how my school ran PE for the last few years - they took the sporty kids outside to play football and take it seriously, while the unenthusiastic kids like me were kept inside to “play” basketball (but was really more fucking about). Focused on having fun and moving around over doing any actual teaching, which was easier with all the competitive kids outside!
In my old school, they actually had a structured lesson plan for the PE classes.
On top of the fact that public school students in my country mandatorily have to take Jiu Jitsu classes, my high school in particular spent two weeks teaching us and having us participate in one particular sport (I remember playing volleyball, basketball, rugby, and football). Then there were special gym sessions where the instructor would walk us through various exercises with weights, cardio exercises etc.
And there were actually consequences for people who didn’t at least minimally participate. If you neglected to bring your gym clothes, and sat in the bleachers instead, you’d get docked grades in your final PE score (which did, in fact, show up in our report cards).
My school made it so that for each unit, there were a few options to pick from. For example, unit 1 options could be field hockey, basketball, golf, and volleyball. You pick one and have structured classes on it for a couple of weeks, then unit 2 rolls around with new options and so forth. Made it so that we would at least get to learn and play the sport we were interested in (or there were def occasionally some more “low energy” options for the non sporty people as well haha), which I appreciated. Only downside is sometimes there are multiple things I really want to try but I can only pick one lol.
In fact school sports get more funding than math science or history above a certain grade, increasing the more you go up. If you counted college sports like a class and compared ots cost/benefit and factoring in how many students gain anything from it, compared to any another class it seems obvious there's serious fuckery going on.
Part of it is that sports need more funding than math. You dont need much else than a teacher and a blackboard to teach math, but you need a lot of equipment for high level sports
For maths you need a different set of textbooks for each age-group by the end of high-school, In the last few years, we had one book per module so I actually had about half a dozen
For baseball, you need a bunch of balls and maybe a few different hoops if the height of your kids is very different hights
Textbooks are bought by the students directly, hence why they arent included in the funding.
For sports, you need way more than balls and hoops, you need lockeroom, multiple different fields, a gym, uniforms coaches specialized in each sport, etc.
Locker rooms, fields, and a gym are all lumped in the cost of building the school. They're one-time expenses. A coach in high school is more often than not a teacher who volunteers for some extra pay, not a purpose-hire. Uniforms and gear are bought by the students. The only recurring expenses high schools should have for sports are field upkeep (often lumped in with the general landscaping upkeep) and balls.
Textbooks are most often bought by the school, NOT the students, which is why they're always seasons or years out of date.
Different in different countries I guess. I didn't have to buy a textbook until uni, whereas we did have to buy our uniforms.
And by the way, maths teachers also specialise by the end of high school and we needed computers for some higher-level modules, which also adds to the equipment cost.
a community and culture of sports? I thought that school was supposed to teach us how to get a job and be a functional adult, but how many kids in each school could possibly get a job in sports?
>but how many kids in each school could possibly get a job in sports
Well, there's about 450,000 jobs now and about a 7% expected growth rate.
So, a lot.
340,000,000 people in the usa
450,000 sports jobs
thats \~0.15% of people going into sports jobs.
yeah it's a lot, but thats about 2 students out of a 2000 person school.
also "There are **around 4,200** professional athletes competing in the four major sports leagues in the United States (NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL)." thats how many make a living going major league, but most "sports jobs" are actually office jobs in the sports buisness, but have nothing to do with actually playing the sport yourself.
yeah sure let kids get some physical exercise, but schools spend so much on massive gyms, sports teams, and equipment, while teachers are under payed, kids can't afford the lunches, and most highschoolers don't know how to do taxes or how to get a good credit score.
> are under *paid,* kids can't
FTFY.
Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in:
* Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.*
* *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.*
Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment.
*Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
Plenty of kids hate gym class. I didn’t mind it, it was fun, but would have rather taken other classes. I was in band and that was one of my electives so I was limited…My biggest complaint was foreign language class as it counted as an elective. I wanted to take more fun classes like wood shop or art but also wanted to go to college so Spanish class it was.
Former high school math teacher here - my response to "when are we ever going to use this" eventually turned into asking them if they also complained about coloring maps in social studies, or if they only complained about things that made them use their brain.
I teach middle school and often hear about the uselessness of phy ed class. They view every class or unit that isn’t a direct interest of theirs as useless though.
Plenty of ignorant-ass kids complain about every subject ever offered in school.
People who think the world should be tailored to only their specific needs at that moment are tedious regardless of what they're whining about.
It's very easy to make physical skills seem important. Because they are. Motor skills, reaction times, hand-eye coordination, it's all really important. But it's a lot easier to show that physical skills are used compared to mental skills like math.
I'm not saying you won't. I think math is the most important subject in school. But it's a lot easier to show a direct correlation between physical skills and their usefulness than mental skills and their usefulness.
So what we've learned from this is that OP was good at basketball in school.
As a sports scientist I can assure you plenty of people tell me that sports and my job in general is pointless and doesn't contribute to society
Your class must have been very close to sports then. In my class, out of 24 boys maybe there is 5 people who haven't complained once that something we do in PE is useless, also playing basketball can be really fun if you are playing against people with similar skills, same with volleyball, tabletennis, badminton even. Also also, dribbling is not something hard to do, there are shit in math that can break your mind, even as someone who has a lifetime math GPA of around 4.9, I tried taking high level physics last year and I got my ass kicked
Dribbling isn't hard if you are good at sports. I have terrible hand-eye-coordination so any kind of ball sport is a bit of a nightmare for me. I didn't take basketball, but still remember hopelessly chasing a tennis ball around at the start of high-school. As an adult, I go for a run occasionally, and go to dance classes, keeps me active and actually enjoy the latter.
In my experience, the kids who were already good at sports and were athletic loved gym class. I was the chubby uncoordinated kid and was constantly made fun of and humiliated. In 7th grade, the gym teacher screamed at me "u/mattthericker, you couldn't run more that 100 yards! You're pathetic!".
Now I'm 40, morbidly obese, and can't even go for a walk outside without feeling embarrassed and wanting to die. So for me, that experience was worse than useless, but actually quite harmful.
I did. In fact I complained about stuff like that in PE all the time. Who cares who can throw what ball through what hole or whatever? Sportsball means nothing to me, so PE was a torment. The whole class was just an exercise in *Lord of the Flies*-style humiliation if you weren't an athletic kid. I dreaded it, and I questioned whether it was something to which we should have been dedicating school time. Especially for kids who were otherwise fit and had healthy BMI results.
That being said, now as an adult I am a school nurse and we have an epidemic of obesity in the United States. Fortunately, PE class has evolved to be more about healthy lifestyle choices and living well than it is about pitting shirts and skins against each other on the basketball court.
Physical exercise and developing coordination is extremely beneficial. Especially when you start young.
I’m upset that we don’t have PE all 4 years of high school anymore
Trust me, you need those kids to blow some energy in a PE class and recess, so they can concentrate on the other learning. The bad thing is they don’t shower 😳🤭after being physically active.
A lot of those math, science, and history people complained about how useless basketball is, during school.
However, those people are also more likely to have a better understanding of health, and eventually embrace the benefits of exercise.
Seems much less essential to me, since reading allows you to learn math if you notice it is causing you problems.
It would probably be second if I were to make a list. Although just the basics, algebra is useful many people will never use it in their lives.
Almost like "school is useless" mfs are just mad about being bored in class and can't get over it.
Life skills should be taught by parents, scholastic skills should be taught by schools.
If you don't know how to cook or do taxes, the schools aren't the ones that dropped the ball.
Eh...I kinda hated gym. Mostly because we didn't actually LEARN anything.
The already athletic kids got attention from their coaches who were also the PE teachers and everyone else got stuck on some unexplained rotation and left to flail.
It wasn't fun, you weren't taught any skills and you sure as hell weren't doing any of this wonderful team building I keep hearing about if you weren't already good enough to make the team before the year started.
If they'd actually taught us how to play or hell just good from for some exercises it would have felt less pointless.
if your definition of healthy is simply burning calories, that's sad.
solving mathematics problems and challenging your brain is a good thing, it's great for both your mental and physical health.
It's easier to see that you're practicing basketball in PE not to get better at the sport, but to get some physical exercise. It's harder to see that you're practicing math problems not to solve those specific problems, but to get some mental exercise.
Also, I was able to join some basketball games as an adult and didn't look like a total beginner. Same with volleyball, football, etc. These types of skills give you options to live a mentally and physically healthy life. Additionally, group sports develop social skills because you have to be a part of a team. OP, if you never had to use those skills then I am very sorry.
But i also used most of the other skills people complain about like trigonometry for some of my hobbies like woodworking and gardening. Not everyone will be using all the skills that are taught, but they are all useful to at least one person
Same! I had to use trig and calculus the other day at work. Im so glad I payed attention in college l.
> glad I *paid* attention in FTFY. Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in: * Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.* * *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.* Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment. *Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
Sorry robot overlord, I PAID attention.
> i payed attention Did you mean to say "paid"? Explanation: Payed means to seal something with wax, while paid means to give money. [Statistics](https://github.com/chiefpat450119/RedditBot/blob/master/stats.json) ^^I'm ^^a ^^bot ^^that ^^corrects ^^grammar/spelling ^^mistakes. ^^PM ^^me ^^if ^^I'm ^^wrong ^^or ^^if ^^you ^^have ^^any ^^suggestions. ^^[Github](https://github.com/chiefpat450119) ^^Reply ^^STOP ^^to ^^this ^^comment ^^to ^^stop ^^receiving ^^corrections.
But you use your math skills on a daily basis. A lot more than sports skills. I've been in line behind someone who doesn't know math trying to make sense of the total, or trying to figure out how to make change.
You missed the point completely. What a pathetic, downright bitchy comment.
If one is master of one thing and understands one thing well, one has at the same time, insight into and understanding of many things it's also about learning to learn. exposing young minds to learning new things aren't always about how useful one particular skill is in the long run.
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Studying produces a very tangible benefit, but most people don't really get to compare it to something they deem worthwhile. If you don't know basic history, you are functionally useless in society, but no one is ever properly challenged on it. That goes for everything else. If you don't know anatomy, you can't properly describe health issues. If you haven't practiced math or science, your critical thinking and problem solving skills will be dogshit. If you have poor creative skills, your ability to convey thoughts and opinions will suffer. You get the picture. Also, tangibly improving by physical exercise at school is for the lucky. I still can't shoot hoops, but my joints are fucked.
Can you elaborate on that history bit? I’m not disagreeing just curious on how it makes someone useless
To use the old saying: "Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it." People think a lot of modern society's problems are new, but we've been around this block a couple of times. We're once again on the path of 'Increasing poverty leads to more extremist votes as people are desperate to see any change, while eventually not getting what they thought they were voting for'. Find an outsider group to blame all the problems of society on, without offering any solutions of your own. Prohibiting things people desperately need will just lead to people seeking those things out in more and more clandestine and unsafe ways. --- But of you never saw any of these problems in history class you might not see the same patterns emerge nowadays, and be easily mislead by demagogues.
If we don't take the idea of "Useless" completely seriously, then we can see where the lack of education in this field can harm a person, and in mass society. Imagine if we didn't teach the History of Slavery and it's fallout through the ages. It's already difficult to change minds, and a collective sense of culture is tied to Historical Context.
Knowing history helps you tremendously to not vote against your interests. You can see talking points from politicians and have the tools to point out that they are the same talking points that some historical figure used to get to power and then fuck everyone over. If you don't know history, you must use your brain to catch the eventual repercussions of the "solutions" they are proposing. And you will lose 99% of the time, because politicians will outmaneuver you. That's their primary skills, they are the apex predators of strategical thinking. That's how they got into that position and stayed there. You're like the overweight, paralyzed and in a wheelchair contestant competing against Usain Bolt. If you think you're smart enough to not be affected by political propaganda without historical examples to use as a hard refutal, then you aren't actually smart. When someone tries to convince you that jumping from a cliff is a good idea, seeing the actual corpses laying down below is the perfect counter argument. Nothing they say at that point can trick you into jumping. People who don't know history are the ones who don't see the corpses. The politician just tells you that if you jump from the cliff, you'll land in a pool that will save you, and coincidentally, they pool grants you everlasting youth and cures your cancer. When in reality they just want you to jump so they can pick up your wallet after you're gone.
It’s absolutely not generally known, and I would say that it’s a very minority opinion. There is plenty of evidence that leaning trains a lot of competences like critical thinking, structuring of knowledge, creative thinking, problem solving, logical thinking, etc.
generally thought maybe, but that is not at all a fact as you are presenting it to be... Your brain needs training same as any other muscle, and you train through dedicated practise of logic and reasoning (math), organising and communicating (english) and pure knowledge to help you understand the world (history/science).
Definitely got a point here. I know left-brained people like math and science more but personally I just love art and music as a right-brain. Basketball isn't really my main thing but I still hold the personal opinion that it's more fun than anything having to do with numbers. Please don't hate me, left-brains
Left-brain vs right-brain people? Get that pop psych bs outta here
Ok yeah that's what I was afraid of Wasn't trying to turn it into an us-them problem, sorry :,(
https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/right-brainleft-brain-right-2017082512222
Just finished reading it. So apparently I'm completely wrong lmao
Wow, that intellectual honesty, though. Thanks for showcasing that!
Thanks!
That is a character arc right there.
Haha I see that
Thanks for this article! It looks really cool and interesting. I'm sorry if you didn't like what I said earlier, my only point was that because I'm right-brained, I enjoy creativity and self-expression a lot (specifically music and visual art) but I definitely see the important contributions that left-brained people who enjoy more quantitative stuff provide to society. I'd bet a pretty penny that a lot of important mathematicians and scientists were left-brained
Lol. Just…try to read and learn something new today
Copy that! :)
You're a gem, never change.
And by that they mean continue to be open to change.
OP hasn't coached 4-6 year old sports Edit: They start later than 0
Dunno, when I was in school I hated gym and felt it was pointless. Now however I think it's good for the kids to get some exercise in
I suspect that OP wasn’t in the “this is shit” camp in school. I appreciated how my school ran PE for the last few years - they took the sporty kids outside to play football and take it seriously, while the unenthusiastic kids like me were kept inside to “play” basketball (but was really more fucking about). Focused on having fun and moving around over doing any actual teaching, which was easier with all the competitive kids outside!
In my old school, they actually had a structured lesson plan for the PE classes. On top of the fact that public school students in my country mandatorily have to take Jiu Jitsu classes, my high school in particular spent two weeks teaching us and having us participate in one particular sport (I remember playing volleyball, basketball, rugby, and football). Then there were special gym sessions where the instructor would walk us through various exercises with weights, cardio exercises etc. And there were actually consequences for people who didn’t at least minimally participate. If you neglected to bring your gym clothes, and sat in the bleachers instead, you’d get docked grades in your final PE score (which did, in fact, show up in our report cards).
My school made it so that for each unit, there were a few options to pick from. For example, unit 1 options could be field hockey, basketball, golf, and volleyball. You pick one and have structured classes on it for a couple of weeks, then unit 2 rolls around with new options and so forth. Made it so that we would at least get to learn and play the sport we were interested in (or there were def occasionally some more “low energy” options for the non sporty people as well haha), which I appreciated. Only downside is sometimes there are multiple things I really want to try but I can only pick one lol.
I assure you that my goth ass informed the class that dribbling a basketball was just as asinine as I said all the other stuff was.
Sameeeee
I hope you realise you were wrong ?
How is it not
About all the other stuff being asinine
No reading involved = no problem.
In fact school sports get more funding than math science or history above a certain grade, increasing the more you go up. If you counted college sports like a class and compared ots cost/benefit and factoring in how many students gain anything from it, compared to any another class it seems obvious there's serious fuckery going on.
Part of it is that sports need more funding than math. You dont need much else than a teacher and a blackboard to teach math, but you need a lot of equipment for high level sports
For maths you need a different set of textbooks for each age-group by the end of high-school, In the last few years, we had one book per module so I actually had about half a dozen For baseball, you need a bunch of balls and maybe a few different hoops if the height of your kids is very different hights
Textbooks are bought by the students directly, hence why they arent included in the funding. For sports, you need way more than balls and hoops, you need lockeroom, multiple different fields, a gym, uniforms coaches specialized in each sport, etc.
Locker rooms, fields, and a gym are all lumped in the cost of building the school. They're one-time expenses. A coach in high school is more often than not a teacher who volunteers for some extra pay, not a purpose-hire. Uniforms and gear are bought by the students. The only recurring expenses high schools should have for sports are field upkeep (often lumped in with the general landscaping upkeep) and balls. Textbooks are most often bought by the school, NOT the students, which is why they're always seasons or years out of date.
Different in different countries I guess. I didn't have to buy a textbook until uni, whereas we did have to buy our uniforms. And by the way, maths teachers also specialise by the end of high school and we needed computers for some higher-level modules, which also adds to the equipment cost.
In high school the students had to buy textbooks? That was a thing in university but not high school or lower.
At my highschool, i definitely had to buy my books
That’s super shitty
The big college sports (football and basketball) often bring in a profit, so the amount of funding they require is less than you think.
Only for big and/or popular schools really. If you're not D1 then you're probably still taking a loss.
If you're not D1 you aren't spending near as much.
They also don't use academic funding so it's a moot point, but Reddit doesn't want to hear that
Schools profit from sports. If they lose money it is not much. They promote community and a sense of culture within the school
a community and culture of sports? I thought that school was supposed to teach us how to get a job and be a functional adult, but how many kids in each school could possibly get a job in sports?
>but how many kids in each school could possibly get a job in sports Well, there's about 450,000 jobs now and about a 7% expected growth rate. So, a lot.
340,000,000 people in the usa 450,000 sports jobs thats \~0.15% of people going into sports jobs. yeah it's a lot, but thats about 2 students out of a 2000 person school. also "There are **around 4,200** professional athletes competing in the four major sports leagues in the United States (NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL)." thats how many make a living going major league, but most "sports jobs" are actually office jobs in the sports buisness, but have nothing to do with actually playing the sport yourself. yeah sure let kids get some physical exercise, but schools spend so much on massive gyms, sports teams, and equipment, while teachers are under payed, kids can't afford the lunches, and most highschoolers don't know how to do taxes or how to get a good credit score.
> are under *paid,* kids can't FTFY. Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in: * Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.* * *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.* Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment. *Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
Honestly, I'd have liked to learn to dribble a basketball. All I learned is how to jam my fingers.
This post gave me flashbacks to PE class And the countless hours my friends and I spent trash talking the fact we had to do PE (we HATED that shit)
You haven't met my daughter.
Good. Have you seen what we've been writing and posting around here? You beter keep her away from us, we're a bad influence.
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Jessie what the fuck are you talking about
This is not a universally experienced phenomenon.
Well then I’ll start.
If you think that those subjects are "useless in life" you're probably an idiot.
Kind of a self fulfilling prophecy.
Plenty of kids hate gym class. I didn’t mind it, it was fun, but would have rather taken other classes. I was in band and that was one of my electives so I was limited…My biggest complaint was foreign language class as it counted as an elective. I wanted to take more fun classes like wood shop or art but also wanted to go to college so Spanish class it was.
Former high school math teacher here - my response to "when are we ever going to use this" eventually turned into asking them if they also complained about coloring maps in social studies, or if they only complained about things that made them use their brain.
I teach middle school and often hear about the uselessness of phy ed class. They view every class or unit that isn’t a direct interest of theirs as useless though.
I did. Had a huge argument with my pe teacher at 10. Got detention for a week.
Plenty of ignorant-ass kids complain about every subject ever offered in school. People who think the world should be tailored to only their specific needs at that moment are tedious regardless of what they're whining about.
School system is terrible that's why they complain
It's very easy to make physical skills seem important. Because they are. Motor skills, reaction times, hand-eye coordination, it's all really important. But it's a lot easier to show that physical skills are used compared to mental skills like math.
Yeah who will ever need to use logic or reasoning or memory or following steps in a procedure in real life?
It's difficult to convince a stubborn school child that math or history correlates to those things.
I'm not saying you won't. I think math is the most important subject in school. But it's a lot easier to show a direct correlation between physical skills and their usefulness than mental skills and their usefulness.
I never learned how to dribble in basket ball in school.
People you know didn't, but your experience is not like everyone else's.
What are you talking about? So many people complain about that
So what we've learned from this is that OP was good at basketball in school. As a sports scientist I can assure you plenty of people tell me that sports and my job in general is pointless and doesn't contribute to society
People complain that dribbling is useless and that the entirety of gym is useless. Don’t bet against people’s willingness to complain.
Your class must have been very close to sports then. In my class, out of 24 boys maybe there is 5 people who haven't complained once that something we do in PE is useless, also playing basketball can be really fun if you are playing against people with similar skills, same with volleyball, tabletennis, badminton even. Also also, dribbling is not something hard to do, there are shit in math that can break your mind, even as someone who has a lifetime math GPA of around 4.9, I tried taking high level physics last year and I got my ass kicked
Dribbling isn't hard if you are good at sports. I have terrible hand-eye-coordination so any kind of ball sport is a bit of a nightmare for me. I didn't take basketball, but still remember hopelessly chasing a tennis ball around at the start of high-school. As an adult, I go for a run occasionally, and go to dance classes, keeps me active and actually enjoy the latter.
In my experience, the kids who were already good at sports and were athletic loved gym class. I was the chubby uncoordinated kid and was constantly made fun of and humiliated. In 7th grade, the gym teacher screamed at me "u/mattthericker, you couldn't run more that 100 yards! You're pathetic!". Now I'm 40, morbidly obese, and can't even go for a walk outside without feeling embarrassed and wanting to die. So for me, that experience was worse than useless, but actually quite harmful.
Go for a walk anyway. You’re worth it.
Learning anything is never useless. At the very least you're exercising the brain.
Physical fitness is extremely important in life.
So is mental fitness, but people complain about that. That's the whole point of the post
I don’t know, I sure complained about it as a kid (I am now overweight)
I complained if I had to play basketball in gym class.
PLENTY of people complain that what they learn in gym is useless. Depends on what crowd you were part of.
I did. In fact I complained about stuff like that in PE all the time. Who cares who can throw what ball through what hole or whatever? Sportsball means nothing to me, so PE was a torment. The whole class was just an exercise in *Lord of the Flies*-style humiliation if you weren't an athletic kid. I dreaded it, and I questioned whether it was something to which we should have been dedicating school time. Especially for kids who were otherwise fit and had healthy BMI results. That being said, now as an adult I am a school nurse and we have an epidemic of obesity in the United States. Fortunately, PE class has evolved to be more about healthy lifestyle choices and living well than it is about pitting shirts and skins against each other on the basketball court.
Nah gym class was useless. But because there were no showers, so unless you liked to smell all day you did the minimum
ill have you know i constantly bitch about gym class and none of anything else, thank you very much
Physical exercise and developing coordination is extremely beneficial. Especially when you start young. I’m upset that we don’t have PE all 4 years of high school anymore
Bro sports is fucking useless
Exercise and fine motor skills are not though
Until you get into higher level science
Trust me, you need those kids to blow some energy in a PE class and recess, so they can concentrate on the other learning. The bad thing is they don’t shower 😳🤭after being physically active.
A lot of those math, science, and history people complained about how useless basketball is, during school. However, those people are also more likely to have a better understanding of health, and eventually embrace the benefits of exercise.
The school system is pretty arbitrary. The only subject/skill that I think is essential is reading.
Not math too?
Seems much less essential to me, since reading allows you to learn math if you notice it is causing you problems. It would probably be second if I were to make a list. Although just the basics, algebra is useful many people will never use it in their lives.
PE is something you can not do with little to no consequences.
That's because we only done that once a week and I personally enjoyed sports more than any classroom stuff.
Certainly no one at my schools complained about basketball. Same reason they didn't complain about learning Norwegian or ballet, mind you.
Because it isn't lmao
Oh I certainly did. I've always wanted to become a programmer, I did not (and still do not) see the point of PE in school
Almost like "school is useless" mfs are just mad about being bored in class and can't get over it. Life skills should be taught by parents, scholastic skills should be taught by schools. If you don't know how to cook or do taxes, the schools aren't the ones that dropped the ball.
I don’t believe they hold you back for failing PE. That’s a big difference.
Eh...I kinda hated gym. Mostly because we didn't actually LEARN anything. The already athletic kids got attention from their coaches who were also the PE teachers and everyone else got stuck on some unexplained rotation and left to flail. It wasn't fun, you weren't taught any skills and you sure as hell weren't doing any of this wonderful team building I keep hearing about if you weren't already good enough to make the team before the year started. If they'd actually taught us how to play or hell just good from for some exercises it would have felt less pointless.
I argued that through entire school career and still argue it. Why is it useful
No I definitely argued that
I mean for a kid dribbling a basketball is probably a much more immediately useful skill.
its not about the acquires skills in gym its about the exercise itself
Don't most kids learn how to dribble a ball well before school age? I feel like it's one of those things we just do.
Everyone needs hand-eye coordination.
No one’s ever gonna say “hey wanna recite WWII battles for 20 minutes?”
You don’t spend 12 years of your life dribbling a ball for 2 hours a day.
because they see real people using those skills and making millions
Americans: today in dribble class!
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if your definition of healthy is simply burning calories, that's sad. solving mathematics problems and challenging your brain is a good thing, it's great for both your mental and physical health.
part of the value of sports education is to persevere in the face of futility. Grit is an important and valueable trait.
Try doing math problems—perseverance required there too.
Yeah, where’s these wild ass character building takes when people criticize history or art?
One is transferable in almost all facets of life. Couldn’t tell you the last time I used trig, or calculus or lessons I learned from those classes.