I hated chemistry in school, because it was teaching us irrelevant shit like the electron structure of atoms. But when I’m interested in something, I’ll look it up, and may get lost in a Wikipedia wormhole for hours about the most random topics. (some recent ones were: image file formats, the history of feminism, Serengeti National Park)
Imho the difference all lies in when knowledge is shoved down our throats vs exploring it out of curiosity.
I hated chemistry in school, because it was teaching us irrelevant shit like the electron structure of atoms.
It’s only unimportant because you don’t care. Reading random facts on Wikipedia isn’t learning, it’s just reading. You can read the Wikipedia page on juggling, (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juggling) but I wouldn’t expect you to understand (much less, perform) a 3 ball cascade, reverse cascade and waterfall after just reading the page. Those are very basic juggling patterns and fundamentals to more advanced patterns, such as juggler’s tennis, mills mess, boston mess etc… and that’s the difference between learning, and reading.
Not ripping on going on a Wikipedia dive here, it’s one of my favorite things to do, but recognize that it’s not the same as learning
It’s funny how as adults we become interested in elements of stuff we were taught and found boring before. But I’m not sure how you’d teach science without “shoving it down people’s throats” because most teenagers simply don’t give a shit about any of it, so pretty much anything you teach will be shoving it down someone’s throat. The better solution would be explaining why electron structure is important foundational stuff. About 98% of the time, in HS, they didn’t explain why we needed to know it, how it would be contextualized in later life - it was simply “learn this so you can pass next week’s test.” And for me, knowing why is crucial to me caring enough to learn.
I used to think like this until I found out you can explain a lot of chemical interactions by just knowing how the electron structure of atoms lead to those reactions. Helpful when you try to wonder if anything could be toxic.
I hated chemistry in school, because it was teaching us irrelevant shit like the electron structure of atoms. But when I’m interested in something, I’ll look it up, and may get lost in a Wikipedia wormhole for hours about the most random topics. (some recent ones were: image file formats, the history of feminism, Serengeti National Park)
Imho the difference all lies in when knowledge is shoved down our throats vs exploring it out of curiosity.
It’s only unimportant because you don’t care. Reading random facts on Wikipedia isn’t learning, it’s just reading. You can read the Wikipedia page on juggling, (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juggling) but I wouldn’t expect you to understand (much less, perform) a 3 ball cascade, reverse cascade and waterfall after just reading the page. Those are very basic juggling patterns and fundamentals to more advanced patterns, such as juggler’s tennis, mills mess, boston mess etc… and that’s the difference between learning, and reading.
Not ripping on going on a Wikipedia dive here, it’s one of my favorite things to do, but recognize that it’s not the same as learning
It’s funny how as adults we become interested in elements of stuff we were taught and found boring before. But I’m not sure how you’d teach science without “shoving it down people’s throats” because most teenagers simply don’t give a shit about any of it, so pretty much anything you teach will be shoving it down someone’s throat. The better solution would be explaining why electron structure is important foundational stuff. About 98% of the time, in HS, they didn’t explain why we needed to know it, how it would be contextualized in later life - it was simply “learn this so you can pass next week’s test.” And for me, knowing why is crucial to me caring enough to learn.
I used to think like this until I found out you can explain a lot of chemical interactions by just knowing how the electron structure of atoms lead to those reactions. Helpful when you try to wonder if anything could be toxic.