Imperfect

choice over coercion

In guy montag killed my grandma, Dante says:

i read fahrenheit 451. for what? i saw a really attractive character based off of guy montag and my interest piqued. i'm in grade 8 and i think it's required reading in grade 9. i didn't really get it and had to look up a lot of things

though i think that's why i liked it so much, since i read it willingly instead of being forced to read it for school. if it was for school, i don't think i would have cared all that much about it. if we do read it in 9th, i'm gonna breeze through the lessons, guaranteed. (•؎ •)

What lessons can be learned from his concise story?

However, the most crucial point I see is how much more people may like what they read willingly. Insights from a good book that you chose yourself can be imprinted in your mind forever. Compare that to temporary affinities with material that is instead forced by school or other co-parenting institutions. Knowledge from such books can be offloaded once in-class questions, exams, and homework cease referencing them.

The above difference resonates throughout Langs' That one time when I accidentally learned a language. In short, they are slogging through Arabic and Persian, yet learned Catalan without planning to. They started watching Catalan podcasts and shows with easy and entertaining enough plots to follow along with. Those eventually slotted into their daily routine for multiple years. Most importantly, it felt neither like work to them, nor like the painful memorization which is rife within school systems. No matter the discipline or your level of fluency: may you find inevitable, if not frictionless, entry points.

Speaking of rote learning, Mason's homework touches upon that and more. Like my quote of his in revive adult friendships reads, meaningful learning in his own time derives from interest-based doing, not forced memorizing.

In What’s wrong with school?, Theodore points out that many hard-working professions allow ample leisure time for adults (once children) after work. This parallels how Mason describes himself having "a clear distinction between leisure time and school time." Why then must children (future adults) adopt an artificial construct of coerced homework? We can stop the vicious cycle of rugpulling and imparting false real-world expectations into our future generations.

In On school improvement, Theodore says:

Every time a student is graded with a failure mark in an exam it is proof that people cannot force people to learn.

Mason mirrors the above sentiment:

I cannot do the type of work school makes us do, outside of school. Rote learning only works for me on a schedule. And I cannot schedule my personal time.

Schools also force certain types of work within them too. How much do schools "entrust students with responsibility to decide what to learn, when, where, how" as Theodore says? Dante, Langs, and Mason all seize learning opportunities on their own accord to great effect, in and out of institutions. What could be the potential for children or students that you know to enter the same advantage state?

Meeting people (closer to) where their interests lie can make them that much more performant at and receptive to learning. Could such methods be worth focusing on and investing in compared to centrally planned, one-size-fits-all state indoctrination? Theodore warns about how damaging that behemoth is with his Letter from prison. It ends:

At 2pm the bell rings and the guard opens the gates. This is when we get to go home. Home is much better. Much more relaxed, but we still have to do work. It takes a few hours. After that, we are free. Or at least that's what they say.

How can one be free, if the only thing they can control in their life is a few hours per day? Even more, when they have no money to spend.

Slaves get limited free time per day. It is slaves that do not get paid for work. It is slaves that cannot quit.

Yet slaves are free to at least dream of freedom. They are free to think of it. Only a slave of mind is not. What could be worse than that?

It was the citizens of Oceania that had their thoughts controlled and it was with the same techniques: prescribed information to consume, defined language to talk, constant fear of punishment by the authority.

So, how could we ever expect even a remotely balanced person to come out of school?

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