Workin' on the Railroad

No, I haven't been. Just figured I'd title it something cute. Or at least, as cute as my sleepy brain could come up with at 6 in the morning.

I'm not a morning person. Never have been, never will be, never will profess to be. It just doesn't make too much sense for me to get up out of the comfort and security of my warm queen-sized bed while being wrapped with blankets to face a world that isn't even yet illuminated by sunlight. If the sun's too lazy to show its head at 6 in the morning which, for more than half of the year is seriously the case, than I should be allowed to keep my eyes shut for the same amount of time. Tis only fair and righteous for us little people, and not at all a form of selfish justification that I can use to make sleeping a legitimate way to spend away an entire morning.

Of course, this entire post isn't so much to lament at me waking up in the morning as a form of procrastination so I can avoid going to work.

Work is, actually, interesting. I work in a high school doing rather petty things like 'helping students' and 'running errands,' but my particular assignment has given me the chance to see the world in a way that I wasn't afforded to when I was younger. Yes, I went to high school, but the high school I went to was radically different compared to the high school I'm working in and as opposed to being grouped with a bunch of similar Asian overachievers (though I was never one of them), I find myself teaching those who are less fortunate in both resource and in motivation. Things that I would have jumped at to learn and even things that I just learned to learn them seem to hold no grip on these youngsters; calculus? Nah. Science? Forget it. English? Eww, I hate Shakespeare (I did too). Kids in these schools seem to make it a priority to do as little work as possible in order to achieve a passing grade. I can certainly unerstand this from an 'efficiency' (har har) short term point of view as I do it too (more often than otherwise with disastrous effects), but my bottom minimum is closer to a B/B+ than C-.

Perhaps it's the rough schedule that discourages these kids from learning things that are fascinating; in fact, this brings up an interesting point. As youngsters, we learn that science, math, and 'rthmetic are mystical things that are taught through magical school buses and crazy science teachers like Bill Nye and Beakman; we learn that geography is important if you're a dastardly thief wanting to make the world her oyster (and never getting caught!), and we learn that if you really want to learn how the world works, your mum and dad will give you a lollipop to suck on as you walk through halls filled with the bones of dead animals with esoteric names like Stegosaurus and Pervatosaurus leerai. Then you enter school and realize that learning doesn't compose of such magical things, but of textbooks and quizzes and teachers so angry at you for doing poorly that it's best to just not care. Whatever bit of magic you found inside that special subject is lost; now, it's just an old lady with a ruler berating you because you had to slog through mountains and mountains of work that you don't seem to find relevant.

Truthfully, I understad this viewpoint all to well and it really doesn't get better in college, lest you can stomach the doctrine of it all without puking over your shoes. Maybe if learning and education was more fun and awesome, more of us would be into doing so than there are now. A critical look at education not simply as it being a requirement in the world (that honestly goes without saying these days) but as a way to enrich a person's life; a positive 'I'd love to learn' vs a negative 'I have to learn,' is perhaps needed. Conclusion?

We clearly need more psych majors in education.

Or perhaps these kids just need more sleep, like me.

Today looks to be brighter, but I'm at home in the dark. Hence, I am lazy.

Cheers.