Me Talk Pretty One Day

In America, a child normally goes through at least twelve years of public school to be prepared and knowledgeable for college and the real world. However, a question about the schools is being raised –– are students truly learning in the education system? The system seems to be straying from its purpose. Nowadays, students aren’t enjoying the journey to learn and only goes through the motions of being a student. This takes away from them by not having in-depth learning, making them not as prepared and not as ready to master new challenges as they should be. To allow students to have true, deep learning, schools should grant students time to explore passions, lessen competition between peers, and give opportunities to experiment to find best
methods for them. By giving students time to discover their passions, they are able to find what they love to do and what they want to spend their time doing. In the documentary “Losing Ourselves” by Rachel B. Wolfe, it juxtaposed high school students and elementary school students. They were all asked the same question, “What are you passionate about?” The teenagers all hesitated and couldn’t come up with an answer, unlike the younger children who answered very quickly. As a child’s education journey progresses, he is given less time to try to learn what he loves to do. Instead, Deresiewicz describes in Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and The Way to a Meaningful Life, he is taught only how to be a good student because he isn’t actually interested in what he is learning. When Wolfe asked the students in her documentary questions about what they’ve learned in the past, the students didn’t remember what they were taught because they weren’t curious about that subject. Even though they did well in the class, the students only learned enough to pass the class but didn’t learn anything that was impactful to them. This is because the students are in a “system of elite education” (Deresiewicz). The teenagers are conditioned to go to schools with a good standing and spend their free time studying or going to programs to increase their knowledge. They aren’t given time to discover what they love to do because they’re too busy trying to do well in school. Since the high schoolers don’t know what they’re passionate about, they don’t care about what they learn in school and only care about being an outstanding student. Schools should also lessen the competition among peers to enable the students to enjoy learning, rather than being afraid of failing.
Deresiewicz references Harry R. Lewis, a former Harvard dean, who wrote how all the college students refuse to take a chance on a new class that they might not do well in because they are afraid of failure. They are unable to venture into the unknown because if they fail, other students will judge them and deem them as inferior because of the competition in the environment. In David Sedaris’ Me Talk Pretty One Day, the narrator recounts his experience at a language school in France. He had a harsh teacher, who would shame and insult her students as they tried to speak and understand French. This lead to feelings of confidence and fear in the students because they constantly felt like they were failing. However, at the end of the passage, the narrator realises that through all the failures in class, he is finally able to understand everything the teacher said and became hungry for more knowledge about the French language. Sedaris’ story demonstrates the benefits of failing because if there is failure, there is effort to improve, to explore uncharted territory, and to discover more knowledge
willingly. Finally, schools should give students the opportunities to discover the most suitable method for them. For example, Malcolm X depicts the journey he went through before he discovered his love for reading. He dropped out of school after eighth grade, but still couldn’t read or write most words he saw. One day he got a dictionary and to study, he would copy each page of words. Through his “homemade education” that he discovered during his time in prison, Malcolm X discovered a love for reading and was able to have a new world open up to him. Despite being in prison, he states he has never “been so truly free in [his] life.” Since he was able to have time and uncover the best approach for him to learn, he is able to genuinely gain knowledge and enjoy the time spent on learning. Even in the eighteenth century, Rousseau mentioned in On Education, to let a child receive lessons not verbally, but “only through experience” (265). He understands the importance of letting a child learn by experimenting through life because when a child is not limited by boundaries, he understands the world and himself better in a method that works well for him, making the process enjoyable. However, at schools today there isn’t time to teach students based on the best approach for them. Teachers tend to have a set schedule and teaching style that doesn’t work for all students. This causes students feel the class is tedious, which results in being unmotivated to truly learn. If students are able to discover and to learn in a manner suited to them, they’ll enjoy the process of gaining knowledge. In conclusion, schools will foster in-depth learning if students can discover what they love to do, decrease competition to lessen fear of failure, and grant time to uncover the best approach of learning for them. The education system is meant to help children be ready for the future through deep learning. However, it is doing the opposite as students are not interested in genuinely understanding the information taught. This is an issue as the system ends up creating many similar young adults who are lost in the world because they don’t have an actual passion and won’t venture into the unknown. They won’t know how to think for themselves, instead, they’ll only do what is expected and safe for them to do. It’s a concern that will be problematic for the society in the future from the lack of diversity among the people.