Things I was taught... that proved useless.

[alisonwunderlnd]

Algebra I agree with as being totally useless.

Another totally useless thing is to me is accounting. I will never use it and therefore it is totally useless to me. At least the way that it was being taught made it totally useless to me.

I agree,,and I hated it then anyway,STILL DO!PLUS,,my algebra teacher had THE WORST breath i a have ever smelled in my life,,UNBEARABLE!

 

[de-valmont]

I find a lot of basic algebra really useful, Quadratic Equations however I have never found a single use for...

 

[going_long]

Hi everyone. Thanks for joining in. Just thought I'd throw my two years of LATIN in. That was useful. Teach kids a language NOBODYS SPOKEN FOR HUNDREDS OF YEARS.

conjugate the following Latin verbs

Amo, amas, amat...errrrr
Bello bellum, bellas .....or something.

next week we'll be constucting wattle and daub houses and learning to skin mammoth.... whoopie-do!

 

[warwood]

Useless........

I found transitioning from classic Newtonian physics to Quantum Mechanics difficult. What that means is that the above statement isn't an absolute truth but actually just a correlation of experience.

 

[snowhugs]

my attempt at learning the violin, ooh i sounded terrible lol

 

[going_long]

Giving this a bump... and so far algebra is a run away leader but I reckon there is still plenty out there. I remember calculating percentages of population with Yellow fever and river blindness on some African river delta in Geography.

I Still haven't met anybody with either so I could say knowingly... "tell me about it. You're just one of 37% of people from that region afflicted with that ghastly ailment... now can you please step back and stop coughing"

come on spill the beans!

 

[going_long]

my attempt at learning the violin, ooh i sounded terrible lol

Actually that could be you rather then the teaching...

 

[Guttergoddess]

How to figure out the diameter of a circle.

 

[southerntierguy]

Everybody is picking on algebra ... I loved math. Truth be known, I took a course in partial differential equations AFTER I left college, just for fun. (I suppose this should be on the dirty little secrets thread. People in here will look at me differently now.)

Things I never need at this point:

(1) Diagramming sentences. Seems some screwed up educator liked both English and geometry, and tried to cram them into one lesson.

(2) Names of ancient Roman feasts. (You had to do something in your 4th year of Latin.)

(3) Reciting the names of all the American Presidents ... did Millard Fillmore ever do anything other than get in this list? (Oh, and I pity the kids who have to list the British monarchs. Do Catholic kids have to memorize the names of Popes?)

(4) Mnemonics for "Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, Species" ... I can remember the mnemonic, but often not what it stands for. And who cares if I do remember? (Kinky People Can Often Find Good Sex is the best)

 

[mrtnmoon]

to just be myself.

 

[chrismiss]

Any Latin word.

 

[southerntierguy]

to just be myself.

How is this a useless teaching?

 

[mrtnmoon]

re: being myself as a useless teaching

How is this a useless teaching?

have you ever seen the movie dodgeball? there's a commercial at the beginning of the movie for the gym that ben stiller runs. one of the things he says is, "you'll still be you in a legal sense, but you'll be a better, more attractive you than you could ever be without our help." something like that.

anyway...

myself is a nice, caring guy, kinda shy. there's nothing special about that. to attract any attention, I have to be a funnier, flirtier, more entertaining guy than I normally am. it can be fun... last night with you and MG and WF and toly was kind of a blast. it just feels like putting on a show sometimes. do you know what I mean?

 

[southerntierguy]

have you ever seen the movie dodgeball? there's a commercial at the beginning of the movie for the gym that ben stiller runs. one of the things he says is, "you'll still be you in a legal sense, but you'll be a better, more attractive you than you could ever be without our help." something like that.

anyway...

myself is a nice, caring guy, kinda shy. there's nothing special about that. to attract any attention, I have to be a funnier, flirtier, more entertaining guy than I normally am. it can be fun... last night with you and MG and WF and toly was kind of a blast. it just feels like putting on a show sometimes. does that make any sense?

It was fun, I was laughing really hard at some points.

What I hear you are saying is, you can't be you and still get certain things that you want, with those things being defined as person(s). That's true, that's part of life we just have to accept, we can't control other people (generally speaking, and we can't control their thoughts and emotions even if we do have control over certain aspects of their existence). That doesn't mean becoming the real you is a bad idea ... you wouldn't be happy getting someone else when you have to hide the real you to get them, it just doesn't work at all. And I'm convinced there are people out there for everyone, the only question is how to meet them...

Obviously it doesn't help in the MEETING of people to be shy, but it makes it hard to get a job, too. I'm not sure I know how to help there. I used to be a hide-in-the corners guy in high school (at least when it came to social events), but at this point I am good at public speaking, doing consulting work, etc. At least in my case, I found that shyness wasn't a personality characteristic, fear was, and it just took more and more experience in public settings before I became more comfortable in those settings. I'm not really sure if this would apply as a general principle, but I think it applies in a lot of cases.

Anyway, being someone we aren't AND DON'T WANT TO BE doesn't help; we will never be completely happy hiding behind walls that we've painted to look like someone else. Now, does it sometimes help to grow in a way we might not otherwise grow if not for prodding or desire? It certainly doesn't hurt to test new aspects of life ... I've love things now that I would have had to be pushed into 20 years ago. It certainly doesn't hurt to be broad minded and try new things, just as long as you have the right to say, "Yuk! I hate this!" if that's how you feel. But that's just natural personality growth, that's learning new things, that's not changing your basic character. The best you to present to people to find the one right for you is to find out who the real you is, and be that around enough other people so they can see who you are.

 

[LeahLo519]

Not a Playgrounder...

But diagraming sentences! We had to do that every single day and I have never once put any of that crap to use.

 

[southerntierguy]

But diagraming sentences! We had to do that every single day and I have never once put any of that crap to use.

Never had that come up on a job interview, huh?

 

[montrealgirl]

I'm right now sitting in my Chinese History: Science, Medicine & Technology class.

We are learning at this very moment about the Later Mohists views on keeping time.

Interesting, but probably pretty useless.

 

[southerntierguy]

I'm right now sitting in my Chinese History: Science, Medicine & Technology class.

We are learning at this very moment about the Later Mohists views on keeping time.

Interesting, but probably pretty useless.

I think the later mohists stopped the clock when the ball left the field of play. Earlier mohists just added a form of stoppage time at the end of the match.

You can probably tell I got less than the usual amount of sleep last night.

 

[Stegral]

I will agree with most... ALGEBRA..... I had to repeat it in summer school in grade 10... I found it very boring & when the teacher started the year with "unless you plan on being a rocket scientist, this is just another mandatory course for you, I apologize for the restraints of the educational system" I knew it was NOT going to be anything worth learning....

 

[_Nina_]

Hey Long!!
Just bumping your thread and sayin hi to you and little kitty!!!
Hope things are well with you, and you're enjoyin life.
I'll catch up with you soon.

 

[mrtnmoon]

well.... I'm going to give a little shout out to algebra. there are times it might be useful in everyday life. there was a scene in mean girls that reminded me of that, when one the girls wondered about the percentage of fat calories in some food she was going to eat. lindsay lohan's character explained how to figure it out, using algebra. I'd be willing to bet we've all pondered such a thing at one time or another. now.... if I could only remember how to cross-multiply.

calculus, on the other hand...... I haven't come across any reason to know anything I studied in calculus, other than maybe as a question on jeopardy.

 

[Agent 86]

Any Latin word.

I absolutely hated learning about coitus interruptus, didn't you?


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