What Life Skills do you think we should teach in school?

amother

Tue, Jul 08 2014, 11:52 am

How to tell the difference between genuine information and cr*p.

I am sick and tired of people who choose not to go for chemo for treatable forms of cancer because of some magine recipe they read on the Internet.

FYI: Reading something on the Internet doesn't make it true!

MaBelleVie

Tue, Jul 08 2014, 12:03 pm

iluvy wrote:

Professional communication.

In eleventh grade, my school (PPY) had a short workshop on making phone calls, because that was the year students had "jobs" that required them to deal with outside professionals on the school's behalf. It covered *very* basic things that many kids simply don't know. I have a bit of a phone phobia, and I use the formula I learned that morning -- introduce yourself, say which organization you're calling for, say what you're calling about -- every time I need to make a call.

I would like kids to learn how to write an email: asking for letters of recommendation or other favors, thanking people for professional favors, asking a question from someone who is senior in your field, following up with someone who you met at a conference, thanking team members for a successful project, etc. Most professional communication follows generic formulae that it are easy to teach and that can make things much easier later on.

Love this.

summer0808

Tue, Jul 08 2014, 12:14 pm

Want to hear something interesting. I attended a school that most of you would say does not give a good education. (satmar) But most of the stuff people are mentioning we learned.
sewing
typing
first aid & cpr
budgeting
cooking
business math (diferent tricks for math shortcuts)
bookkeeping
95% of us knew how to take care of babies LOL!

suzyq

Tue, Jul 08 2014, 12:18 pm

iluvy wrote:

This is excellent. I also think teaching students the difference between text-language and real English is important, and when to know which one to use.

My husband always says that the most important thing for kids to learn is how to shake someone's hand, look them in the eye and show confidence. Dale Carnegie's "How to Win Friends and Influence People" actually has a lot of excellent, simple life lessons.

amother

Tue, Jul 08 2014, 12:28 pm

halachos of the kitchen, also things like not leaving an onion cut open over night.

hilchos tzizus and how to clean them properly.

my father teaches a consumer science class. one of the activities I did with them (when subbing) was to assemble items. The school bought things like 3 shelf bookshelf, cozy coop, etc. The girls assembled them while I oversaw what they were doing and then the objects were placed in the 11th grade chinese auction (tzedaka). The follow up activity was to write a proper letter to the company naming some positives and negatives about the product (like "your instructions are unclear").

if there isnt a public speaking course yet then add that. The Ron Clark School has all of their 8th graders speak at graduation without note cards. Watch this link at 44:15, if you want you can watch from 40:40 to hear the introduction of the student

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIXkoGoe8jI

sky

Tue, Jul 08 2014, 12:41 pm

We had a home ec class and some of it I've never done again (kasher liver). But some was good like how to clean a chicken quarter (I had no clue how), sew on a button, cut your nails (skip nails...).
Also in 12 th grade we had some sort of intro to taharas hamishpacha which was basically an overview of the basic halachos (like you have to separate and dip - didn't mention counting or internals bedikos) and that you have to find out more before you got married.
I know one school in town has every girl call a rav with a sheila to make sure they are comfortable doing that and to see that it isn't a scary thing to do.

Last edited by sky on Tue, Jul 08 2014, 12:43 pm; edited 1 time in total

morah

Tue, Jul 08 2014, 12:42 pm

A lot of these things are already covered in other classes. CPR and nutrition are part of the health curriculum- however the nutrition is very theoretical, so I could see doing a cooking unit in what we're planning to show how to quickly prepare something nutritious, how to make a Shabbos meal etc. I think the cooking element could also help concretize concepts learned in Halacha class. Basic computer skills are already a course in 9th grade, coding is offered as an elective at the moment. Any class that involves essays involves typing, as they are taught to submit in MLA format. I think business writing could be made a unit in English classes. I can bring that up in my department :-). For personal finance, I think we would steer away from anything values based (that has to come from home), but discuss terminology and do some exercises and activities to get them thinking about factors they may not initially consider (for example, cost is important but so is quality, convenience, possible extra features, etc).

amother

Tue, Jul 08 2014, 12:55 pm

[quote="summer0808"]Want to hear something interesting. I attended a school that most of you would say does not give a good education. (satmar) But most of the stuff people are mentioning we learned.
sewing
typing
first aid & cpr
budgeting
cooking
business math (diferent tricks for math shortcuts)
bookkeeping
95% of us knew how to take care of babies LOL![/quote They TAUGHT you how to take care of babies, or you're just saying it matter of fact?

cbsmommy

Tue, Jul 08 2014, 1:29 pm

Emotional wrote:

Basic sewing. There's no reason why an adult woman should have to spend money to fix the hem on her daughter's skirt.

Honestly, that might be easy for you, but I can't sew to save my life. I've taken classes, attended workshops, etc. I just can't sew. And I'm ok with that.

Having me take a sewing class that was graded in high school (I took one that wasn't school related) would have meant that I failed a class.

Instead, I learned how to budget for a seamstress. I think driver's ed, basic credit management, and basic first aid are essential.

Anything above that like cooking, baking, sewing, cake decorating, scrapbooking --- those are nice, but those aren't vital.

cbsmommy

Tue, Jul 08 2014, 1:33 pm

morah wrote:

Thanks! Crowd sourcing is the best :-) We already offer drivers Ed as an extracurricular, I don't think they will require it any time soon. Also, I guess I should mention that this is an elite MO co-ed school, so everyone is going to college (many to very selective ones), it's a no-brainer. However, a lot of these kids still know nothing about any of this stuff- financial, home, or otherwise. I don't know if they'd be ready to learn the details of mortgages, but we would probably go into details about car ownership (which is very relevant for teens) and then just show how the issues are similar with a house.
Also, anyone think we should get those dolls that act like babies? The public schools use them to scare kids out of getting pregnant, and while I hope we don't really need it for that purpose on a Jewish school (though I'm no ostrich, I'm sure a few kids need a reminder to not fool around), maybe it could be useful as simply another life skill.

As someone that worked in a teen pregnancy program, the dolls are not universally used in public schools.

We manage to scare the kids by discussing the cost of having a baby and how the babies grow up into even more expensive children. Most kids think babies are cute and although they know that infancy is "just a stage" - they turn their living, breathing babies into dolled up magazine worthy "dolls". Interestingly enough, the teenagers I know that put their children up for adoption, did it for a toddler and up.

seeker

Tue, Jul 08 2014, 1:46 pm

dancingqueen wrote:

Some of these professional and career related things I can see learning in school. But don't parents teach their kids some of these other basic life skills hopefully?

Unfortunately hope is not enough. Kids spend a lot of time in school, parents spend a lot of time working, and they don't always get as much as we'd hope. Teaching these things in school levels the playing field for successful adulthood in a big, important way.

bigsis144

Tue, Jul 08 2014, 2:31 pm

ectomorph wrote:

I agree with the person who suggested CPR. I have never understood why basic first aid is not part of the regular curriculum.

My Bais Yaakov high school required taking a CPR course in order to graduate. It wasn't a full first-aid course, just a quick intense course, but we did compressions and breathing on a dummy and everything.