Why do you hate school: I hate school so much, even the thought of attending makes me frustrated and I start to cry. I even pretended to be sick several times, last Friday in fact, to not have to go to school. Why do I feel like this?

Why Do So Many People Hate School? | by Erik P.M. Vermeulen, PhD | Age of Awareness

Why Do So Many People Hate School? | by Erik P.M. Vermeulen, PhD | Age of Awareness | Medium

This doesn’t seem right. Isn’t learning amongst the most beautiful things in life?

Erik P.M. Vermeulen, PhD

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Dec 20, 2020

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“Did you hate school? I know I did.”

I was asked this question last week. And it made me think.

I didn’t hate school. But I don’t want to call it a fun experience either. It was a mandatory stage of life. Something I…

Written by Erik P.M. Vermeulen, PhD

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Prof (Law) passionate about sci-fi, Gen-X culture & re-imagining education

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Hate School? These Are the 11 Reasons

If you hate school, you’re not alone. Millions of students across the country (and globe) find it to be the bane of their existence. For reasons either real or imagined, they want no part of the educational system as it currently stands.

But here’s the thing that simple basic statement doesn’t tell you. It’s not that they hate learning. And schools that can tap into that love of learning tend to avoid the hate altogether.

In the following article, we’ll be discussing the specific reasons that make most students school-resistant. If yours is guilty of any of these, perhaps it’s time to bring it to light. Now, dig in. Class is in session!

1. People Telling You What to Do

Everyone in life will have to follow instruction at some point. The sooner you make peace with that, the better off you’ll be. But schools that fail to make the instruction clear end up leaving a sour taste in the mouths of their students.

These schools are too quick to adopt a “because I said so” approach rather than relating why the instructions matter. Students always want to know why. And if their educators can’t tell them in a way that explains it while respecting their character, it puts everything else on a shaky foundation.

2. Moral Superiority

Many educators run the risk of coming across as morally superior in how they approach students. They utilize that previously mentioned “because I said so” mentality. It’s their way or the highway, so to speak.

Students that don’t take the same steps toward working a problem or fail to make studious decisions are castigated and embarrassed. This can put a stumbling block into the learning process faster than anything else.

3. Unsafe Conditions

More students feel unsafe at school than ever before. And it’s easy to see why. With report after report of school shootings, public disputes over not having enough of a police presence, technology shortfalls, and cyber-bullying from their fellow students, it can seem like going into a physical or emotional war zone.

Just as with the job force, one has to feel safe to do their best work. If one hates school, it may have something to do with the actual environment and the outside stressors.

4. Starts Too Early

Students have been forced out of bed too early for a number of years when it comes to the school day. Psychology tells us we’re functioning better at 9 a.m. than 8 a.m. So why not move the times so that students can enjoy a little more sleep and be ready to give the day their all?

5. Failure to Challenge

Many students are just downright bored with what they see and hear on a daily basis. They realize that teachers are under pressure to get everyone up to a certain level, and that means teaching to the lowest common denominator.

As a result, students who are above average tend to feel stifled and unchallenged by the material they come across. This boredom can lead one to waste talents or even get into disciplinary issues.

6. Teacher Agendas

Some teachers spend a little too much time pushing an agenda and a little less teaching facts, knowledge, and concepts that will benefit the student. While the complaints come often from the right side of the aisle, it goes both ways.

Teachers can feel so passionately about their political views that that ends up influencing the way they present certain materials. This creates unnecessary stress in the lives of students, especially ones who must reconcile the moral aspects with what they’re being taught at home.

Teachers would be better off sticking to their materials and only using current events if they can maintain an air of neutrality. That often doesn’t happen and it really puts off the student from what and how they’re being taught.

7. Inability to Teach Applicability

How many times have you asked a teacher, “Great, but how am I going to use this in life?” Every student has probably asked it at some point, and every student has probably heard some response like, “It will be important later on,” without any clear specifics to back up that promise.

Teachers who cannot show how their material will be realistically applicable are doing their students and their schools a disservice. They’d do far more good if they just leveled with you and said, “You know what, this is an outdated technology. It probably won’t be relevant by the time you’re out of high school.”

Taking the time to explain the reality of the situation or just being honest about what’s not relevant will go a long way in repairing how students see and feel about school.

8. Too Much Homework

Students value their free time. And while a certain degree of homework is necessary to understand the concepts and information relevant to the unit, teachers who assign homework just for the sake of it are not doing themselves, their schools, or their students any favors.

Busy-work leads to burnout. It also causes a student to start hating the subject, and it gets in the way of the many obligations that students have in other classes.

9. Importance on Grades and Tests

So much emphasis has been placed on getting the grade or teaching to the test that it seems like the last thing anyone talks about anymore is actual learning. For there to be learning, students should have passion. Passion is hard to maintain when it is all boiled down to a number or percentage.

10. Competing Against the Wrong People

The fallout from teaching to the test or mandating certain grades is this. Students end up comparing themselves against other students to determine their level of learning adequacy or success. This isn’t as effective as competing against oneself.

When you compete against yourself, you’re guaranteed of improvements. This keeps momentum as well and ensures that a student will not get too discouraged if they’re behind others in the class.

11. Failing to Nurture Passions

Many schools fail to recognize a student’s individual talents and passions until it’s too late. By “too late,” we mean they have beaten that passion out of the student by forcing them into courses that are not relevant to where the student wants to go in their lives.

Schools need to start recognizing these passions earlier. They also need to tailor the class load to the subjects that best brings that out of the student and nurtures it into a higher level of proficiency.

That doesn’t mean shutting out other subjects. It just means teaching those subjects within a context that’s more relatable to what the student wants to do with his or her life following graduation.

What to Do If You Hate School

It’s never a good thing if you hate school. But it may not be your fault. Still, you can only control what you can control, and you have to make the most of the hand you’re dealt.

If you find that you do hate school, try to focus on the areas that are your strengths and get involved in things after school that help guide you down that career path. Unfortunately, you’ll also need to go through a certain amount of “the motions” to keep your educational career on course.

Good luck, and keep your head up!

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I don’t want to study, communicate, or live, I hate school

Requests for helpWrite your story

I don’t want to do anything: neither study, nor communicate, nor live. I am so tired of everything that the only desire is to lie on the sofa and lie on it all my life. Why? Why does all this happen to me? After all, I’m just studying at school, and it would seem that my whole life is still ahead of me. I hate school. I have no problems with teachers and classmates, but I don’t want to communicate with them either. I don’t like people. Animals are better. A week ago, I asked my parents to transfer me to home schooling, I decided to start living a new life, set new goals, find motivation, but … It’s impossible to learn Spanish in two weeks, which condition my parents set for me. And they knew it, so they did it. And I knew it. But I’m a dreamer. Dreamer. I went to teach. And she couldn’t.
Now I just don’t want to do anything. Apathy. And indifference. I just want to lie down on the bed, wrap myself in a warm blanket and turn on my favorite TV series. They have at least some kind of life there, on the other side of the screen. In the past, I was a gamer – I could not tear myself away from computer games. Now she has given up this business, and she should seem to be glad, but … I have no friends, and never had. Moreover, I am completely normal about this, rather positively. The only thing I want is a dog. But parents never agree to it, I have been begging for more than ten years. As for mom and dad, they say to go to school, get an education. Well, I understand that it’s not easy for them now because of me. But still, please help me, otherwise it’s not far from suicide. And I also believe in God. No, not even that. I KNOW he is. And I’m very afraid to disappoint him, one of the few factors that keeps me.

Raccoon, age: 16 / 22.12.2013

Responses:

Raccoon, fatigue, of course, accumulates. End of the semester. But ahead of the holidays and holidays. How beautiful it is on the streets! Try to be outdoors more.
As a child, I was also not allowed to have a dog, but the solution was found by itself. A homeless puppy appeared in the yard. We started feeding him. He stayed in our yard. We played with him, spent a lot of time, tried to train him. For that matter, people have always kept dogs outside. For protection, hunting, various work. For the health of the dog itself, this is definitely better.
You have apathy, you do not want anything. How are you going to study on your own at home? At school, a teacher, general discipline encourages you to listen, read, and do something. It’s much harder to force yourself. The shame of being last is also present somewhere, and this is also a good external motivation.
I don’t think you’re ready for homeschooling at all. For home schooling, the student requires an increased level of self-motivation, self-organization, self-control and self-discipline. Usually these are those children who, in addition to school, are professionally involved in sports, music, or something else. They are used to working hard, counting every minute of their time. Their motivation is simple, but strong: if I don’t study well, I will have to give up my favorite activities.
The second option: the child already knows exactly who he wants to become, and ALREADY is intensively engaged in core subjects, it is hard to keep up with everything. Then he really needs his own schedule.
The third option: the child is in poor health and is not able to learn at the general pace.
You have a different reason: you really do not want. But at home you will be even more unwilling to study, and there will be no one to correct the situation.
You used to be too fond of games. You don’t have any friends right now. There are no conflicts, but you yourself do not want to communicate. What does this say, Raccoon?! – About the fact that you have not yet tasted what communication is. I haven’t learned to enjoy it. You definitely need to be among people, then there is a chance. As you grow older, your outlook on life changes. Peers also change. Growing up, childish nonsense disappears, stable interests, hobbies appear, thoughts strive upwards, the search for answers to important questions begins: how to live, what life is for, what love is, and so on and so forth. It is already much more interesting to communicate with such people. You look, maybe someone from those around you will seem attractive for communication.
In vain do you think that within four walls you will be fine. Will not be. It will be sour, dreary, monotonous. Motivation cannot be imagined. You either know how to see her or you don’t. If not, you are motivated by the teacher and the positive example of other guys. Then, over time, you learn to force yourself to do something not very interesting, in order to get a very interesting result later.
There are books, there are excellent tutorials, but no one in the world has become a master of his craft without a teacher. Schools, circles, sections, universities, graduate schools, and even academicians (top managers, ministers, anyone) are still working, doing scientific work together, teaching each other in the process. Every project has a leader. It is still the same teacher for the rest of the participants. He will prompt, and organize, and discipline and motivate.
You believe in God and are afraid to disappoint Him – this is wonderful, this is a rarity today. This is called the fear of God. That is, the fear of upsetting your Heavenly Father. Read the gospel. One chapter a day is good. Then you will know what God wants from us and how to achieve it.
All the best!

Elena Ordinary, age: 37 / 22.12.2013

Try Spanish “polyglot” video lessons. Just there for 2 weeks. That’s how I learned French. The whole language, of course, cannot be learned, but at the everyday level, if you study well, you will. That’s right, that there is an idea to learn a foreign language! Expands outlook and possibilities. And in general, knowledge of languages ​​very often happens that suddenly appears.
Do you know? You have the most important thing. You have God! You ask Him everything in the world. And you can ask for strength, and the right decisions to survive this situation. Well, since you don’t have your own dog yet, try to help other dogs. You can work as a volunteer in an animal protection organization, or feed stray dogs. Just be careful.
You know who imposes bad thoughts on you. Drive them away from you. These are not your thoughts. You just have to be happy, because God is with you!

– , age: – / 22.12.2013

Raccoon, try to persuade your parents to go abroad with you to relax for a couple of weeks. If they do not want to or the family budget does not allow, then independently study the culture and life of other countries. Maybe there will be interest in any country and you will want to go there in the future. Find a hobby that suits your interests. Do you have a competitive nature? Then try to become the best in the class in studies, by the way, it saved me at school :))
Of course, studying is not always interesting, but try to highlight for yourself some subjects that will interest you. Think about which university you will go to after school or maybe to a technical school.
And do not watch too many feature films, they repel reality.

Vladimir , age: 19 / 22.12.2013

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Why I still hate school

This is your puppy, now he is yours forever.

And you don’t want to, but count his days and years.

And every day your love for him grows.

It will become huge when he dies.
Dolphin. “Milk”

I hated school when I was 10, I hated it when I was 15, I hate it now. I will not publicly name the number of the school where I studied, but I can say with confidence: it was terrible. Even compared to other schools. And this is not another post “the education system is shit, I could do better!” I want to tell you exactly what I endured for 11 years specifically at my school.

School uniform. You can start with the fact that I do not see any sense in it as such. The same clothes for all schoolchildren will not help to “concentrate on the subject” and “not be distracted by extraneous things.” These are ordinary clothes, and no one will gain a single drop of brain if he puts them on. Moreover, the nasty funeral black suit, on the contrary, drove me into depression and made me feel like shit. The same shit as all these identically dressed people sitting with me in the same class. Moreover, this form did not suit me (as well as many others). And yes, it’s a huge problem when you have to walk in front of a hundred of your peers in clothes that are completely not made for you, just because otherwise you would simply not be allowed into the school at the entrance. Sometimes it got to the point that some were not allowed in because the shirt was not so white or a little grayish. And this went on until the end of the eleventh grade! Think about it.

Canteen. At school, children spend on average about 5-6 hours, or even more. It is reasonable to assume that they need something to eat. Unfortunately, in our school (as in most others), apparently, they did not hear about such things as meat, side dishes, salads, sandwiches, after all. All this was perfectly replaced by BUNS. BUNKS were for every taste: with poppy seeds, with cinnamon, with raisins, a bun with a bun, a bun with a bun in a bun. And the climax was that all this dough was practically nothing to drink. There were either glasses with iced tea and some kind of self-made juice, which stood almost on the aisle (estimate for a second how much dust got there in one change), or some major juice for 5 hryvnias. And in those rogue times, they gave me only 5 for a day. So choose: either eat two, buns that have bothered you even more than the school itself in 11 years, or drink 100 milligrams of juice for 5 UAH. Those who were not lazy ran to the neighboring school (!) during breaks to eat in their canteen (the local diet was expanded with slightly more edible dishes, including hot dogs, pizza and other fast food). Why did our school not think of at least somehow rectifying the situation? I also asked myself this question. And the answer was that they have no right to sell any food containing mayonnaise, ketchup, tomato paste, cheese, butter and other overseas spices in the school cafeteria. I wonder then why the neighboring school has been selling prohibited goods for a couple of decades and still has not survived a single raid by the Chekists? In any case, running into the next building and poisoning yourself with monotonous rolls is much safer for children, of course.

Bad behavior? Two in a magazine! Now I understand that I could just file a complaint against this teacher, because. He has no right to engage in such nonsense. But then I felt only incredible anger and an overwhelming sense of injustice. The magazine gives grades for academic performance, and not for anything else. Did you notice any violation? Ask a question about the topic of the lesson, look at the summary. If the student was able to answer your question, then, despite his ugly behavior, there is nothing for him to give a bad mark for the subject. With us, it looked something like this: “What? You turned to Masha Petrova? What difference does it make that you have everything written down and you can repeat everything I said? in life and my subject in particular – that means you get TWO for a lesson! Sit down!”. And besides, what normal child can sit for 45 minutes without moving and constantly looking at the teacher, as required by the code? Either a spherical motherfucker, or a future teacher. There is no third.

KVN! Our school, like many others, was simply obsessed with cultural events. I was always infuriated when they tried to force me to participate in some incomprehensible amateur performance, which I was not at all interested in. What’s the point of her when everyone hates what they do? Teachers are sitting in the assembly hall and hate everyone because they are not lying on a comfortable sofa right now, watching the next episode of some Russian TV series with mediocre actors. Kids hate everyone because they don’t smoke behind garages or even do their homework now (this is a much better alternative in my opinion). But everyone smiles at each other, shows some stupid scenes, devoid of meaning. Idyll! Joy! Happiness! And everything would be fine, but the most severe collapse of these events came to us at the end of the 11th grade. Do you understand? We have state exams ahead, UPE, begging a physics teacher for a good grade in a certificate. Many children have a schedule that is scheduled by the hour, including paid tutors and self-study. But no, you need to make KVN, you need to make ideas about the tolerance of society and the unity of peoples. And for disobedience, of course, severe threats to spoil the certificate and the rest of our lives. By the way, our school is also unique in this respect. Unlike many of their peers, our graduates were not helped to raise the GPA – on the contrary, they tried to lower it as much as they could. And the argument is simple: “here comes the test, it will knock on the heads, they say, why do you have such good grades?” Thousands of schools across the country live quietly for themselves without fear of being destroyed, and we are so special, yeah.

Lots of letters and a number. This is how you can briefly describe the lessons of mathematics in our school. The formatting requirements were enormous: don’t go out of bounds, don’t make grammatical mistakes, step back 4 squares after homework, write everything in each square, write down the answer in detail (see below), wrap the notebook in a cover, write everything neatly, with a pencil, ruler, compass and green pen, etc. It’s horrible. No, really. For example, the following solution would be considered incorrect. Why do you think?

-3+2 = x+z; (z=0)
x = -1;

If such a problem had a maximum of 5 points, you would get no more than 2 points for such a solution. And all because it is necessary: ​​

-3+2 = x+z; (z=0)
2+(-3) = x+z;
-1 = x+z;
x+z = -1;
x+0 = -1;
x = -1.

And this is in the eleventh grade! But this is only part of what you could get a triple in mathematics for, answering 100% of the tasks correctly.