Post #4471683

It was a good bridge. Sturdy. Well built. The mandate was to hold 1kg, which it did with ease. 2kg, 4kg, and it didn't even wobble. We gave up testing after that. It was a good bridge. But the only place it led to was frustration and confusion. It led to desperately trying to explain to an 11 year old how suspension bridges work. It led to the realisation of how apathetic 'almost teenagers' are when it comes to science and other boring shit. It led to the realisation that I was the same way at that age and that I should really apologise to my parents. The cycle continues. Why is it so hard to teach kids? Why does the statement 'I fucked my life, don't fuck yours' go right over their heads? The bridge was a test to get into an enhanced STEM science curriculum. An admirable system to teach kids real stuff that actually matters rather than wasting time on drama, dance, how to be a youtuber and languages like Spanish. (I mean, seriously, Spanish? This is fucking Australia. When the hell is a kid from Australia ever going to need to know Spanish? Not Japanese or Mandarin, which might actually be useful in this hemisphere. Fucking Spanish!) But the interest wasn't there. And without interest, learning becomes impossible. I ended up building most of it myself. We could have lied and possibly cheated our way into the STEM course, but we are at least semi-responsible and couldn't do that. So after spending a few hours building the bridge and many, many more hours trying to explain the principles behind its construction, we destroyed it. Our uninterested pre-teen didn't get into the STEM course and that was that. School doesn't really work. It's at the wrong time of their lives. You can't really teach kids what matters when all they can think about is fun, the opposite sex and media in whatever form. I understand that school also works as a child minding service because people have to work, but its a fucked up system and I don't like it. #kids #society