And after they've left school there's no knowing when they'll be involved in/come across a road accident, etc.
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Adulting GCSE: Things that should be mandatory to learn in school
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DarloRich
Veteran Member
Interesting - often wonder about work places and first aid
nlogax
Established Member
First aid should be something we're all taught on a reoccurring basis throughout our adult lives.
pdeaves
Established Member
Looking before stepping into the road (or pushing the pushchair into the road) and other 'obvious' safety stuff.
trainophile
Established Member
Respecting other people.
ABB125
Established Member
Some of the things mentioned I did at school:
Things I'd like to be taught more/better/at all are mainly practical things such as basic DIY, basic car maintenance (such as changing the oil, which I assume is still necessary in an electric car), how to change a lightbulb
- Wiring a plug - GCSE physics (although I'm happy to do moderate electrical work myself anyway, since about the age of 13 ish!)
- Basic financial stuff - covered at the end of Year 10 in maths as some "GCSE relief" (but again, I was fairly "in the know" about stuff like that anyway)
- Reading a map - pre-GCSE geography (although I could read a map anyway)
- First Aid - all Year 8 students spent a day doing a basic First Aid course, including a certificate at the end (although I can't remember how "official" it was)
- I seem to remember that an emphasis on road safety existed one year (but only because someone at the school was hit by a car)
Things I'd like to be taught more/better/at all are mainly practical things such as basic DIY, basic car maintenance (such as changing the oil, which I assume is still necessary in an electric car), how to change a lightbulb
birchesgreen
Established Member
I can wire a plug but have never had to once in 20 years of having my own house so i query thats its that vital a survival skill.
Any personal finance education to include the potential long term negative impacts of bad decisions
How student finance works
Current world and domestic affairs. You could dress it up and call it international relations. I’m amazed how little teenagers know about what’s going on in the world
How student finance works
Current world and domestic affairs. You could dress it up and call it international relations. I’m amazed how little teenagers know about what’s going on in the world
Westcountryman
Member
Being able to take their eyes off the phone screen when walking or crossing the road.
Slightly odd choice, since history is the main place where critical thinking is already taught in the curriculum. It tends to start off fairly light in primary school, where a lot of the point of it is to improve literacy and comprehension, but after that it's really all about critical thinking and how actions have consequences.
Critical thinking itself is a fairly abstract concept, which is almost impossible to teach without examples and context. History gives you the examples and context.
ABB125
Established Member
Yes - it's not debt, it's just a "graduate tax"!
I changed all the sockets in my old house for cosmetic reasons, as the closest I’ve come to a plug
headshot119
Established Member
How tax on your earnings work. It's shocking how many adults who've had jobs for years don't have even a basic understanding of how it works.
My brother was very surprised when his first £25k salary didn't involve actually bringing home anything like £25k...
scotrail158713
Established Member
I don’t know about that. I’d say there’s plenty who do know a lot.
There are undoubtedly some who are clueless though - but isn’t that the case with any age?
An_Engineer
Member
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Basic understanding of how our political system works.
While arguably less important than the more practical suggestions already mentioned, nearly every adult has the right to vote yet I've seen very few people actually understand how it all works (or doesn't work depending on how pessimistic you want to be).
While arguably less important than the more practical suggestions already mentioned, nearly every adult has the right to vote yet I've seen very few people actually understand how it all works (or doesn't work depending on how pessimistic you want to be).
LSWR Cavalier
Established Member
Insurances of various sorts
Pension finance planning, I did not think much about that until shortly before retiring
Pension finance planning, I did not think much about that until shortly before retiring
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Gloster
Established Member
How to shut doors (“Were you born in a field?”) and how to shut them without slamming at 03.00 in a hotel. Even when you are drunk.
How to pay with small change. If you lose your mobile ‘phone, there are alternatives to shoving a piece of paper at the shop assistant or bus driver and then wondering what those bits of metal you are given in return are.
And keep your bus ticket until the end of the journey. Don’t just put it in the bin or drop it on the floor the moment you turn away from the driver.
How to pay with small change. If you lose your mobile ‘phone, there are alternatives to shoving a piece of paper at the shop assistant or bus driver and then wondering what those bits of metal you are given in return are.
And keep your bus ticket until the end of the journey. Don’t just put it in the bin or drop it on the floor the moment you turn away from the driver.
I think the big ones for me would be a general "Financial Capability" education which would cover several of things talked about above such as how to understand your payslip and deductions from it, how to budget, what types of current account exist, what insurance products you may need at various times of life and how they work, how different forms of credit (credit cards, bank loans, etc) work and what you should think about before using them, different types of savings products (savings accounts, regular savers, ISAs, etc) and how they work, what a rental agreement should look like and things to look out for, how mortgages work, what are pensions (state, occupational/private pensions, etc) and how they work. None of these things need to be gone into in any great detail as the goal should be to ensure that everyone has a basic understanding of how all these things work as everyone, at some stage, will need to deal with at least some of the things from the above list so it's important that they understand to at least basic degree what these things are. Doing that might go at least someway to ensuring that people are able to make better financial decisions which can only be a good thing whether your middle class or working class.
I think basic first aid is another good shout by the by not even for dealing with the big things like CPR or responding to a stroke but for the seemingly small things like what do you do if you mum, brother, sister, dad, friend or even a stranger starts choking? Teaching everyone how to respond to choking would no doubt save quite a few lives!
Perhaps we were lucky but we got a talk on that at my Sixth Form during Lower Sixth when we were making our decisions about post A-Level life.
I think basic first aid is another good shout by the by not even for dealing with the big things like CPR or responding to a stroke but for the seemingly small things like what do you do if you mum, brother, sister, dad, friend or even a stranger starts choking? Teaching everyone how to respond to choking would no doubt save quite a few lives!
Perhaps we were lucky but we got a talk on that at my Sixth Form during Lower Sixth when we were making our decisions about post A-Level life.
The trouble with this is that it's often only applicable for a few years. ISAs have only been going for about 20 years for example - if I'd learned about them at school they'd have been PEPs. In any case most of the rules and logic of saving and taxation of savings, has changed over that period.
Pensions equally have changed completely - my first pension 20 years ago was a final salary one, and my most recent two are types of pension that didn't exist at all at that time. The main thing I suspect we're all about to learn when the statements drop on the doormat in April is that the exceptional government response to Covid has shattered a lot of peoples dreams of avoiding poverty in their old age altogether. All things they never taught you in school.
Rental agreements equally have changed - assured shorthold tenancies were new between shortly before I finished school, and yet were the only rental agreement I ever signed until recently. Now the rules have completely changed again in Scotland.
What school should be trying to do is build up the abilities and confidence necessary to find information about these things as you need them. There's a pretty hard limit on what they can do beyond that.
Sex and relationships
Inequality
Poverty
Respect and understanding
Cultural acceptance
Morality
World Affairs
'Modern Culture'
Media Studies
I also firmly believe the curriculum is out of date and not fit for purpose.
Disclaimer : I have 2 in the education system.
Inequality
Poverty
Respect and understanding
Cultural acceptance
Morality
World Affairs
'Modern Culture'
Media Studies
I also firmly believe the curriculum is out of date and not fit for purpose.
Disclaimer : I have 2 in the education system.
GatwickDepress
Established Member
Pretty much all colleges and sixth forms have seminars about student finance during the UCAS application period now. There's little point having that talk in Year 10/11.
First Aid was easily the most useful thing the Army Cadets taught me. It's a shame it's something that isn't more widely taught.
However, principles like compound interest and how to compare APRs stay the same.
trainophile
Established Member
Bit of a tangent, but while the education system is struggling so much due to lockdown etc., I have an suggestion that they should concentrate on the core subjects of the three R's at primary level, and English, Maths, Science and IT at secondary level. Those are the basic requirements to progress into the working world, and all the other subjects can be caught up on later and may never be required in adult life.
There is, because that knowledge can influence decisions about tertiary education, and in turn the choice of A levels
It's not clear that getting more lessons in those subjects from non-specialist teachers would help a great deal. In any case, the disruption to lessons is happening at random and largely without notice. Further disrupting things to concentrate on a completely different curriculum would likely just make things worse.
Add to that that many students are basically keeping up fairly well. You would be making them waste time going over stuff they've already learned at the expense of other subjects which may be more important to them. That will mean they are more behind in the non-core areas than they need to be, and are even more bored and demotivated that they are now.
Rutland23
Member
Darts, Dominoes and Cribbage.
Hand -eye coordination in Darts, but all three teach counting and mental arithmetic.
I have come across too many young people who cannot count without a calculator or phone for the simplest calculations or transactions.
PS, I used to run a Pub
Regards
Ian
Hand -eye coordination in Darts, but all three teach counting and mental arithmetic.
I have come across too many young people who cannot count without a calculator or phone for the simplest calculations or transactions.
PS, I used to run a Pub
Regards
Ian
DerekC
Established Member
Good idea, but you'd never get it past the Daily Mail.
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