I recently came across Steiner Schools, and I thought they sounded pretty amazing.

And it got me thinking about all the pointless shit I learnt in school, all for a few pieces of paper and access to a university I dropped out of, instead of things that would have made a difference to my life.

We were never taught textiles in my school as the inspectors said it was a waste of money, so it was scrapped. I can't shorten a pair of jeans but I know Pythagoras!

I also can't cook to save my life, as food tech pretty much consisted of designing appropriate packaging for sandwiches and a lot of flow charts.

We were never taught how to prepare for job interviews, how to apply for a mortgage, how to write cheques. Our sex education lessons were pretty much skimmed over and all I remember of them was laughing at the texture of condoms.

Out of my school days, the lessons I got the most out of were the ones where the teachers were most passionate, which were mainly the arts, apart from my chemistry teacher. So I look back on Art and Drama lessons with joy and I am glad they taught me things that I can continue going on to enjoy now as a hobby. I wish my school had made music more integral (and now I hear that music funding has been cut again!)

I realise the boring stuff is there in case we ever want to go on to be an engineer for example, or a mathematician. But things like analysing characters and themes in books really peed me off. I could NOT stand English Literature (though I am an AVID reader). Even though I'm pretty much split down the middle when it comes to my academic abilities versus my artsy side, I could never get my head round that crap. I can't see how that would make your life better in anyway, other than if you want to become an English teacher!

So tell me what things you learnt in school that you have never used since. Things such as long multiplication, the Kings and Queens of England, what colours certain chemicals turn flames (Lithium - red, sodium - orange, copper - green. Gosh, how helpful.)

What do you think should be taught in schools? I do believe that if we are going to be taught such pointless shit, they may as well teach us stuff that will help us.

Languages are very important. I think it should be compulsory to learn French and another modern language. 2 languages :) I wish I had taken GCSE French..

Sex ED was a complete joke.. I was never actually taught anything! What a waste of time..

I enjoyed History a lot in school. I think History is very important. Plus, when I took it at school, my history teachers have always been really good, so that probably made me more interested in the subject :)

English literature/language is also important. Considering how many people can't even tell the difference between "you", "your" and "you're"..

Religious Studies.. Again, a complete waste of time. I have never actually been taught anything in this lesson because it was so badly "taught". I'm well glad that it wasn't a compulsory GCSE subject, lol.

I don't think I've learnt anything in Chemistry or Physics that could greatly benefit me in my life.. Though, I think Biology should be the only compulsory subject out of those 3 sciences -it's the most useful.

You can take Theatre Studies as an A Level but it would've been nice if it was also a GCSE option. Same with Politics and Archaeology. I would've totally taken all three of these subjects as a GCSE if I had the opportunity.. Politics should be compulsory so that people are informed at a young age.

Yeah, I've missed out a whole bunch of other subjects I've been taught.. *shrugs* ;D

I agree with the languages. I was in the last year where it was compulsory to take a language GCSE. I took French and got an A and it was a toss up betweent hat and Law at A Level.

RE was a joke! But at some schools it is compulsory at GCSE level!

See English language - totally useful. English lit - really not. It made me stop reading for years because I resented it so much.
And to be fair, even in language they didn't teach us much grammar. I learnt a lot of it myself. Many of my friends who I went to school with still have a horrible grasp on grammar.

Aha, I think we've established what should really be taught! Grammar (and spelling!) ;)

Nooo not Biology!! I DON'T CARE about PLANTS!!!

Haha in my GCSE year they gave us a newly qualified teacher. And she was TERRIBLE. I have hated biology ever since.

Although I was completely useless at Biology (and science in general, lol), I did find a lot of it quite interesting :)

I agree. Plants are boring. xD

I agree about most your stuff (clearly my English lessons were wasted!), but I don't think French should be compulsory unless you live in Europe. I mean, in the U.S it seems to me Spanish would be a much more useful language to learn! The Aussies are probably better off with... I dunno - whatever they currently have probably!

I was just thinking of the British schooling system when I was replying, lol ;D

Japanese, Indonesian or some kind of Asian language is quite common here. One school I went to offered Japanese, French and German. The other offered Indonesian and Chinese.

Sorry, that was for the Aussies :P

Heheh, we have a lot of the Asian languages. My school had Japanese, French, Italian and Latin (I did Latin for my school-leaving exams).

I'm probably rare in that I liked school. xD My favourite subject was mathematics.

Things I found pointless were:

Geography, Civics & Citizenship - a mandatory subject in years 9-10. I remember one of our assignments included standing by the roadside and counting how many cars drove past. I'm sorry, but how on earth does that bear any relevance to me whatsover? xD Probably the most pointless of them all.

Religious Education - pretty pointless, but interesting at any rate. So it gets points for that. xD

PD/H/PE - I hated doing sport. xD I was so unco-ordinated and clumsy. And the teachers were mean to me because I was shit at it. xD And the theory? Learning about 'decision making processes'? COMPLETE bullshit. xD But at least I did well in the theory because it was so easy (and pointless).

English - just didn't appeal to my black/white way of thinking back then. I liked concrete things, so I found English difficult to comprehend at times, due to the often bullshit interpretations we learned regarding a given text. English was one of those subjects you could totally bluff your way through. xD I managed to top English from about years 7 to 10 (I enjoyed writing essays, which is probably what saved me)... and then it got even more ridiculous after that (or everyone else got better) so my grades in it started to slip. xD

I'd probably be better at English now, given the very grey areas I'm learning about in my medicine degree. xD

Definitely NOT pointless subjects:

MATHEMATICS - my love. Teaches you logic, discipline, order. And, funnily enough, creativity. Maths is about solving problems. There are multiple ways to solve problems. So if you try it one way and it doesn't work, you can try it another way. It teaches you to be flexible.

English - if it was taught better. xD Well, if you read widely (which you can technically do without studying English... xD), you get to expand your vocab as well as your general knowledge and understanding of the world. I don't think that's pointless at all. Basically, I enjoyed the basis of English, just not how it was taught at school.

Languages - as I said, I studied Latin for a few years, and the knowledge it gave me of English grammar constructs is invaluable. To this day I am constantly drawing on my Latin knowledge to write awesome-sounding grammatically-correct sentences. xD And I know Latin isn't spoken anymore, but I found it to be such a pure language. That, and 70% of English is derived from Latin, so if you come across any obscure words in your day-to-day wonderings, just think about what word it looks like in Latin, and voila. =) I'm so glad I studied Latin because now it makes it that much easier for me to learn and remember the names of certain diseases and all the different parts of the body. As for languages that ARE still spoken, well you can't argue much about them - they're definitely not pointless. xD

Other subjects I took were Physics and Chemistry. They are of a moderate pointlessness level. xD Can be applicable and relevant, if you choose to study science at university. But only interest value if you don't. xD

Sorry about the long post. xD Like I said, I liked school and I think education is seriously important.

I think pointless is entirely different from just subjects that you didnt like! PE is definately not pointless, and neither is english! Though I completely agree about geography!! I even got married during a geography lesson because we were SO bored

Totally true. xD I definitely see the merit in teaching kids the importance of physical activity and team playing and the like. But the theory 'personal development' stuff we learned about was totally pointless. It was a bunch of tables and acronyms that I don't even remember anymore so it mustn't have been that relevant. English... again, like I said, not pointless in its own right, but the way it was taught, I believe, leaves much to be desired. Perhaps it needs to be restructured so that students SEE the "point" in learning about that stuff. xD Although with English, I think it's a skill thing (writing essays, structuring your thoughts, building an argument), rather than a content thing, that makes it relevant.

Just to contradict myself slightly - in maths, we learned a couple of things that I a) absolutely HATED and b) thought were extremely pointless.

1. Long division of algebraic expressions. Now, long division of INTEGERS in bad enough. But to throw a couple of pronumerals into that? Complete and utter suck. An example question would have been "Using the long division method, divide (x - 1) into x^2 - 2x + 1" (except a lot harder). I was good at it because it was logical. xD It was just a grind to do.

2. PROBABILITY. Holy shitting fuck. "What is the probability of drawing 4 Jacks consecutively from a deck of cards if you shuffle them 5 times and cover them in dijon mustard?" xD Okay not really. But I haaated probability. The *one* thing in maths that I was never good at. I can see that probability would have a purpose in, I don't know, the world poker tour. xD But for the average joe, no. xD

OMG probability! I was ok at maths generally, but probability was beyond my comprehension. As was fractions! I NEVER got my head around fractions. I still have trouble; I prefer percentages.

And I also never learnt long division, even though we were taught it EVERY YEAR. Just never went in. Thankfully, it never came up on my GCSE paper!

I was good at algebra and trig however; the stuff that everyone else struggled with ;)

I agree with you on the English part. I too am a black and white person, which is why I am enjoying studying law right now. It's either RIGHT or it's WRONG. English was completely subjective and it just depended on if you got a nice person marking your paper!

GOSH, YO - NO, THAT IS NOT QUITE TRUE ABOUT ENGLISH. LIKE IT IS SUBJECTIVE, BUT YOU TOTALLY HAVE TO USE EVIDENCE AND LOGIC TO ARGUE YOUR POINT! IT'S QUITE SIMILAR TO LAW IN THAT WAY! IT'S NOT ABOUT BEING RIGHT - IT'S JUST DECIDING A PERSPECTIVE TO ARGUE, AND TOTALLY PUTTING FORWARD A CONVINCING ARGUMENT! WHICH IS WHAT LAWYERS DO WHEN THEY ARE DEFENDING A GUILTY PERSON!

Yes but they never LIKED my perspective :-(

And gosh, I remember reading the marking guidelines for past papers before taking my GCSEs, and there were only a certain number of angles you could argue. If you found something new and amazing, well gosh, it didn't matter, because the exam board were arses! That was why I had such problems with it (and most GCSEs in general; they were all about including 'key words' when I did them in 2004); I'm great at bullshitting and would always back it up with evidence and stuff and they'd still be all, 'NO, that's wrong!'

YES, YO - THE KEY WORD CRAP IS SOMETHING NEW AND SHIT. IT'S EVERYWHERE - IT'LL BE IN YOUR OU COURSES TOO PROBABLY. I WAS ABOUT TO SAY HOW ENGLISH LIT IS SO MUCH BETTER WHEN YOU GET TO UNI, AND SO MUCH MORE SCOPE FOR ORIGINAL THOUGHT, BUT I'M NOT EVEN SURE IF THAT IS STILL THE CASE ANY MORE, ALAS.

I'M CURIOUS - WHAT NAUGHTY STUFF DID YOU ARGUE AND GET TOLD IT WAS WRONG?

Gosh it was ages ago now, I can't remember! I did Eng Lit at AS (because I had to with Drama) and I got an A on my paper about The Tempest (I answered a question about Ariel) and I think a D or E on my paper for Death of a Salesman. Or was that my coursework? Gosh, I don't even remember! I hated Miller plays.

I think we should have more careers training... Not useless lessons such as "Make a mind map of your life, charting where you want to be in 5 years time etc.," (I did have to do that in one lesson, as I'm sure many of you did... to no benefit, of course. I'm sure my life hasn't turned out how I mapped!). Proper useful things like how to not be a moron in a job interview, how to give a presentation without accidentally inciting your boss in some scandalous affair (I've never done that, but the potential to do so is always there!), and stuff... I feel that school in no way prepares you for work!

Otherwise... don't really have any complaints about my education. I know people like to mock Pythagoras, but I'm sure it's useful in life. For pool or snooker perhaps... um. Yeah, that's the only example I can come up with! I mean, I use it in my job so it's useful to me!

Can I mock trig and algebra instead then? Haha. I was ok at maths but I really disliked it.

How careers lesson stood when I was at school was an absolute piss take.

How to construct a resume/CV!