To think schools should have a class to teach basic life skills

[beesandstrawberries]

We all learned so much in school that we haven’t used in day to day life - I mean when have we ever touched a Bunsen burner since school? But none of us was learned the basics of life and how to navigate it - things like:

• Showing how to do basic meals, cooking pasta safety, use of kitchen appliances correctly
• paying bills
• what a mortgage is, how to deal with contracts and paperwork
• how to meter readings
• change a lightbulb, basic tool use in the home
• how to check fire alarms
• credit card education
• managing money, spreadsheets to manage them
• insurances like life insurance and what ones you need
• education on abusive relationship signs
• things like peer pressure
• how to write formal letters/emails

I think we learn so many things that mean nothing when we leave school. If you teach kids basic life skills from a young age, it would make kids a lot more well rounded and less anxious in the ‘real world’ when it comes to managing money and not getting in debt. Even learning things like the warning signs of abusive relationships to young and impressionable teens as I think if I heard the signs then, I would have know what to look out for to prevent myself from getting in one as an adult.

I remember being in the real world and not knowing how to have good money management and I’m 28 and have no idea how to change a lightbulb. Even education for kids to learn about their bodies, that their outie bellybutton is normal and so are their stretch marks - so they don’t go into adulthood thinking their bodies are imperfect.

Children deserve more than Shakespeare or how to play football in pe. They deserve a kick start to life

I learned many specific life skills at school. Most of them are now obsolete. Everyday life changes faster and faster now so any skill you learn at school isn't necessarily going to be useful even just 10 years later.

But what about the parents who can’t or won’t do it. Do their older children not deserve a chance?

Most of the are covered at school, e.g. food tech, maths, pshe, English.

For all else, there is google and chatgpt, 2 taps away on your smart phones.

The rest of school of life.

I'm amused by the idea that teachers should explain how to do a metre reading. It's not rocket science and there is always YouTube if you're stuck.

@FunAmberShaker agree and use that time for these skills the only problem is you need to get in people who know that stuff.

I'm glad to read this. I find it so depressing when I read yet another thread on MN from a poor mumsnetter trapped in an abusive and unhealthy relationship.

I hope pupils ars taught how to recognise the red flags.

I TOTALLY agree! Maths should contain a lot more financial management - how to understand mortgages and credit card rates and budgeting. Everyone needs this in their lives and never simultaneous equations!

And cooking - definitely alongside nutrition and healthy diets.

I agree a lot of it can be taught at home too by parents but I also think that the school curriculum should cover a lot more practical / useful things.

You have a really good point, however…..

how the fuck do you not know how to change a lightbulb?

I think lack of parenting has started to change the curriculum a bit to include more general stuff that should be taught by parents. It is recognised, particularly in deprived areas, that you get kids who aren’t even provided with the basics like clean knickers, let alone taught how to change lightbulbs.

Tbh, financial management is pretty basic. Incomings minus outgoings. I can't say I ever really understood interest rates or mortgages ery well, but I did know not to spend more than I could afford and I knew buying anything where you were being charged interest (with the exception of a mortgage) was dumb

@fossilBee

For all else, there is google and chatgpt, 2 taps away on your smart phones.

Playing Devil's Advocate. So why teach pythagoras then? Likewise it can easily be found by google.

The core subjects/curriculum in schools hasn't fundamentally changed for decades yet the World has changed out of all recognition.

In a nutshell😉

As many others have said that's a parents job

So you're consigning millions of kids to a life of incompetence, misery and financial failure, because of their parents who can't/won't teach them life skills? I thought we'd moved on from that kind of thinking?

Parents should be teaching healthy relationships, but schools seem to have taken that on board in PHSE.

It seems that the school system has "picked and chosen" some "life skills" but not others.

YABU this is the parents job !

I'm not in the UK any more and in the country I'm in now they do home ec in 7th grade (and as an optional course in 8th and 9th, apparently most popular elective for boys which surprised me) where they learn so much about cooking and nutrition, much more than I learnt in gcse food tech. They cook full meals, make bread from scratch, learn how to wash up properly (a 13 step method!).
They do handicrafts throughout school learning to sew, knit, crochet so can repair clothing and make their own, and woodwork and metalwork where they make much more stuff than I did in the UK. Some 8/9th graders in DD's school made a full size play cottage which they are now selling. Every 7th grader makes a chair.

In 6th grade social studies they learn how to apply for jobs, do mock interviews, work their job for one day in a mock business village, earn their wage and spend it. They learn how to budget for a household and how to budget tax income and expenses for a town (teaching them where their taxes go). Many schools also do a similar project in 9th grade except instead of a mock job, they make their own business in small groups and learn about entrepreneurship.

They do emotional and social intelligence classes in 2nd grade and 6th grade, and now (changed from when DD was in primary school) they do an hour a week of social skills lessons starting in 1st grade. In upper school they have student guidance classes which seems to be a mix of pshe and preparation for next stage of learning and working life. They also have health classes separate to science.

I think they teach so much more useful things to children than I was taught in school (although I was taught formal letter writing in year 5 - still remember it vividly) but that was a long time ago so hopefully things have improved in the UK now. They manage to fit this all in without increasing hours (and much less hours in primary school than the uk).

Parents should but in many cases they don’t because they are useless. I agree OP it should be part of the curriculum. Sadly we have a few generations upcoming of useless people!

I once mentioned this to my children's headteacher (primary school) and her response was that these are skills that should be learnt at home. I come from a very capable, independent household where children were expected to cook, clean etc. As in normal household chores. However no one actually showed me how to clean the bathroom, light the fire, iron a shirt. I just learnt. Admittedly possibly from seeing it done. School is preparation for the world of work where expectations are conscientiousness, time keeping, developing work relationships, IT skills, writing reports etc. schools can't be responsible for everything.

Nail on the head. We can't write off young people because they had useless parents.

It really wouldn't take much time to put a bit more "real life" English skills into the English lessons. Nor add a bit more real life examples into Maths lessons. Or put "home" skills like changing a lightbulb into "tech" lessons. How about doing it in otherwise "dead" time like in cover lessons where the cover teacher just tells the class the read their books or do their homework (happens far too often), or at the end of the school year after the formal exams have been done and there's a couple of weeks (at least) of watching DVDs, playing games, filling in wordsearches or crosswords, etc? After all, if schools/teachers think these things are parent's jobs and so easy, then any cover teacher (any subject) should be able to use dead time to impart some useful "Life skills" into the pupils!

I don't think "lifeskills" needs to be formally put on curriculae and included in exams. As others have said, some of the skills (like compound interest) are already there, but are often not accessible to the less able pupils (i.e. who can't do algebra) whereas real life scenarios of not paying off the credit card bill or saving into a pension for 40 years may help a struggling pupil to "see the light" in the way that the compound interest equation wouldn't.

I agree with you @applestrudels - I've always found it ignorant when people say it's waste of time, no it's an academic discipline. It doesn't mean you spend the lesson praying and it really is important in the pluralist global world we live in. Knowledge is power. 😉

I think they should. Bring back Home Economics!

No one ever taught me any of this apart from cooking. I think if I had been introduced to this stuff, even vaguely, it would be easier to learn fully as an adult.

Seriously, is there anything teachers aren't going to be asked to do? Basic household day to day tasks like looking at a meter box to read the numbers, changing a lightbulb and boiling pasta can be shown in a minute, or picked up through observation and a quick chat. Would much rather schools focus on what can't be learned at home

Most of these things are taught in school.

Light bulb, meter reading and smoke alarms can be covered at home?

@Feckoffimonholiday

Would much rather schools focus on what can't be learned at home

Most stuff these days could be learned at home. I think there should be a shift to school's teaching the most important things. We have more knowledge than ever in our hands so we should be teaching skills rather than knowledge.

A lot of these things are actually covered in pshe days.
And the kids moan every time about how boring these subjects are. Every. Bloody. Time.