The Horns

One of the beliefs that I try to pass on is that you have to grab life by the horns and wrestle it down.

Life does not give anything away. If you want it, it's out there. It is only out there, though, if you are willing to fight for it.

Whenever students tell me that what we are learning is stupid (or the completely terrible slang term of "gay" now--kids say, "That's gay" meaning stupid), I try to explain that there is a method to the madness. I am frank with them in saying that some things are just an exercise in thinking. You can't tell me that even 1% of the students needs to know about factoring polynomials in math. You do it because it is an exercise in thinking and logic. You will never do sentence diagramming again outside of English class. I admit that. ...But you never know.

I impart that they don't know what they are going to do yet. They may do a million different things. They have to be ready for anything. Sometimes it is just learning for the exercise of learning. "You have to exercise your brain," I say, "just like a bicep."

I tried today to explain to a couple of classes, after a student or two talks about how they hate school and wish they didn't have to be there, that you may be happy working on a shovel for the rest of your life. But wouldn't you like the choice?

I can't download the information into their brains.