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Comment by Ensorceled | Hacker News Reader

The biggest problem preteen me faced as a curious and voracious reader was not knowing what I didn't know. With limited experience and limited knowledge of the world, I didn't know what phenomenon were actually interesting to me.

So, I became an limited expert in medieval weaponry, which didn't even serve me well in later D&D sessions because a "long sword is a sidearm damn it". Other kids became experts in dinosaurs.

How many kids would actually pursue learning about the phenomenon of "cafeteria services" and would that actually be something that was taught, that just seems ludicrous on the face of it.

Also, I have ADHD, the idea of pre-diagnosis me being dropped into this environment makes me wonder; would I have done better or far, far worse.

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I agree that kids might have a hard time deciding what they want to learn, but it sounds like this approach is less "learn whatever is interesting to you" and more "let's pick some topics together and go from there."

And I disagree that "cafeteria services" is ludicrous. Think of how many things go into planning and preparing meals in the cafeteria. There's the cooking, serving, staffing, ordering, combining, purchasing, and planning. Math goes into estimating how much of each thing to buy, food safety and biological processes can be taught in the context of how long food can be kept safely. Communication goes into creating the menu, and also in the ordering processes. A persuasive essay on cafeteria food selection could be part of the work.

Right, but what high school student is dreaming of a job in cafeteria services? Why are they developing curriculum for this? What poor kid gets to become an expert in how long drums of fry oil can safely be stored before they turn 18?

Would not general management or general nutrition be a far more interesting, useful and universally applicable skill set?

Speaking from experience, none of the high school skills apply to my current job or day to day.

Why would this utilitarian argument that doesn't apply to the current curriculum have to apply to the new one?

That's my point, the example "phenomonon" given, cafeteria services, is extremely utilitarian.

This is such a good point.

If I were to have known what the world had to offer, and how important subjects were I would have made more of my education.

It's really hard when you're young to even get a sense for how powerful knowledge can be.

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