Joy: A Subject Schools Lack - The Atlantic - 1 views
-
The thing that sets children apart from adults is not their ignorance, nor their lack of skills. It’s their enormous capacity for joy.
-
Human lives are governed by the desire to experience joy. Becoming educated should not require giving up joy but rather lead to finding joy in new kinds of things: reading novels instead of playing with small figures, conducting experiments instead of sinking cups in the bathtub, and debating serious issues rather than stringing together nonsense words, for example
-
In some cases, schools should help children find new, more grown-up ways of doing the same things that are perennial sources of joy: making art, making friends, making decisions
- ...3 more annotations...
-
why not focus on getting them to take pleasure in meaningful, productive activity, like making things, working with others, exploring ideas, and solving problems?
-
The more dire the school circumstances, the more important pleasure is to achieving any educational success
-
You can force a child to stay in his or her seat, fill out a worksheet, or practice division. But you can’t force a person to think carefully, enjoy books, digest complex information, or develop a taste for learning. To make that happen, you have to help the child find pleasure in learning—to see school as a source of joy