5 Life Skills Your School Should Have Taught You But Didn’t

There are a lot of memes about how what we learned in school is never useful in our real lives. The skills that we need to survive in the real world are seldom taught by schools or even elders. The most important things that we need to do as adults are something that most of us learn ourselves.

Getting out of colleges and universities, we feel like we are now ready to step into proper adulthood where we earn for ourselves and pay for our own bills. But, that is not how we continue feeling; the first few years pass in figuring out how to exactly to do the adult stuff. Here are a few things that people usually struggle with and why it is important to incorporate them into our lives early on.

1. Personal finance

As we grow up, we realize that money is one of the most significant aspects of life that we need to survive. Proper management of finances is seldom taught to us, it is learned through mistakes and experiences. Learning personal finance is usually expected to be coached by parents but isn’t it an important life skill which schools should be responsible for?

It is no surprise that most of the lottery winners end up getting broke or exhausting the money on addictions. Adequate management of funds and investment of money should be introduced from an early age by the school systems to make the future children more responsible.

2. Importance of mental health

Mental health is something which was not even acknowledged until the 2000s. Anxiety, stress, worry, paranoia, depression, etc. are realities of life, and children should not grow up kicking themselves for feeling these things. The way a person behaves in adversity is usually molded by how that person grew up dealing with problems as a kid.

The notion that not having a good head space is unnatural, uncommon, or not important ends up worsening the situation rather than dealing with the issues at its source. Many schools are starting to introduce psychiatrist and counselors, but they should also make sure students don’t feel worried or taboo to approach them. Respect and awareness for mental health should be introduced right at the beginning of a person’s life to ease things in the future.

3. Friendships and romantic relationships

A significant part of a person’s life is spent on maintaining friendships and romantic relationships, yet little to none is contributed in this direction by the schooling system. This is another important aspect of life, which is expected to be taught and taken care of by elders and parents.

The constant breaking of relationships is proof that people need to be taught how to respect others’ space, learn to trust, overcome bad times, share feelings, and communicate. Dating, romance, and sexual urges are frowned upon and ignored in certain countries, which ironically ends up worsening the situation as children grow up learning from wrong sources.

It is high time this is acknowledged as a fact of life, and schools try to lay down a foundation from the beginning of a person’s life. Some schools have taken that up by introducing sex education into their curriculum.

4. Basic life skills (cooking, repairing, and swimming)

We all come across memes online on “If only I learned this in school.” Cooking, repairing, and swimming, are all life skills which might not necessarily be vital in life, but they are very common and makes a person independent and confident to live alone. Cooking is not learned by someone unless it is necessary or they have an interest in it. When people move out of their parent’s house, this is one of their biggest regrets as food is one of the basics of life.

Repair work and swimming, however, might not seem as important as cooking but they are handy skills to have in the bag in case something goes wrong. It is often the case that people say growing up is a combination of learning and getting a lot of things right, but seldom do we realize very few of them were taught to you in school. This pattern has to change to make the future kids better equipped to deal with the reality of life.

5. Professional etiquette

It is often the case that people have to learn to speak and write formally. Writing a resume, email, or even a letter is a challenge for most; communication is poor in general. Communication and professional work etiquette are vital in life irrespective of the field one intends to go into.

In the past, recruiters have found it difficult to hire a person just because of the lack of common etiquette and communication skills. Respecting diversity and working in harmony with people you do not necessarily connect with is critical. Hostile work environment will always lead to inconvenience and less productivity. Common manners and etiquettes should be introduced by the school system to generate better workers and better work environment.

Where does this leave us?

While we all know this, and we all discuss this. Changes aren’t that easy to come. School systems changing isn’t as easy as just flipping the curriculum. Yes, we would love to have schools teach real-life skills. Many schools are making changes to incorporate various subjects and workshops for better preparing the kids for life.

It is slow, but there is progress. Meanwhile, as elders, we need to teach the children all that they will need to know when they step into adulthood themselves. Don’t shy away from teaching them about personal finances, savings, taxes, housing, anything that can be pegged as boring. Tag them along from time to time so that they get the experience of these things first hand. Take the children with you to the bank, to shopping for groceries, to pay bills – let them see what it takes and how it is done. Remember, we all need to do our part for a better world.