Random Area XI: The Good, The Bad, and The Random.

Americans being bad at geography isn't on them, it's on the education system. Even as a Sophomore in High School, many students didn't know basic information. I once tried to help some students with geography so I showed them a world map and one girl was shocked to find that Egypt was in Africa (As opposed to being entirely in the Mid East like she thought). I also remember having to help a bunch of students with finding Anatolia (Asian Turkey) on a map of the Mid East. And, this was most shocking to me personally, one compadre of mine didn't even know Japan was a chain of islands!

Now, you could say "OMFG, these kids are dumb, rofl", but that in itself is a very uneducated statement. These students are very smart, probably smarter than I am. They could probably know more geography and history than me if they wanted to, but they just aren't as interested. This was an AP course, and they worked very diligently to get the grades they wanted and to get their grades on the final AP Exam.

At the end of the day, it comes down to the education system. The only geography we were ever mandated to know by the State or by the Federal Government were the 50 States of the United States, and even then, it's only taught in FIFTH GRADE. After that, no longer required. I, fortunately, had two great History teachers in a row, however, who got me interested in History and Geography and the like. In 7th Grade, my teacher forced us to learn the 50 States and to take a quiz about them, saying "As an American, you need to know the States". And he's completely right. I think that's what solidified my memory of the states and what forced me to remember them. My 8th Grade Teacher then made us learn 5 random important foreign countries and where they were for a quiz as well. If those two teachers ran the Education system in the United States, our populous would be so much more educated.

Education system is going worse and worse, always focuses on unimportant stuff over what could actually be used...like music class(some like it but I hate it 🔥)

Edit:as in geography and history is more important than music imo they say history is useless? BS there is plenty of lessons very few heed too.

Music teaches to think, history to analyze, geography to understand politics, politics raises wars and wars can only be stopped by those who can think, analyze and understand.

Well, to place NK near it's actual location/in PRC, close enough.

To place it a little bit off in the South (Vietnam), well, wrong country but still acceptable (it had a North VS South, Commie VS Democrats war once).

To put it in Canada, your own neighbour, however, that's a little alarming isn't it?


My country's education system has Geography be based around natural processess of Earth and Human Geography (Urbanisation, Traffic, Tourism). So if yours at least does have a system like this, can't fault you for not being exposed to mordern politics.

For Social Studies, we focus on politics in our own nation, can't fault you for not knowing about NK if your SS system is like this.

For History, unless you've yet to advance to WW2 Japan's expansionist policies or Cold War, well, you should at least know Korea isn't in Europe (cuz everyone will focus on Europe where the war "officially" started).

Singapore education is slightly better off.

We weren't taught much history or geography in Primary school, though our Primary 5 and 6 Social Studies textbooks (which were very thin, less than 1 cm) were about Ancient Civilisations and Southeast Asia respectively.

At Secondary 1, for geography, we were taught the world map, though only about the five continents and oceans; nothing about countries (unless it's SEA or that we asked the teacher). But that's all about maps and places. We definitely won't be taught what the capital of Mongolia is and such.

For history, we learn nothing but colonism in Singapore and a bit about things before that. Even at Secondary 2 we are only taught Japanese Occupation and Politics after that. We only learn WW2, WW1, Cold War and Colonism at Secondary 3 and 4 ONLY IF WE CHOOSE IT.

Music is something that should be taught in Elementary and Middle School, but by High School, it's really unnecessary for everybody to take it. Music class in Elementary and Middle School is important as it can possibly ignite interest in music as the students are still fairly young and probably haven't been exposed to music yet. By High School however, kids know whether they like music and whether they're good at it. For those who are good at it, great, there are enough of those type of students to make an elective or even a couple for those. But for those, like me, who couldn't sing to save their life, then there's no point to making us take music, even if it's needed for one elective credit. Same goes for stuff like Art or Technology (I do believe that taking at least a semester long computer course should be mandatory, however, given the world we currently live in).