<p>Given the current (big) issues in our society I think some formal training in nutrition and personal finance and finding a job/ workplace etiquette.</p>
<p>We had a “life management” class in middle school which taught how to write checks, balance a checkbook, basic cooking and sewing… that’s all I remember. The sewing was fun but most of it I think it was too soon to be productive, I had forgotten how to write a check by the time I was actually old enough to have a checking account. Not that any of those skills were particularly difficult to pick up when I needed them… I feel like most kids who fail to learn how to do these things it isn’t because it is just so hard to learn on their own and they’ve never been taught so much as they did not care or resented having to learn.</p>
<p>We did have an assignment in the class, which I also think was too early to be productive, where we were assigned a partner and a salary and price listings for various apartments, cars, grocery stores, utility companies, etc and had to figure out how to make the budget work. Could have been very useful in high school or college, especially if student loans were included in the bills-- that might have helped me immensely senior year of HS in choosing a college, but not so very helpful in 6th grade. My assigned partner was a moron and insisted on buying designer clothes and sports cars on a teacher’s salary and flatly refused to buy the generic groceries we could afford or pay our rent, so we failed the assignment.</p>
<p>“financial literacy becoming a requirement to graduate”</p>
<p>Just teach math on a good level. Let kids calculate mortgages, taxes, credit card fees … all could be done as part of the math curriculum, in middle school.</p>
<p>Third world country experience? </p>
<p>Why do you think it will teach your kid anything? Why? It is a different world with different rules of game. </p>
<p>“Survival in inner city Detroit” - real life experience … :(((</p>
<p>"The kids were required to write research papers using library books as sources and not the internet. "</p>
<p>Real life skill?</p>
<p>"My assigned partner was a moron and insisted on buying designer clothes and sports cars on a teacher’s salary and flatly refused to buy the generic groceries we could afford or pay our rent, so we failed the assignment. "</p>
<p>He was right. The assignment is so bizarre, that I understand why he wanted to make fun of it.</p>
<p>I think this kind of education could be helpful but would need to be implemented a lot better than what I’ve seen. The education my daughter received about taxes consisted of learning the names of a few forms and how to transfer a few numbers from one box to another, and searching the internet for some pie charts relating to how the government spends our taxes. It might suffice for a teen trying to file their first 1040 EZ, but when you don’t even mention how different things are handled in the tax code (like mortgages or IRA’s), it’s not going to help anyone aiming for a middle class lifestyle. </p>
<p>In the unit on interest and banking, she had to fill in a table with interest calculations (done not on a calculator, that would have been too hard, but on a supplied fill-in-the-blank computer form). She got some very rosy projections on how much money she could save in her savings account. Turns out it’s quite easy to grow your money when the bank is paying you 8-12 percent interest (!!)–with no mention of the fact that you’d get more like 1/10th that rate in today’s economy. It’s also much easier to get rich off your savings account in a world where the government doesn’t tax that interest and there’s no inflation, despite those high interest rates. I just hope no kids are using the information in this class to make any real plans… Overall, I’d call it kindergarten personal finance.</p>
<p>This thread brought back some memories of an earlier time that I just had to share. When I was in junior high school (we didn’t call it middle school then), the girls took quarter-long classes in sewing, cooking, home nursing, and home management, while the boys took woodworking and some class that seemed to involve measuring stuff-can’t recall the name. I spent an entire quarter making a wrap-around skirt in sewing and found the whole experience so awful I haven’t touched a sewing machine since. In cooking we learned how to can grape jelly (mine boiled over and coated the entire stove in jelly) and make cheese sauce. Home nursing taught me how to take a temperature and how to change sheets without the patient having to get out of the bed. All I can remember from home management was learning how to polish silver. All in all, not one of the great moments in the history of American education!</p>
<p>A required financial literacy class is a great idea. It also should include information on the stock market and on investing and trading.</p>
<p>I also would have computer skills be a part of a life skills class. Perhaps teach Word, Excel and other basic programs.</p>
<p>I’m pushing 60 and I never balanced my check book.</p>
<p>Momma J, I loved Home Ec! We learned about 50 nifty things to do with cheesecloth; what to do with a worn out bath towel, and yes, that quite dated lesson on polishing silver with a soft toothbrush. I wore that wrap around skirt until it fell apart, but have never made jam apart from that awful experience in 7th grade. BUT we also had one semester of Wood and Metal shop (while the boys swapped and took Home Ec) which has come in handy a few times.</p>
<p>"I also would have computer skills be a part of a life skills class. Perhaps teach Word, Excel and other basic programs. "</p>
<p>Not in the HS!</p>
<p>“stock market and on investing and trading.”</p>
<p>This would be cool!</p>
<p>" job/ workplace etiquette" - interesting idea.</p>
<p>Mock college admission interviews? May be some mock job interviews? “5 minutes to talk about yourself” training.</p>
<p>When I was in HS we had to take a speech class - I think public speaking as a required class would be a good “life skill” class</p>
<p>Agree with ^</p>
<p>and maybe an interview could be one of the speeches in the speech class?</p>