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British people? I have a question: Do you really not learn history at school?

Ok, let me explain. I was talking to my mother earlier, and she told me again that I should get a teaching qualification, since I probably could and it would definitely come in useful someday. My argument against this previously has been that I wanted to get a job and make money this year, not spend the year preparing for a job. But since jobs aren't forthcoming, I suppose I might as well. And it does sound really fun, actually.

So I went and asked the Google, and it said that if you want to teach Secondary School you need a degree relevant to a school subject, so I thought well, Archaeology is obviously relevant to History, rite gais? But no. Because there is, according to tda.gov.uk, no History in the national curriculum.

Seriously? Seriously? How can you not teach history to children over the age on 10? How can you relate to your society without knowing its history? How do you make sense of its politics and its institutions and its flaws? How do you even begin to comprehend international relations? I am so baffled right now. This fills me with bafflement.

History is one of my main tools to figure out how people work. When I see something happening I relate it to my stock of historical data and figure out why it could be happening and what's likely to happen next. Quite apart form that, History class is where I learned about picking up the bias in a piece of writing, and thus in what people say and think. History is what taught me about seeing things from different people's point of view, about how conflict arises and how it might be resolved. It sounds seriously trite, but history is the mistakes you learn from (and, I suppose, the successes you try to emulate). Individually and collectively. Without it, you're left with only your own experiences to draw on*.

Why would you leave yourself lacking such a tool? I don't get it.


Maybe I should take a course to brush up on my Rechtschreibung and Grammatik and become a sexy exotic foreign language teacher.

I am also amused that the Modern Foreign Languages list ends with "Biblical Hebrew and other European languages". Biblical Hebrew, oh yeah, height of modernity. Right up there with Latin and Akkadian.


Anyway, I think a TEFL qualification might be more suitable for me at the moment. It's less expensive and less time-intensive, and everyone wants to learn English, right?


NOW THEN, as a reward for reading that rant, have some art!

I didn't end up doing that much drawing yesterday. I was busy wandering around looking at exhibits at first, and I also couldn't find a good place to sit where people would hang around long enough for me to sketch them. So I mostly have rough outlines of poses and quick doodles.


My favourite drawing of the day is one I started doing of the pretty building opposite the museum. I was going to finish it from a photo, but I think I might just go back and finish it there. I've got time, after all. :3

And then I bought a calligraphy pen from Muji (couldn't help myself -_-) and drew a bunch of tentacles:

Inane writing is inane.

*(Well, there is history for that, and also fiction. That's also one of the many reasons I enjoy books.)
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