I Wish Education Aroused The Same Passion As Football

I wish that education ever aroused the same passion as football. I wish it were so relevant and essential that our children and young people could have a quality education. An education where discoveries arouse the same emotion as a goal or a basket at the last minute.

If only we could relieve our teachers, if only we could make their profession a well-regarded and paid job. We wish we could see in our children their true potential, wish governments would adopt the best means of teachers so that they could teach in the most individual way possible, embracing and highlighting the strengths of each of their pupils.

I wish the teenager who asks and shows passion for what the books tell arouse the same expectations in parents, in society, as the teenager who promises to be the best in the world, silver, bronze or all at once. I wish newspapers alluding to new discoveries made those headlines as long-awaited and interesting as those in the days after the big games.

As we read and think about these “wouldn’ts”, there are thousands of children who have nothing to eat, who are looking for a plot of ground to study an inherited book, who look at their notebook and don’t know what happened. Thousands of kids who get frustrated with math, thousands of analyzes they don’t understand, wars they don’t know. Wars, prejudices and beliefs that deceive with their intention to move forward, to survive.

It has been found that most of the educational systems in the world are inadequate due to their insufficiency, as they limit the study to school and do not start from the knowledge of children to enhance them. Even though the means are different, bad education is present in both poor and developed countries.

The “doctor football” effect

It’s well known in the medical context: on football match days and at the time of major competitions, our hospital emergencies get emptier. A phenomenon so curious that it provokes some reflection on our passions.

In Spain, studies were carried out on this fact and the conclusions are that 35% fewer patients arrive at the emergency room, and the percentage is higher (44%) if we consider people with minor or minor illnesses. The difference is significant and makes us question our habits.

Habits that are reflected in the question – obligatory answer – that we ask our children practically since they begin to utter their first words: “Which team do you support?” . We don’t usually ask ourselves that maybe the child doesn’t like football or, at least, doesn’t have that much interest. We “force” them to have an answer, to score a goal.

Education is the basis of society

The secret of the success of Finnish education, a clear reference in this regard, is that its performances are characterized by consideration for the professors who have been selected and that they are offered the means to become wonderful instructors.

In this way, the guarantee that education  must offer is to instruct each child according to their potential, ensuring that each person can surpass themselves, and not manufacturing general agendas that do not allow for any adaptation but for many frustrations. , to many annoyances, disastrous notes and losses that are difficult to quantify because of their importance for society, for the species or for the planet.

The best educational system is the one that manages to make students go further and improve their results, individualizing and making the curriculum that is proposed more flexible. That is, transforming into reality an educational proposal based on the Vygostkian concept of capacity and potential.

This is not to say that we should stop being emotional about the sport. We would be silly if we didn’t understand that, in addition to its playful component, it is a source of entertainment and a perfectly valid context for the formation of values. A team would not be good if its members did not understand the importance of cooperation, if they did not put into practice the Gestalt principle that the whole is much more than the sum of the parts.

It’s a miracle that education survives our education system.

Education, as defined in terms of resources and concept, is currently in deficit in most parts of the planet. Einstein, one of history’s greatest geniuses, claimed that it is a miracle that human curiosity survives regulated education.

Let’s agree that something is wrong and that something is not new. Why does a 4-year-old ask more than 100 questions a day and a 10-year-old just start worrying about test answers? The answer is easy, as as a society we are clipping our children’s wings. And that doesn’t just happen at school.

Because if the child cannot learn along the general path that was traced out for him and for the rest of the children of his age, then he must teach along the path in which the child will learn, along the path indicated by his abilities. Because, in the end, it’s mostly about keeping in mind that the real right is not to be equal, but to be different and to be treated as such, starting with education.