Guil Johnson

Dr. Rieman

English 1101x-033

April 7th, 2010

Bored throughout school: Interpretation of Gatto’s “Against School”

Probably the best way to sum up this essay of Gatto’s is a quote the talks about a woman

married at the age of 15, Ariel Durant, who was “Unschooled perhaps, but not uneducated”.

This essay is describing the boredom that comes with the process of going through the 12 years

of general education. Points in this article are that, like the previous quote, one does not have to

be well schooled to be well educated or successful through life; as those before such as George

Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Edison, and Abraham Lincoln. All of these men were

very affective and powerful in the nation without ever having the credential of general grade

school. “ We have been taught (that is, schooled) in this country to think of success as

synonymous with, or at least dependent upon, "schooling," but historically that isn't true in either

an intellectual or a financial sense.” My personal opinion on this is that this quote could not be

any truer. The evidence has already come and gone, past presidents, engineers, inventors, famous

celebrities, who have been successful without the so called “necessary” schooling. I have friends

who dropped out of high school and doing well. Some with business opportunities that were

waiting for them to just get out of school because of family businesses, those who went into the

military early and are training to fight for this country have all the respect they need without this

12 year general education.

 Boredom in schools is one of the main points that Gatto was trying to make in his essay.

He uses examples of students not being excited to learn which in turn make them not focus in the

classroom in which frustrates the teachers. Also the teachers at which are bored with the material

they are basically told to teach through the school system. I like the quote that Gatto uses from

his grandfather when Gatto was a little kid. It stated that when he was seven years old, he told his

grandfather that he was bored, after his grandfather popped him on the head he told him to not

say that around him ever again because it was “his fault and only his fault” that he was bored.

Same applies for the students and the teachers in the school. One, the material might being

boring to teach, but it is the teachers fault for letting it be that way; same goes for the student by

letting themselves be bored instead of trying to be into the subject and interested about learning.

As like me through grade school, I was not interested in many subjects that were taught in my

school. The only way I could learn was if I was not bored by the subject. I was fortunate to have

teachers who cared and made the “boring” subjects fun and exciting by do such methods like

reenactments of battle scenes from famous battles in history, and fun games that you play to test

you on your knowledge of material which awarded prizes at the end. This a lot of the time took

the boredom out of classes I did not like, and I have the creative minds of the teachers to thank

for this because they understood that students do not like being bored so their selves changed

that. This means that boredom is able to be changes within us and not just a thing that has to

happen in the school material.