What a roller coaster of emotions this week’s readings were.
Can we just take a moment to appreciate how well written the Phillip readings were? I can’t be the only one who audibly groans when seeing a 25 page reading of scanned textbook pages…but can I get more of this?
Learning about the neuroscience involved in adolescence really opened by eyes on how tumultuous our early teens can be. Of course we didn’t need reminders as I’m sure each of our own histories can attest to that, but seeing the inner workings of what may be causing these issues was nothing short of fascinating.
I wonder how puberty affects sex education. I know personally I don’t remember any sex ed until maybe 6th grade? But if people are hitting puberty around age 9/4th grade is that same education taking place much earlier, around 3rd grade? Should it take place preemptively? The gap between our current scientific knowledge vs how the society views these matters is likely what makes policy decisions so difficult. Even with all these progressive ideas that I hold, I don’t think that I would have pushed for elementary sex ed without this new information.
On the other end of the puberty timeline, I wonder how our elongated societal sense of adolescence (as detailed in the “Long Road to Adulthood is Growing Even Longer”) interacts with adolescent risk-taking and how that informs our educational practices. For example, should we still temper early risk-takers considering the increasing need to adapt during your twenties as opposed to how “stable” it previously was? Or should we encourage risk-taking in order to prepare them for the modern world? Of course there is probably some middle ground but who doesn’t love to think in absolutes every now and again.
Lastly, I have to mention the intense levels of cringe I felt when reading the idea that 50 Cent was the Kurt Cobain of the early 00’s. But I had to check myself when thinking about who I was during that time. I was the new kid, transferring from a middle school in Queens out to Long Island. I was worried about making my first impressions but was shocked to find out that all I needed to do to make friends was to tell them my name. You see, it was 2003 and 50’s new banger just hit the sound waves. I quickly became known as Giovanny “Rims” and it became such an intrinsic part of my identity that I began to sign my middle school journal entires as “G-Unit”.
sigh