This morning I had one of my health and exercise science classes. In this class I always arrive somewhat early just because I hate trying to get a parking spot at the same time everyone else is. Anyway this is what I went to class with, everyone came into the classroom and just sat down, no one said anything to anyone except the occasional head nod of acknowledgement. Here is my theory behind this.
Everyone in life has the same kind of goal (this is my assumption based off my friends and family it could very well be wrong) is to not be lonely throughout their life. Everyone has different ways of filling this loneliness, some people make tons of friends, some try to get in a relationship, and some people get pets (this is usually the most extreme case when it is ONLY pets keeping a person company I've come to notice) and some people do a combination of all of these. The two most popular are friends and/or relationships, you are probably thinking why is he pointing out the obvious?
Well I say all of this because I have learned that all relationships are based somewhat off of the first impression between the people in question. This all becomes an issue in the classroom because no one has been able to, or at least very few people have had the chance to, make a good first impression on the other people in the class. I do not believe that anyone in life wants to be considered the weird person and ignored by everyone. This becomes a problem because when a teacher asks a question to the entire classroom and no one answers it has a reason and is "solved" by the teacher very poorly if you ask me. What happens is no one in the classroom wants to get the rep of THAT guy/girl who is going to answer every question the teacher asks or thinks they know everything. So because of this no one in the classroom answers the question, and the majority of the time the teacher will say (if this is the beggining of the year/semester) "Ok everyone take a chance and get to know your neighbors and talk/introduce yourself to at least four people around you" We all know this because it has happened to us at least once in our academic career (most likely more). Here is the problem with this system. To make a good first impression it usually requires the person initiating the "meet" to be relaxed (some people can feel this way faster and are usually the people who have lots of relationships of all kinds). However when the teacher makes you talk to these people, you suddenly get a small rush of panic of how to make a good first impression because you know you will forever be remembered by that impression. This usually results in an even more awkward environment because everyone in the classroom is acting like they are too cool to introduce themselves and make an impression when they are really just a little nervous about the impression they might make.
Here is my possible solution to this problem (may work, it may not, its just a suggestion). But from what I have found as I have watched people get to know eachother is that the first thing that someone looks for as a connection to someone is usually a sense of humor. Most people feel joy when they can make someone else happy or laugh. This is why my solution involves comedy and luck. If a teacher has a class and then one day (preferably in the beginning of the school year) does not show up until about 20-30 minutes into the class one of two things can happen. Usually the "Class Clown" does this but sometimes it can be someone else, but this person will make a joke out loud to the class and hopefully make people laugh, thus breaking the ice. I think this works because when you laugh with other people you suddenly feel like you might be able to converse and you become more relaxed and start talking to people around you about the class being stupid or why the teacher is late, either way these people will be able to talk to eachother about something they have in common and become less awkward. Yes you can't do this with everyone in the classroom but by the transitive property if everyone knows someone through someone then everyone knows eachother at least a little.
However the reason why this solution requires a bit of luck is that there is a second result to a teacher not showing up. The "Cool kids", or the people who think they are too good for everything and everyone, will get up and just leave, and then everyone else will follow because no one wants to be left out or be considered a goody two shoes that will sit in the classroom until the teacher shows up even if everyone is leaving.
So in conclusion, for this solution to work you have to hope that the comedy guy/girl in your classroom will make a joke before the "Cool Kids" decide they are better than everything. For those of you reading this that are not in school anymore, this same thing happens in offices and work situations, people try to find a time where they can make a joke to break the ice. So if you want to try and start a relationship of any kind, giving other people an oppurtunity to make a small joke that isn't offensive or mean will be a great way to meet them, or if you are the jokester try to make jokes to more people that looks like they are in a mood to meet a new person.
-Dan
Also I realize that a lot of my pieces will change from the starting topic as I write it, this is because my thoughts piece together better when I write them out and I usually go into writing these things with just an idea, nothing official.
No comments:
Post a Comment