On Teaching Something Students Hate

The day started at 7 am and by 6 pm, which is actually now, I found my day to be especially hectic. I just finished teaching my FYP student basics of the Python programming language, 3.2.2. My mind totally went blank after a continuous series of (moderate to heavy) physical and mental 'workout'.

After so many FYP students, this is probably the one I had the most headache of, and surprisingly the first one whom I take the time to actually teach him programming. Not that I want to, but I am cornered, since there are some functions which are needed to treat the data before you plot them. If not, I would love to let him use the new MS Excel which could store more than 1 million rows of data, and do away my troubles (and his, since he doesn't need to learn programming).

I have tried motivational teaching, situational teaching and also spoon-feeding teaching. I found that there are differences in each of the method (of course, you say), but however different they are, there's one similarity all these different teaching styles share: the students simply hate and reject the content taught.

There are things we love to learn in life, and there are things we hate. It's normal. The thing is, sometimes you need the skills you hate to learn to perform. And that's where the dilemma kicks in. Whenever I tell students that they have to know it nonetheless, they groan or frown or throw tantrums. In their minds. I can see it. I feel the pain in them. I really do. I wish I can do away the pain, or inspire them to love what they hate at first sight, to no avail of course, no matter which style of teaching I employed. So, the question is, which style of teaching will make them learn the thing fastest? Motivational? Situational?

It turns out the answer is none of the above. I am enlightened today, apart from being extremely tired at this point. There is simply no 'most efficient teaching style' when you are teaching things the students hate, for example, programming in my case. However, if you actually drill them through the real thing, let them perform what they are to perform while learning the skills they hate on the spot, they actually get it. Lightning fast. No motivational talk is needed this time whatsoever.

And maybe that's how we should deal with the things we hate in life, those that we have to face anyway. It kinda reminds me of Nike's slogan: Just do it.