How I Made Even The Most Boring Class Interesting
By Alexis Bowen
We all have those classes – the boring ones we can’t seem to pay attention during or find any motivation to do the work for- no matter how hard we try. You’re not alone if you feel like falling asleep in your history class! Trust me, I like history, but I would rather be sleeping at 8AM rather than discussing a podcast we had to listen to for homework.
Outside of my own personal feelings, being able to find a way to engage with seemingly boring classes and put a personal interest in them can make your life a lot easier. The way each person can do this will be different, so I will take my experiences so far this semester with my history class.
In my history class, my readings I had to do for each class would take me much longer than normal because I would put them off and constantly get distracted while reading. However, I realized that I could use our topic, the time period before, during, and after the Holocaust and how it impacted migration. This is a very specific topic, and when doing research about it I got lost in a lot of the politics (I get very bored by politics to which I don’t relate).
In order to avoid these things, I put some type of personal stake into the knowledge I have been learning. I am a creative writer, and I am always gathering inspiration for new stories to write. So I began to look at it from that aspect. I can take inspiration from real life events and use them to make my writing pieces even more realistic.
Now, maybe not everyone is a creative writer, but similar things can be implemented for other outside interests. Maybe if you are a photographer in a chemistry class, think about ways you could use certain types of chemical reactions in a photoshoot. If you are a mathematician struggling in a creative writing class, try some short stories from the point of view of a character that is in a similar situation as yourself (drawing inspiration from yourself can help make the writing process much smoother).
While this may not work for all classes or all people, I have yet to find a class that I can’t find some type of interest in. Finding a way to put my passion into all aspects of my life has really done many favors for my focus and motivation.