# What were the most useless skills you were taught in school?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [June 5, 2026, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648 "2026-06-05T19:11:43Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 17
### Author:  [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/321 "2026-06-11T01:54:03Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#):
>
> When we converted to metric in New Zealand, we had both systems on every ruler, every road sign, every car odometer and speedometer, and also just made the hard cut off commitment to no longer teach Imperial in schools or have it on food products etc.
Metric was introduced in Australia on religious / socio-political grounds, and heretics who wanted imperial were treated accordingly. They had to walk-back the hard cut-over on road clearance signs, because of the huge surge in low-clearance truck / bridge collisions, but for the rest, mostly no choice was offered – under weights-and-measures legislation it was illegal to provide imperial weights-and-measures values instead of or along with “true” weights-and-measures values. Doubled-up rulers and tape measures were (eventually) illegal to sell or import.
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### Author:  [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/322 "2026-06-11T02:13:44Z")
> [@Melbourne](#):
>
> I don’t know what a polytunnel is, but I would expect the actual length to be 6ft, regardless of how it is described.
I think a polytunnel is a half-tube of transparent plastic sheet supported by flexible arches, used to cover garden plants.
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### Author:  [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/323 "2026-06-11T02:22:55Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#):
>
> I can’t imagine being an engineer in a non-metric country not wanting to change to metric. They should be the ones to know the advantages, or else they’re idiots.
(As an Engineer), it’s a little more complicated than that. It doesn’t really have engineering advantages: it has trade advantages.
When we switched from thousandths of an inch to millimeters, it didn’t reduce errors on the shop floor: the reason we used thousands to specify the length of a car was because workers couldn’t convert units, and the reason we use millimeters to specify the length of a car is because workers can’t convert units. “Decimal” unit conversion is “easier”, but many people don’t “get” decimals, and can’t do decimal conversion: the putative benefit of decimal conversion is irrelevant in engineering, and we don’t do decimal conversion.
Also, you may think that “everybody using decimal” may be an advantage in Engineering, but that’s not true. It’s a _trade_ advantage, not an _engineering_ advantage. In very little of Engineering is “everybody using the same units” of any advantage at all. “Everybody using the same thread pitch and profile” is an engineering advantage, but the engineering dimensions are always different, to achieve the outcome dimensions, which are just labels anyway.
As a kind of example, imagine 2x4 lumber: it’s not actually 2x4. We can take advantage of metrification to rationalize the names, but at the engineering level we still have to work with different input and output dimensions, and we have to work with standard dimensions, not unit conversions.
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### Author:  [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/324 "2026-06-11T02:47:09Z")
> [@Tamerlane](#):
>
> I was fascinated by this and immediately adopted crossed sevens and have been writing them that way ever since
When I started FORTRAN, I _immediately_ adopted “star” for multiplication. I didn’t even think about it, it was so much clearer and less ambiguous than “dot” or “x”. Without thinking, I used it in a blackboard example, and the rest of the class objected – “what is that?” – but my teacher, who had to read my written submissions, jumped in on my side. She was comfortable with the use of “star”, and evidentlly did not think it would be a problem in externally assessed exams.
I also cross my Z, which is unusual here. The typing pool thought that was deliberate, and reproduced it by overtyping, but actually I don’t need that in typed material – it’s just so that my Z isn’t mixed up with my 2
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### Author:  [@sunacres](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sunacres)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/325 "2026-06-11T03:22:29Z")
My (American) middle school students always became furious when I told them about our national failure to follow through on the conversion - by then they’d been using both systems depending on context and VASTLY preferred metric.
Just one more irritating thing for them to blame on Boomers.
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### Author:  [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/326 "2026-06-11T03:25:21Z")
> [@DPRK](#):
>
> I really have to ask, was anyone really taught how to “print” in school? Is that word just thrown around loosely, or was a print typeface really used as a model? Grotesque or Antiqua or…? Was calligraphy a separate class?
Depends on the school you went to, I guess. I was taught to print, as illustrated by charts above, at elementary school. Later, in elementary school, I learned cursive. I can still do neat block capitals, which come in handy for crossword puzzles.
But it was at art school, specifically in Lettering class, that I learned various calligraphic hands (Italic, Celtic, Gothic, etc.), using a dip pen and ink. I also learned text typefaces in that class (Garamond, Caslon, etc.), and I still have my Letraset Catalogue, which, believe it or not, was a required textbook for that course.
So, to answer your question: Yes, calligraphy and lettering was a separate class, taught a long time after elementary school, and only to those who were interested.
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### Author:  [@sunacres](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sunacres)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/327 "2026-06-11T03:28:53Z")
> [@Spoons](#):
>
> Yes, calligraphy and lettering was a separate class, taught a long time after elementary school, and only to those who were interested.
Lucky dogs. I had to teach myself, which was a mess until I eventually mastered the various Speedball nibs.
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### Author:  [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/328 "2026-06-11T03:30:32Z")
> [@Spoons](#):
>
> Depends on the school you went to, I guess. I was taught to print, as illustrated by charts above, at elementary school. Later, in elementary school, I learned cursive. I can still do neat block capitals, which come in handy for crossword puzzles.
Similar to my education (Catholic schools, Midwestern U.S., 1970s). We learned “printing,” as others have shown, with those patterns, starting in either kindergarten or first grade. Cursive writing was introduced to us in, I think, third grade; similar to printing, we were given worksheets with very specific expected shapes for each letter in cursive writing. Once we learned cursive writing, it was generally expected by our teachers that any schoolwork or homework which involved writing words on paper would be done in cursive.
As has been already described, while we were given very specific shapes to use, they weren’t “named” for specific fonts/typefaces – or, if they were, those names were never shared with us kids. They were simply referred to as “printing” and “cursive writing.”
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### Author:  [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/329 "2026-06-11T03:43:25Z")
> [@Dorjan](#):
>
> This chart was on the classroom wall and in the folder of nearly every fellow Gen-X I know in elementary school:
I never understood why the lower case B, D and Q had to be so different. Especially b & d- why? Adds to confusion.
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### Author:  [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/330 "2026-06-11T04:28:37Z")
> [@DPRK](#):
>
> That is one very specific style of cursive.
Yes, but it is the relevant one being discussed when Americans discuss the cursive they were taught in school—albeit possibly with slight variations.
Print and cursive were definitely separately taught for me. You learned the letterforms that were going to be used in all the print books first, and then moved on to learning 3 letter words (in the pink books) with the basic sounds of said letters, then later longer words (in blue books).
You learned cursive when you have moved on to the “green” section, where you learned that letters could make other sounds. From that point on, you were expected to handle reading in print and writing in cursive.
I kept it up mostly through high school, but eventually I realized how hard it could be to read when I was writing quickly, and just how much more space it took up, and that no one cared anymore if I just wrote in print.
I still mostly write in print today if I ever actually put pen to paper. I still don’t consider cursive useless, though–it’s fun.
One thing I find funny is that I almost never saw teachers writing on the board in cursive, except at my elementary school.
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### Author:  [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/331 "2026-06-11T04:36:20Z")
> [@BigT](#):
>
> Yes, but it is the relevant one being discussed when Americans discuss the cursive they were taught in school—albeit possibly with slight variations.
I found this article, which indicates:
- Up through the 1950s, the style of cursive which was generally taught in the U.S. was the “Palmer Method.”
- From then until the late '70s or early '80s, the dominant style was the Zaner-Bloser Method. Looking at the example of Zaner-Bloser in the article, this is what I learned, c. 1973.
- Zaner-Bloser went into decline when the D’Nealian Method was introduced in 1978.
> **[What Method of Cursive Handwriting Was I Taught in 1959-1960?](https://auxiliarymemory.com/2024/03/25/what-method-of-cursive-handwriting-was-i-taught-in-1959-1960/)**
>
> by James Wallace Harris I’ve been wanting to write by hand again, using cursive handwriting. For decades now, whenever I’ve had to write anything by hand, I printed it with block letter…
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### Author:  [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/332 "2026-06-11T04:39:46Z")
True, but as the article itself says:
> What’s weird is all the letters look about the same from method to method.
It also claims that the method is different, but the strokes seem mostly the same to me, too.
IOW, I would count all three as the one I was taught. They’re just so similar that handwriting variations would be sufficient.
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### Author:  [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eyebrows_0f_Doom)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/333 "2026-06-11T04:45:38Z")
The second two methods look virtually identical. Pretty sure it must have been one of those I was taught, early 80s, I remember the Fs and Ts looking like that. Strangely I too, as with the author of that article, have no recollection of that bizarre-looking Q.
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### Author:  [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/334 "2026-06-11T04:46:18Z")
> [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](#):
>
> Strangely I too, as with the author of that article, have no recollection of that bizarre-looking Q.
I remember it; at that time, young me wondered, “why does Q look like a 2?”
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### Author:  [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/335 "2026-06-11T05:00:05Z")
I thought that too, when I was introduced to cursive in about 1968. But when I learned calligraphy, it made sense. Well, kinda-sorta.
Think of an analogue clock face. If you start writing your Q as illustrated, you’re starting at 11 o’clock, curving up to 12, then down to the right, through 1, 2, 3, and so on; and creating a loop that crosses your just-drawn down line.
Now, start your letter at 6 o’clock, or even 7. Follow through, going up through 8, 9, 10, and 11, and you’ve got (or nearly have got) a circle with a line through it at the 5 o’clock position. Just like the printed version.
It wasn’t until I was in my 20s and at art school, studying all this stuff, that I realized that. The cursive Q that looks like a 2 is just a shorter way of doing what I just described.
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### Author:  [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/336 "2026-06-11T05:04:02Z")
The fact that all of those are called “Methods” suggests to me that they were as much about _how_ the writing was taught as the shapes of the letters themselves.
In reading the Wikipedia article on the D’Nealian Method, it sounds like part of it includes the initial teaching of print letters, as well as cursive, and the style of the print letters were intentionally not as “blocky” as other styles, to make the transition into cursive easier.
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### Author:  [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/337 "2026-06-11T05:39:00Z")
More re: Zaner-Bloser vs. D’Nealian:
> **[What Is the Difference Between Zaner Bloser and D'Nealian Handwriting? -...](https://simplycharlottemason.com/zaner-bloser-vs-dnealian/)**
>
> A comparison of Zaner Bloser and D'Nealian handwriting styles, to help you determine the best choice for your child.
> D’Nealian is written at a slight slant in both manuscript printing and cursive. Zaner Bloser is written straight up and down in manuscript printing and slanted in cursive.
>
> D’Nealian letters are learned with tails in manuscript printing, so the transition to cursive is simpler; pretty much all you need to do is connect the tails. Zaner Bloser letters are learned as two completely different styles between printing and cursive.
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### Author:  [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 6:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/338 "2026-06-11T06:54:50Z")
> [@BigT](#):
>
> writing on the board in cursive
I still get complaints about that, especially after my hand gets tired, but I suspect it may come down to general illegibility rather than any problem with my cursive style… A friend of mine used to use an overhead projector and acetates for lectures, not a bad idea, plus you face your audience that way.
> [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](#):
>
> More re: Zaner-Bloser vs. D’Nealian:
Interestingly enough, some styles of cursive (even fully-joined) are upright, some are slightly slanted, and some slope heavily. It does, at first glance, seem queer that the Zaner–Bloser Method starts out upright but then apparently changes its mind and adds a tilt.
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### Author:  [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 6:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/339 "2026-06-11T06:59:52Z")
BTW, are physical business cards considered useless? Do you still give them out?
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### Author:  [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)
#### Post date: [June 11, 2026, 7:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-the-most-useless-skills-you-were-taught-in-school/1030648/340 "2026-06-11T07:06:06Z")
> [@DPRK](#):
>
> BTW, are physical business cards considered useless?
I’d say that they are not _entirely_ useless now, but getting there. Earlier in my career, I was regularly given big boxes full of business cards with my contact information, to hand out; I haven’t been given printed business cards at any of the jobs I’ve had since around 2019.
I receive them from time to time; lately, as I’ve been helping my family navigate health stuff for my elderly father, I suddenly find myself with lots of cards for doctors and residential care facilities. I suspect that, as they are often dealing with an older clientele, they are still seeing demand for printed cards.
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