#feeling like a dad with a baseball bat demonstrating there are no monsters in the closet. no really look you're plugged in. you're fine

[everybodyknows-everybodydies]

computer... don't do this

[tf2canons]

Parent mercs teaching their children how to do their first specialized activity? (couldn't think of a better word for it but basically, medic teaching his kid how to do surgery, sniper teaching his kid how to shoot, Scout teaching his kid how to play baseball, etc)

Spy - There’s quite a lot to Spy’s job, but as soon as his child is old enough to get into trouble he decides it’s very important that they know all of it. For safety’s sake. He’ll show them where you should stab someone so that it’s fatal, how to disguise yourself so that you blend into the crowd and go unnoticed, and how to use the invis watch without getting caught. He insists these are essential survival skills so they’ll be learning it one way or another. He’s a bit anxious for them to get it right, because every time they do something wrong he can’t help but think, “if they did that in the field they would be dead.” But by the time they’ve got it all down he’s extremely proud of them for their hard work. As bad as he is at expressing his feelings, he makes sure to tell them that.

Sniper - One of his own best memories is when his dad first taught him how to shoot, so he’s eager to give his kid that experience, but also a little nervous that they won’t enjoy it as much as he did. He’d take them out into the middle of nowhere and set up some targets of various sizes. He lets them watch him shoot for a minute before he puts the gun in their hands. He goes over the basic safety they should know and shows them how to hold it correctly. He’ll kneel down behind them so he can help them aim, talking them through it and making sure they aren’t scared. When they hit their first shot a huge smile will come across his face and he’ll ruffle their hair. “See that? You’ll be taking my job in no time.”

Medic - He’s been teaching his kid about biology and letting his kid watch him preform surgeries since he first brought them home, but he forces himself to wait until they’re old enough to handle sharp objects carefully before he lets them dissect something for the first time. It’s probably a frog or a baby pig, like kids have to dissect in high school classes. He’d tell them how to do it but he’d stand back and let them do it themself, partially so they could be independent and partially so he can take a million pictures. He’ll point out all the organs and then once they’re satisfied he’ll take the opportunity to show them how to do stitches, letting them sew it back up. They can move onto human cadavers later, but for a first step he’s extremely happy with this. 

Scout - He’s probably more excited to teach his kid about baseball than they are to learn it. He takes them out to the local diamond and (a little emotionally) presents them with their first baseball bat of their own. He has them swing it a few times to just get used to the weight of it before he sets them up a little tee for them to practice hitting balls off of. He brought a whole big bag of baseballs and he doesn’t mind spending most of the time jogging around and picking up balls they already sent flying. If they’re making fast progress he’d try to throw the ball to them so they could hit it, but he’d reassure them it takes some practice to get good at it. No matter how good they did, he’d be super proud of them at the end of the day and would take them out for hot dogs and ice cream after. 

Pyro - Nothing brings a family together like arson! If their kid expressed interest in fire, Pyro would happily spend time info-dumping explaining how fire really works, how some things are more flammable than others, how to be safe when you’re lighting stuff on fire, etc. They’d set up a bunch of little demonstrations and experiments in the backyard but they would be really careful to have their kid standing a safe distance away, because they know how much it hurts to get burned. If their kid is interested enough, Pyro will get them a little suit and gas mask of their own so the two of them can match and safely burn things together. Pyro would be thrilled if their kid liked fire as much as they do, but they would also be perfectly happy if their kid wasn’t interested. Pyro just wants them to be happy! 

Soldier - He’s been trying to teach them military strategy since they were an infant, and of course he teaches them how to snap someone’s neck, but not even that is as exciting as when he finally teaches them to rocket jump. Once they’re old enough to carry his rocket launcher and they get the basics of shooting down, he goes straight to, “Here’s how to use it to blast yourself into the air without killing yourself!” He makes sure they’ve got it all down (two or three times more than necessary) and that Medic’s standing by before he actually lets them try it, and even then he tries to catch them before they hit the ground in case they land wrong. But he’s absolutely thrilled when they get it right and he very happily tells them what a wonderful war machine they’re going to be. 

Heavy - He will not be showing his child how to shoot Sasha until they’re almost an adult, so instead he teaches them how to fight bears in the woods. Because for some reason he thinks this is safer, and even if they don’t really need to hunt bears it’s still a good skill to have. He makes sure they have a weapon in case things go wrong, but for the most part he just plans to let them watch him wrestle a bear to the ground and kill it with his bare hands. Afterwards he’ll explain to them everything he did and how to fight a bear without immediately dying, and they can help him carry it back to the house and cook up a nice meal. He won’t let them try to fight a bear on their own for some time, because he wants to make sure they won’t get seriously injured, but for now he likes that its something the two of them can do together. 

Demo - He doesn’t want to pressure his kid into the demolition business if they’re not interested in it, so he waits until they ask him to show them how to build bombs. But once they do he’s eager to show them. He starts out just teaching them the chemistry behind it, and he gives a lot of demonstrations before he even lets them within five feet of his explosive materials. After his childhood incident with the Loch Ness Monster he’s a little tentative to let children handle bombs, but his excitement to teach his kid outweighs that. He’s just sure to be extremely cautious with them instead, so he’s right there anytime they’re working with explosives to make sure absolutely nothing whatsoever goes wrong. 

Engineer - He’s been subtly trying to influence them into liking math and science since they were born. He always bought them those little science toy kits, and he loves to show them fun stuff you can do with physics and chemistry. And once they’re a little older, he decides he’ll show them how to build a robot. Nothing crazy, just a cute little thing that’ll beep and walk around. They’ll sit down together one afternoon and work on it, him explaining the science behind everything and showing them how to put the pieces together so it works. He’s very patient and he’s happy to see his kid even trying something like this, so he’ll answer any questions they ask in a way that’s detailed and easy to understand, and he makes sure that they’re having fun and that they’re not stressed or bored with it. When it’s done he’ll say something cheesy like, “See what you can do when you set your mind to it?” and he’ll insist on taking their picture holding their new robot.

[mysticdragon3md3]

Seeing this question, my brain is just flooding me with all the memories of how I got into fandoms, how other people got me interested in their fandoms, how I used to be a science nerd, so many TED Talks about education, and my soreness regarding how much school taught me to hate reading/learning, when I've always loved learning and used to love reading.  

...And my lamentations about things I wish school would have taught me.  Just the other day, I finally learned some extremely useful and easy hacks for drawing a line of poles with proper perspective (which I would have loved a few days earlier while drawing a road lined with telephone poles for Kaijune), and someone commented that such things were taught in math/geometry classes but that our artsy brains just didn't pay attention.  No, I may have switched to art in college, but I was a science nerd and damn good at math back when they taught geometry.  I would have remembered such things.  But my math teachers were more interested in making us memorize high theoreticals, instead of learning how math can actually be useful and helpful in everyday things we want to do, like draw for a monthly drawing challenge of giant monsters.  I lament all the things school didn't teach me, because despite hating school, I've always been an information junkie.  I was watching documentaries over and over, since I was in grade school. I hung out in libraries.  I collected documentaries.  I loved Discovery Channel and History Channel, back when they were educational.  And now informative/educational video essays are half of what I watch on YouTube. I loved learning. But school...Oh, school...How much I hated you...!  School was not about learning, thinking, or interacting with the information in ways that related to my own life and thoughts.  School was about passing exams and getting grades.  It was just busy work that took up my time away from learning things that could actually enrich my imagination/daydreams/writing (which was my priority at the time).  

I became concerned when I saw a commenter suggest making the nephews write a book report about these books that the aunt wanted them to become a fan of, while dangling the reward of pizza.  I can tell you right now, no amount of pizza is worth a book report.  x_x;  In fact, as someone who used to be a bibliophile, but in mid-high school had sworn off reading novels, I can tell you that turning something into work, will not only kill excitement, but may even generate a type of defiant glee at the idea of vehemently hating something that someone else tried to shove down your throat.  And it will have nothing to do with the book itself.  Certainly not the fandom.  And that's the problem, with both adults trying to get children interested in their fandoms, and education:  Adults treat it like homework, rather than fandom.  I remembered this TED Talk by Seth Godin (https://youtu.be/sXpbONjV1Jc) where he rants about, if you wanted to turn someone into a baseball fan, you wouldn't make them read baseball textbooks, study, and take exams.  No, sharing a fandom should be about a mutual bonding experience.  Even someone as anti-social as me, got into loving science for that social reason.  It was a bonding experience with my dad who loves science, and continually showed me how useful and magically problem-solving it was, and whose excitement for it was contagious.  That's fandom; not homework.  And no one wants to do homework.  

I don't know why I'm getting so involved.  It's not like I'm an expert in education or getting people into fandoms.  Maybe there's just something really core in me that is concerned about this whole issue, whatever it is.  Education, fandom, Learning becoming a chore, instead of enriching,...  I guess I am sore about how much school made learning into something I didn't want to do and wanted to instantly forget---which is so contradictory to how much I love learning new information!  It just feels really sore inside, when I think about that.  I'm someone who loves learning but hates school, and I guess I'll always be sore about that. Plus, I'm a former book lover who is probably still sore about my learned hate of reading.  I could technically undo it at any time, but there are just more interesting things to do with my limited time.  So instead, I just stay sore about the teacher that made me hate reading.  ^^;   TL;DR:  I'm sorry I'm some rando butting in, but some part of me is still sore about how much school taught me to hate reading/learning, when I've always loved learning and used to love reading.  

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"STOP STEALING DREAMS: Seth Godin at TEDxYouth@BFS" (https://youtu.be/sXpbONjV1Jc)  7:36/16:57 "If you wanted to teach someone how to be a baseball fan, would you start by having them understand the history of baseball, who Abner Doubleday was, and what Barnstorming was, the influences of cricket, and capitalism, and the negro leagues?  Would you do that?  Would you say, 'Ok, there's a test tomorrow.  I want you to memorize the top 50 batters, in order, by batting average'?  And then, rank the people based on how they do on the test, so the ones who do well get to memorize more baseball players?  Is that how we would create baseball fans?"

Are there video essays or geek rant vids about the book series by people visibly excited about the fandom? Show them why these stories make you excited; don't be afraid of telling them spoilers.   You're going to need to tell them spoilers, so they know this is worth diverting attention away from fandoms they're already in.  

I just remember all the fandoms I'm into, without even reading the comic, playing the videogame, etc.  It all comes down to those geeky channels with contagious excitement.  The more I hear Professor Thorgi talk about the storylines going on in americomi, the more I'm interested in picking one up, and even a little confident that I'll be able to catch on, even if I come in late.   And I know that the first few times someone excitedly tells me about a fandom they're in, but that I'm not in, I humor them and stay disinterested. Because I'm already wrapped up in a lot of my own fandom obsessions.  But the more they talk about their fandom, the more it will pique my interest, because they've given me such a positive association with it, familiarity, and curiosity, through their recommendations.  One day, the curiosity will win out.  That's how I got into tokusatsu and Kamen Rider.   Everything in my brain that has synthesized TED Talks about education, and remembers Tatay's excitement about science and demonstrating its usefulness, making me excited about it too, is screaming at me to say that the key to get someone interested in something is to not make it homework, but a social opportunity for bonding.  

You're trying to get them into a fandom, not homework.  Pizza is not worth a book report.   Oh, I forgot!  Also, relate the books you're trying to get them interested in, to whatever fandom they're already in. Explain how they're similar.  I got into tokusatsu when my friend said it's just like anime, but live action.  Charisma On Command talked once about growing an audience by piggybacking onto a pre-existing fandom.  Like the way the vlogbrothers grew their fandom out of Harry Potter's fanbase. Books will be more interesting, if people can see how its similar to fandoms they're already in. Whether it's themes, tones, character archetypes, or even just tropes.  Also, proving how the books are similar to fandoms people are already into, will require you to learn more about their fandoms and interests.  Should be good for bonding.