To function well in society from an educational perspective, I believe one has to learn to read, write, and do maths. None of that is "fun" all the time for all people but the number of choices as to schools, self-education possibilities, TV/video, computers, etc. are such that there's no excuse for not being educated.

I think what one "loves" is a personal thing and allowing anything external to get in the way of one's own development is a personal problem to me. If I love "dogs", that I am asked to learn about cats too, I should use that for my own benefit rather than resist, just because it is not what I want. With children/teens, they have no experience in life so what they think they know about it is more often wrong than right and mostly "new" and, therefore, potentially scary so resistance is not uncommon. While I should be allowed to love dogs and that I do should be acknowledged, that should not get in the way of my also needing to learn about cats.

Because one prefers something as a child, I don't think that has any bearing on what one needs to know as an adult, something the child has not been yet, has no experience whatsoever with. Allowing a child to not work hard to learn what is put before them in school is a bit like teaching them it is okay not to eat a wide variety of foods or like teaching them to eat too much junk food. When a child gets to the permanent choice of what to learn in the future (college and beyond) then they can concentrate on dogs only if they want, skew their own lives in that direction.

The future doctor can quit taking tuba lessons only when he is definitely on the road to becoming a doctor and needs to take doctor lessons. The engineer (my husband) needs to be exposed to that Robert Frost poem for the rest of our sake, whether he likes it or not.