People learn when they have to learn. This quite simple but antiquated insight of motivational psychology can be interpreted in various ways. First of all, it can be understood in a very traditional way as an argument for authoritarian class-management and educational control through external incentives like grades, shame and punishments. On the other hand, the sentence also illustrates that people only grow, adjust and really learn something new if they recognize the need to get involved in the learning processes. While people have learned technical skills, such as baking bread during this crisis, some are also learning to renounce civil liberties, trust authoritarian politics, and protect national borders. With regard to civic education, these latter aspects are unfortunately more significant than the rather technical skills that seem to develop in context of the COVID-19 crisis. In this article, Anja Besand would like to pursue the question of the pedagogical and didactical collateral effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and make clear that in the context of the crisis enormous opportunities do exist, but so do dangers too - particularly for civic education. The starting point of her considerations is the concept of "collateral learning" coined by John Dewey. Following Dewey, she will first examine the concept in the context of formalized learning processes, then she will refer to collateral learning in the processes of informal learning which result from major political and social events.