High Strangeness

[Mythopoeika]

I was very similar. I can remember clearly, in the 60s in junior school, having to write about what toys we had received for Christmas. I wrote that I had received a Scalextric racing car set and the teacher marking my book had crossed this out and written Scale electric. I can clearly remember thinking (maybe harshly!) my teacher was an idiot and I think that one thing shaped my future thoughts on school (i.e. a waste of time!).

I had that a few times too, where a teacher seemed not to know what was going on in the outside world.
One teacher pulled me up on the word 'ascetic', telling me that perhaps I was thinking of 'aesthetic'. I told him that I meant 'ascetic' and held out a dictionary for him to check.

 

[Floyd]

In my secondary school in the 70s, one of the teachers was a heavy smoker ( his fingers were yellow from the nicotine) and I remember quite often that he would be taking out his packet of cigarettes and getting ready to light up just before the end of lesson bell went.

I wonder how they go on nowadays as they're probably not even allowed (or not supposed to) smoke on the premises, let alone the classroom.

 

[Austin Popper]

Hoo boy. My school experience was much like the above anecdotes. I suppose it fits in the High Strangeness thread. In my two years as a prisoner in the local Catholic school, I sat at the back of the room because I was tall. Fortunately, there was a set of World Book encyclopedias on a table right behind me, the same setup both years. This saved my sanity. I'd browse at random and learn all sorts of things in spite of my surroundings.

In 8th grade, back in the public school system, we had a pretty odd science teacher. I would usually be two or three lessons ahead in our textbook because I found the lessons interesting and the classroom experience tedious. One day, we were told to read that day's lesson. I read something else, being very familiar with the material. Mr Weird Guy noticed I wasn't reading the textbook. I don't know what he thought; I got great grades and he knew I was interested in the subject. Anyway, he decided to humiliate me, I suppose, by questioning me closely about the lesson of the day. Of course I had no problem with the questions. This seemed to confuse the guy.

One of my favorite teachers in high school was a chain smoker. He would sometimes disappear for a few minutes if the class was busy studying, and come back reeking of cigarettes. His breath was awful. The only place teachers were allowed to smoke was in the teachers' lounge, which also reeked of cigarette smoke. The lounge was on the second floor, and the window was open at least a bit all year long. It was not unusual to see smoke wafting out of there while moving between classes, as some were held in adjacent buildings.

 

[Who me]

Morning skargy Laura Boswell and robert schmille?are worth a look very very good artists

 

[Paul_Exeter]

Hoo boy. My school experience was much like the above anecdotes. I suppose it fits in the High Strangeness thread. In my two years as a prisoner in the local Catholic school, I sat at the back of the room because I was tall. Fortunately, there was a set of World Book encyclopedias on a table right behind me, the same setup both years. This saved my sanity. I'd browse at random and learn all sorts of things in spite of my surroundings.

In 8th grade, back in the public school system, we had a pretty odd science teacher. I would usually be two or three lessons ahead in our textbook because I found the lessons interesting and the classroom experience tedious. One day, we were told to read that day's lesson. I read something else, being very familiar with the material. Mr Weird Guy noticed I wasn't reading the textbook. I don't know what he thought; I got great grades and he knew I was interested in the subject. Anyway, he decided to humiliate me, I suppose, by questioning me closely about the lesson of the day. Of course I had no problem with the questions. This seemed to confuse the guy.

One of my favorite teachers in high school was a chain smoker. He would sometimes disappear for a few minutes if the class was busy studying, and come back reeking of cigarettes. His breath was awful. The only place teachers were allowed to smoke was in the teachers' lounge, which also reeked of cigarette smoke. The lounge was on the second floor, and the window was open at least a bit all year long. It was not unusual to see smoke wafting out of there while moving between classes, as some were held in adjacent buildings.

Like it

I went to a small comprehensive in the middle of nowhere, Devon that involved a daily forty-minute bus journey through country lanes to get us there, during which us unsupervised children descended into a 'Lord of the Flies' existence. The senior 5th years were supposed to keep order on the bus but instead ran it like a fascist dictatorship whose official currency was lunch money and primary commodity tobacco. This was of course hell for four years until I then became a 5th year...

Once at school we had a lovely old English teacher whose afternoon lessons involved us writing poetry whilst he had a post-pub pipe and nap by the radiator. The Scottish Geography teacher had an imaginary pupil at the back of the class and the chain-smoking Physics teacher had a forest of nicotine-stained nose hair that seemed to grow faster than bamboo. PE teachers seemed mostly interested in getting us boys naked and into the showers, their presence in the changing rooms being "to check for signs of abuse or neglect" (!)

Once we became 4th years and the mock-exam season was upon us, some of us would sign in for first lessons and then escape across the sports fields and walk back home along those country lanes, sharing cigarettes (ah, Marlboro) whilst chatting about nuclear war and -yes - ghosts and UFOs. We repeated this again in the 5th year and never got caught, an achievement better than my O-Levels results...

But overall it was a happy time, being a small school you knew everyone and you will never have friends like your school friends (still keep in touch with some of them). The final year was especially memorable (bet the school were never allowed back to the Royal Shakespeare Theatre) and it set me up probably the best long summer of my life, from June until I had to go College in September.

 

[Eyespy]

in the late 90s we lived in Ohio as part of an international group. My boys went to a local private Montessori'junior school so had a reasonable an education and fun time, some of their older friend s had a less enjoyable experience. aside from the casual rascism directed at europeans they were frequently in trouble for disputing historical truths such as USA invented democracy, Canals were another American invention along with decent brewing.

Wine is only made in southern Europe ( vineyards here in Somerset date back to Roman times), American political system is an inspiration to the world. Americans lead the world in Baseball ( that is probably true).

Most of the European kids learned pretty quickly to put up and shut up.

My friend who had older kids used to volunteer at their school- it was her first exposure to the Ritalin culture- queues every lunchtime of children waiting for their lunch time dose .