Are you smarter than a public schooler?

1918 News Service ^ | 1/17/2006 | Phil Buckley

[mawebgeek]

After watching John Stossel's report on 20/20, I decided to challenge you with a quick one minute quiz, see how you do on a series of what should be easy - moderate questions.

Take the quiz

[AnAmericanMother]

This doesn't look like an 8th grade test.

It looks like a normal school (teacher's college) exam.

[0siris]

I snuck up to a 90 or so after a couple of tries. Zoology is not my strong point.

[FairOpinion]

YOu must have cookies enabled. I don't, and I got an error. It couldn't plant it's nasty little cookie or other stuff on my computer.

"Warning: mysql_fetch_array(): supplied argument is not a valid MySQL result resource in /usr/home/1918/public_html/1918/quiz/quiz.php on line 41"

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

5. Tell what you can of the history of Kansas.

Uhhhhhh.... Dorothy lived there with her Aunt Em.

[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

Yep but it is a real Jr high school test.

[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

LOL
John Brown, red legs, bleeding Kansas, civil war and cattle drives

[Blue_Ridge_Mtn_Geek]

This is a buggy website that craps out on the 6th question and then gives a score anyway. A good metaphor for public schools that take your money and then crap out in delivering the goods.

[processing please hold]

I got the first three questions wrong and got my butt outta there. I would have gotten the last seven right. I just didn't feel like rubbing their noses in it. :-)

[AnAmericanMother]

I think it's an urban legend or at least slightly misattributed.

I'm a former history major and pretty familiar with this era. IIRC, you had "grammar schools" which went all the way to high school, then you had the "high school". At least in the South, there was no such thing as "junior high". Maybe it was different in Kansas.

From my knowledge of the curriculum, though, the questions seem a bit strong for a grammar school. They're also more typical of what would be taught in normal school, which was advanced prep that wouldn't have been covered in high school -- notice that there's absolutely no literature (no poetry, no Shakespeare, no novels), and no general knowledge. Think of all the recitation and memorization and literature instruction that went on in grammar and high school! You should know this if you've read any of the literature of the period. Anne of Green Gables is a good example, or Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm.

I know the trope that we all acknowledge is that education ain't what it used to be -- and that's true -- but I'm suspicious of this particular example.

[Billthedrill]

I'm "Jimmy the 3d Grader." Good time, got two wrong. Oh, well...

[Osage Orange]

It requires cookies and sign in.

You mean you have to feed it?

[hinckley buzzard]

Didn't think this thing was still kicking around. Apparently it was actually a structured interview for teacher applicants to the county school system, not an eighth grade test at all.

[AnAmericanMother]

Wow, maybe my instincts were correct . . . < g >

You gotta source on that?

[Anitius Severinus Boethius]

60 on my first try, 90 on my second. Should have been 100, I had Churchill at gut instinct but changed my mind and said Buckley.

[ladyjane]

Clearly you didn't have my much feared history teacher who made us memorize all the presidents. IN ORDER. We used a mnemonic: Will A Jolly Man Make a Jolly Visitor. (Don't remember the rest at the moment or probably any moment.)
The first letter W is for Washington, etc.
The 4th president must be, uh, M = Madison?

[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

copyright in Anne of Green Gables had been registered on June 11, 1908
Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm ... In this 1903 children's classic

Could you pass 10 percent of this test and it is not an urban legend?



http://skyways.lib.ks.us/kansas/genweb/ottawa/exam.html


1. Teachers each day will fill lamps, clean chimneys.
2. Each teacher will bring a bucket of water and a scuttle of coal for the day’s session.
3. Make your pens carefully. You may whittle nibs to the individual taste of the pupils.
4. Men teachers may take one evening each week for courting purposes, or two evenings a week if they go to church regularly.
5. After ten hours in school, the teachers may spend the remaining time reading the Bible or other good books.
6. Women teachers who marry or engage in unseemly conduct will be dismissed.
7. Every teacher should lay aside from each pay a goodly sum of his earnings for his benefit during his declining years so that he will not become a burden on society.
8. Any teacher who smokes, uses liquor in any form, frequents pool or public halls, or gets shaved in a barber shop will give good reason to suspect his worth, intention, integrity and honesty.
9. The teacher who performs his labor faithfully and without fault for five years will be given an increase of twenty-five cents per week in his pay, providing the Board of Education approves

[demlosers]

Liberal Slayer
(has taken the quiz 52 times)

90

1 minute 9.08 seconds

January 18th 10:11 PM

So who is this FReeper?

[demlosers]

It's mostly facts type questions You either know it or you don't.

[The Worthless Miracle]

Yeah, a lot of the questions were not a test of knowledge - who won the first wimbledon? Or "who yelled fight 'er till she sinks" from the deck of a naval vessel in 1807? How about - What color is my car?

[FairOpinion]