What Was It Like To Go To School 100 Years Ago?

What was it like to go to school 100 years ago? The people of Oklahoma City have a pretty good idea after discovering chalkboards dating from 1917, hidden behind newer chalkboards.

When contractors removed the newer, and as far as anyone knew, the only chalkboards, they were stunned to discover an older set of chalkboard beneath the newer ones.

Here's the full article with lots of pictures. It is just so cool to see this.

These boards were drawn and written on in 1917, 98 years ago.

Look at the pictures...it was Thanksgiving. There are drawings of turkeys, pilgrims and the Mayflower. There's music and a poem. There's even a crazy circular way to multiply.

This was a long time ago. Quite accidentally, they left a little of themselves behind. The content doesn't look much different than it might in any modern elementary classroom. Clearly the technology has changed but anyone from 1917 might feel right at home in a modern classroom learning about the Pilgrims.

Your Brain Might Melt

When I was in high school - ya know, back when “school” was just the largest cave and the blackboard was an outcropping of slate...just kidding.

Seriously, when I was in high school, I learned how not to remember stuff in math. Obviously, that wasn’t the goal, but it is what happened. When I discovered my error, it was an important moment. I thought I’d pass that insight along to you, so you could avoid my mistake (and make some fresh ones of your own).

I can’t recall exactly what we were learning, but it was in math - probably Algebra II. We learned how to do something, and because of the way my brain works, I was always trying to think a memory prompt to remind myself how to remember stuff. (PEMDAS, for example is a memory prompt.) I still do this a lot and it can be an extremely effective way to remember things...if you do it correctly.

The mental note I made to myself was;  “Do the opposite of what you think you should do”  and it worked like a charm. I was solving problems quickly and correctly. We did a lot of practice and I was breezing through the worksheets. I learned this topic sooooo well.

Too well, as it turned out. I learned how to do all the steps in the right order and always got the right answer. Then, the memory prompt turned from friend to foe. 

 “Do the opposite of what you think you should do” had worked like a charm, until I memorized how to do it. Now my prompt was telling me to do the opposite from what I had learned....in other words....wrong!

Suddenly, I went from confident to confused. What way was “the opposite of what you think you should do?” I couldn’t remember what was the right way or what was the wrong way. I was dazed and confused. 

It was then, that I realized that my memory prompt was at the root of my problem. I had to change the prompt.

Do you have any idea how hard it is to forget something when you’re trying to forget it. The more you try, the more you think about it, so the more you remember it, so you’re not forgetting it, but actually remembering it more. It’s very circular and I think if you thought like that for too long, your brain might melt.

So, do yourself a favor, use memory prompts; they really will help you remember stuff. But do not, under any circumstance, use “Do the opposite of what you think you should do.” You’ll just end up confused with a melted brain.

The Name Game

Karma has not been kind to me with respect to the names I have had to learn as a teacher. I am not good with names. I have to make a real effort to learn people’s names.

No, it’s not what you’re thinking. It’s not the difficult to pronounce names that I stumble on, it’s similarity of names that throws me off. And it’s not that I mix up students; that’s never a problem. The problem for me is when I need to recall the name and say it correctly very quickly. 

I know I’m not alone in this. I have a friend with nine children. When she was trying to call a kid downstairs to go to school, she would basically start calling off names of oldest to youngest and stop when she hit the right one. It’s not that she didn’t know her kid’s names, but in the heat of the moment, the mind sometimes does funny things with one's recall.

When I was a substitute, I had a class with three students named Destiny. “What’s the big deal?” you may be thinking, and you’d be justified in thinking that. The part that confused me is that the three students spelled it three different ways: 

Destiny, 

Destinee, 

Destineey.

I started thinking in my head Destiny with one E, Destiny with no Y, Destiny with three E’s and a Y. Let’s face it, that’s a lot to recall in a hurry.

When I taught at the Hellenic American Academy, I had two students whose names it took me a while to get comfortable:

Efthamia

Efthalia

I never mixed up the differences between the students - and they were very different people - but sometimes I’d get a little tongue-tied when calling out their names and it would come out as Eftha,mumblemumble,ia. In which case, Efthamia would answer because Efthalia was often daydreaming.

And then last year at McAuliffe I had two students with very similar names that I mixed up for a little while:

Maria Julia

Julia Maria

I solved this by just using their first names and that seemed to help.  

And, now we come to this year. I've got multiples. I've got multiple students with the same names in class and I've got twins. 

Don't get me started on the twins, I'm confused enough already...

By The Numbers

I have a very long ride to school and then back home each day. It probably averages about three hours and that’s a lot of time each day.

Word problem time:
We have 180 days of school, and your teachers have an additional 10 days of professional development. I spend an average of three hours each day in the car driving to McAullife and then back home again. How much time will I spend commuting during the year?

Answer: (180 + 10) * 3 = 570 hours

If I work an eight hour day, that means my 570 hours is the equivalent of 71.25 work days.

Remember, you only go to school 180 days, so that means if you include my commuting time, I’m “going to school” over 71 days more than you. 

Think about how this might play out for a typical McAuliffe student. After school, you’ve taken the bus home, had a snack, walked the dog, and done your homework. I honestly don’t want to hear about the burden of homework I assigned you because I’m still driving home.

When I started teaching at McAuliffe, I promised myself I would not waste all those hours on mind-numbing sports talk or ridiculously repetitive political talk radio. Instead, I listen to books in the car. 

I listen to a lot of books in the car.

Last school year, I listened to 33 audio books. Some of my favorites were:

• On the Road
• The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals (You will read this too)
• Failure Is Not an Option: Mission Control from Mercury to Apollo 13 and Beyond
• Physics for Rock Stars: Making the Laws of the Universe Work for You
• A Little History of the World
• Zim: A Baseball Life
  
• The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements
• Rendezvous with Rama 
• To Kill a Mockingbird (You will also read this)
• Pedro.

I have to say, I don’t retain the content of a book when I listen to it as well as when I actually read it, but that’s not really an option when you’re speeding along at 65 miles per hour.