[FRIAM] word of the day: "Eschatology"

[Steve Smith]

Nick -
>
> One day, during geography, I raised my hand and said, “How come
> north/south America and Europe/Africa sort of /fit together?” 
> /General merriment on all sides, including the teacher’s. 
>
>  
>
> Did she do that to YOU, also?
>
Nah, but my 4th grade teacher drew her own maps on mimeograph.  When we
were studying Europe, she left out Switzerland.   When she handed out
the unmarked maps as homework and asked us to fill in the country names
and place/identify their capitals, I noticed she had left out
Switzerland!   I raised my hand, waited for her to call on me, then
politely (or possibly too eagerly) asked "Where is Switzerland?".   I
don't remember what happened next... but she basically told me to "shut
up".   I did.   But I did not do *any more* Geography homework (or at
least her hand-drawn map) assignments for the rest of the year. 

When I flunked (who gets an F in a class in 4th grade?) the class, my
parents intervened and made the deal with her that she would pass me
if/when I did all the homework that summer.   It grated the hell out of
me, but I remember whipping out the whole year of assignments in the
first week (or so) because we didn't not do what our parents told us to,
even if we sometimes didn't do what our teachers told us to do.  I had,
after all, paid attention in class and *read the book* as I was as
fascinated with geography as anything else...   I held the line on the
Europe-sans-Switzerland assignment and my parents acquiesced.  I *LIKE*
to think that Ms. McCarty was more careful with her maps after I
(innocently) asked her about "Switzerland?".  

Later she told me to shut up when she was teaching "weather" and my
father had just shown me (he took daily meteorological readings at the
USFS offices)  about wet-bulb temperature and even alcohol thermometers
(which are preferred over mercury ones for very low temperature use)... 
the "shut up" came when I raised my hand and asked if the thermometer
she was showing us was mercury or alcohol.   I think she said "there is
no such thing" before she told me to shut up.   I don't know why she
ever called on me, but then one could ask why I ever bothered to raise
my hand.   I think I did cut way back on that as the year progressed.

Did your first grade teacher break a ruler on your knuckles for having
bad penmanship (age 6) ?   And I didn't even go to Catholic School!  Her
name was Mrs. Hay and *should have been* a Nun...

- Steve

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20200606/b68ac93e/attachment.html>