Ignorance to Make You Gasp

I am appalled by geographical ignorance. Every classroom i was in in Elementary school had a map of the United States on the wall, and a device hanging over the blackboard from which the teacher could pull down one of an array of maps, of the world, and to display world history. Not that that meant much to me at the time, because i learned geography at home.

We had a "Golden Books" book at home which told a basic version of the origin of the solar system and of the earth. The first section dealt with astronomy, the second section dealt with geology, the third with the theories of the rise of life, the fourth dealt with the plant kingdom, and the fifth dealt with the animal kingdom. It was intelligently geared toward children of about ten years of age, didn't mention creation, or delve into any controversy surrounding evolution (which was because in the 1950s, as i recall at any event, there wasn't any such national controversy). It was invaluable to me (although i didn't know it at the time) in establishing a good foundation from which to study and understand science.

We also read, all the time. When we got a television, we didn't want to watch it because the schedule conflicted with our favorite radio programs--and at other times we read books. Even after we got two channels (the ABC network didn't exist yet), if the programs the "grown ups" were watching were not interesting, we'd go read a book. You didn't want to tell my grandmother you were bored, because she'd either give a job to do, or tell you to read a book, after which she demanded a verbal book report. We had wonderful books--the best that Brentano's in Manhattan had to offer--expensive, colorfully illustrated books. We had books illustrated by Arthur Rackham and Maxfield Parrish. Two of my favorite books were The Tanglewood Tales by Hawthorne, illustrated by Parrish, and A Christmas Carol, illustrated by Rackham, and the latter of which i read dozens of times. It eventually simply fell apart. I had literally read thousands of books by the time i got to college. I was given a college reading list in high school, and got into trouble for laughing in class--i'd already read every book on the list.

Today, it seems, people just park the kids in front of the teevee and go away.

I was talking to a friend while working in a bar near the campus of the University of Illinois once, and we started talking about central Asia. I mentioned Uzbekistan, and a frat boy there started laughing, and claimed i had made the name up, and that no such place existed. We were near Greek row, and on another occasion, the same joker got angry because of an argument he started, when i casually pointed out that there were a million American soldiers fighting in France when the 1918 offensive against the Germans started. I told him we eventually sent three million troops to Europe. He actually began shouting, and told me there weren't that many in World War Two--when i told him 15,000,000 Americans served in World War Two, he began to shout, calling me a liar. This was from a frat boy who was an engineering student at the University of Illinois, famous for its engineering school. Truly sad.

I agree with the notion that education has deteriorated into a set of rote exercises necessary to pass the standardized tests, so the school district can protect its budget.

Trouble is, the best parts of that old way are hard to reinstall from here.

And curiosity is tricky to engender, as Roberta has testified to.

I had an uncle I remember very slightly, just as a presence on a back porch in Oklahoma where he taught me about cranking ice cream. He died when I was newly four. But since then I've run across his books, from grammar school back in Indiana, and later. I still have his rock collection, and his tool chest with most of the tools. He was a tool and die man at Douglas, the intermediary between workers and management, as I understand it. He died the day after the plane was finished... not, perhaps from that stress, but from mustard gassing in WWI, and finally getting to relax.



I've tried to engender curiosity with my niece. I've succeeded more than I'd hoped for where she was already personally curious, about human relationships, psychology, communication, language, music.. cooking. She could critique a meal well at ten, re tapas at the Barcelona cafe in northern California. Too bad all her parents of legality don't/didn't let her cook.

Her dad has succeeded somewhat, re physically getting about the land on your own or with bicycle, a kind of education in self sustaining. But he's failed up the kazoo re getting her to look at museum exhibits on this and that. Always, from her pov, too too - rolling eyes - too too instructional, can we go now?

i don't know about the prices, but it amazes me the number of people who don't know what things are, like a turnip, or parsnip or, one poor checkout girl, a cauliflower

the little sticker with the price code comes off and they are at a complete loss

Clearly what we're all talking about are not a few isolated incidents. Something is fundamentally wrong. Likely a combination of things has changed to create such widespread ignorance.

Education has changed. Aside from the national testing that has put the emphasis on on the wrong syllable. there's more. How things are taught has changed. Things were drummed into our heads. Not as much drumming these days. Basics are not the primary focus to the extent that they once were. Teachers sometimes seem to be expected to teach things parents were once responsible for. Television has certainly displaced family time and reading. Kids are now all in the same classes, regardless of ability. We're teaching to the middle. This prevents stigmatizing the slower kids but stifles the faster ones. People are rarely if ever left back. Too traumatic. So they're passed along regardless of whether they've learned what they need to learn.

Why are so many people of various religions desperate to get their kids into Catholic schools? I suspect that standards haven't fallen in them. Still plenty of drumming going on.

This whole situation makes me noivous.

Setanta mentioned books. As a child, I believe that books saved my life--or at least a sembance of my sanity. And they opened a world to me. As an adult, I read books for a living. The last few years have gotten me into a state. People who can't write are writing books. I can live with bad writing (I make a living by fixing bad writing), but thinking is also missing. As a proofreader I see what the author wrote and what the editor fixed. Within the past year, I've been appalled at what the editor didn't fix. I've complained. This person got paid for this? But most horrifying is what I'm being asked to do as an editor. Don't fix some things. Like what? I've been told not worry about such minor things as singulars and plurals matching. (E.g.: One sentence refers to a person. The next sentence refers to that person as "they." One person is not a they, except in some books I've worked on lately and many more I haven't worked on.) Why am I being asked to do this? Because the author, who can't write his or her way out of a paper bag, thinks it sounds better. I've asked that my name not be printed anywhere in these books. It's a losing battle. The dumbing down of the U.S. of A.

Roberta, I think a soliquy column by you could be a hit...not least, given your astoundingly dry and yet inyourface personality.

We have this Princessy person for Slate on Manners, whom I admit to liking,
slightly, if only for her balls.

Any chance you could do a grammar column in some local? That might get picked up (as no one else knows this stuff...)

My grammar's certainly not as good as I thought.

Osso, What a nice thing to say, especially to someone as in-your-facey as me. Not sure I could do a column. First of all, I'd probably have to write a bunch of them and send them to small local papers, which might or might not pay me for them. But I'm not sure I'd be so in-your-face without the anonymity we enjoy here. Only a few people have actually met me. I tend to be nonconfrontational as a rule. Even here, I shy away from an argument. The topic we're discussing in this thread is something I feel strongly about. But you already figured that out.

Pantalones, What's wrong with your grammar? Haven't noticed a thing.

Speaking of the secretary with no interest in anything outside her worldview --

at a large insurance company where I worked in the late '90s, there was a secretary, a nice woman a few years younger than me, who never tired of telling us that she had gotten all A's in school, even secretarial school. Uh, that's nice. I think this is because my boss at the time and I are lawyers so I suspect she felt she didn't measure up. Well, her older son was starting 1st grade. So I asked her, "What does J___ read?"

Her response: "Oh no, I'm gonna let his teachers teach him that."

Ai yi yi. When I went into nursery school, I could read small words and sign my name. I could tell time, tie my shoes and I dunno what else. I certainly was reading by 1st grade and, in fact, had a gig reading a chapter of Charlotte's Web to the rest of the class as I had already read it. I say this not in self-aggrandizement, if I'm aggrandizing anyone, it's my parents, who read to me and then with me and then I read to them every single night before bed for years, into second grade, I think. Where the heck has that gone? Are people just too busy? Coming home from work too late? What the heck is happening here?

When I got out of junior high, after 10 years of studying English, I thought my English was flawless, it's still in pretty good shape but my speaking has declined a lot. I sometimes hesitate before writing/saying something because I'm not sure what's the correct way to say it, I thought I was past that stage. Of course, I do the same in Spanish, less frequently but I do it.

I'd like to be able to teach Spanish and/or English after getting my degree, so I want to be the almost error-free on these languages.

Jes, She's not gonna let the teachers teach her son how to read? Was she planning doing it herself? Congrats on reading before school. I had books but they were read to me. I had to wait until my wonderful first grade teacher (how I loved that woman) taught me how to read. Then there was no stopping me.

Pantalones, Your English isn't flawless, but it's very, very good. It's rare that I can't spot someone who's not a native English speaker. (I tutored ESL for nine years.) Didn't spot you. No mean feat. I congratulate you.

Actually, maybe I said it wrong, but this woman was not going to do anything at home with her son, in terms of teaching him to read. Rather, she figured it was the teacher's job and who was she to interfere?

When in the Navy, we had one particularly clueless individual, who was a cook. When he went to the vegetable locker for cabbage he would carry a lettuce in one hand and a cabbage in the other, repeating aloud, "This is cabbage; this is lettuce." He was a heck of a good guy; I thought this odd, but never made fun of him.

On liberty in Long Beach, he met some unscrupulous encyclopedia salesmen. They told him he was being given a set free, on condition he give them free advertising, by word of mouth. Of course, the agreement he signed was actually a sales contract.

Once I made reference to something he did not agree about (don't recall what) and he challenged me to a debate of history. One of his first statements, "If they hadn't killed Lincoln, we would not have fought the Civil War," caused me to abort the argument and get on with my other concerns.

Thanks Roberta, does really mean a lot to me.

Now to keep the spirit of the thread alive and history related. Last semester I was taking a course called 'El Ser Humano y la Historia' (The Human Being and History) and some classmates were doing a presentation on the French Revolution.
At the middle of the presentation the teacher asks:
- "Are you gonna talk about the Versailles Treaty?" - to which one answers - "Yeah, later" - and the teacher responds - "Oh, ok".

They could've at least been honest.

Oh yeah, like rutabaga. They hardly ever know what that is.

Shallots are unknowns to some at checkout counters.

Well, hey, never mind the checkout. I see fennel routinely identified by signage as anise, even in relatively good markets. Fennel is NOT anise.

Check this out.

I had someone once try telling me that the Jews were not responsible for 9/11! Some people really are clueless.

I bought squash last week and discovered later I had been charged for cucumbers.

Cucumers are cheaper. You got a deal! Maybe the sales clerk lady has a thing for you Edgar.

I don't think so, nick. I bought one seeded watermellon last season, and was charged for twelve unseeded. I ended up getting the money back, but somehow they made it out that I could only be compensated for the non seeded kind. To me, it wasn't worth a fight to take it any further.

No, Jes. You said it right. I read it wrong. Sorry.

Edgar, Gasping. Probably not a bad idea to step away from that discussion.

Some of you guys are talking about some mighty fancy shmancy veggies. I hope there's not gonna be a quiz on this stuff.

I once asked the butcher in the supermarket about meat for tartar steak. She had no idea what I was talking about. Not a clerk--the butcher! I decided to keep cooking the meat.