Apart from finding my old essay on how my choices influence my future, I also found the worst multiple-choice question ever:
A leprechaun is:
a) a small man
b) a tiny old man
c) a small old man
WHAT THE...?!?
Showing posts with label primary school. Show all posts
Showing posts with label primary school. Show all posts
Sunday, February 13, 2011
"How My Choices Will Influence My Future"
I found this old "essay" in one of my exercise books from primary school. Be warned that it is pretty long and repetitive (we were required to write 10 or so paragraphs of 10 lines (handwritten) each, not including the introduction and conclusion, and we hadn't been given much instruction on essay-writing).
A lot of things, such as friends, money, jobs and luck will influence my future. Some of these will have a positive effect and some will have a negative effect. Some I have no control over but some I do have control over. I believe that it is my choices that will influence my future most.
It will be easier to make decisions if I know exactly what I want to do when I am older. For example, if I want to live a happy life with a good job without becoming a drug addict or an alcoholic, then I would be far more inclined to work hard at school to get a good job and avoid drugs or alcohol than if I did not have a goal. Even if a goal is vague it can still have an influence on my life.
How I behave can have a large influence on my life. If I got a criminal record then I would not be able to do a lot of nice things and my life would be very different and possibly a lot more unhappy. I might be treated differently and maybe be avoided which would not be very pleasant at all. On the other hand, if I was nice to other people, people would be nice to me and possibly know me of the good things I had done.
Friends can also influence the way I behave, depending on which friends I make. Some friends might be very nice while others might try and force me to do things that I do not want to do. I believe that people who try and force you to do things against your will are not your true friends. I think that true friends respect and appreciate you for who you are and do not make you do things that you may not want to do.
My education will influence my future too. If I work hard and study well, I will have a better chance of getting a better job. On the other hand, if I slack off I probably will not get a good job and earn a lot less money. Usually it is not easy to stop procrastinating and study instead but it may be easier if you think about how it will help you enormously in the long run. It may be even easier if you have a goal in mind.
The job I get later on may have an impact on my life. If I get a good job, I could earn a lot of money, which in turn could be used to go on holidays, get a nice house and have a lot of nice things. If I don’t have a good job, then I will probably earn less money so I would not be able to go on as many holidays or get as many things. In addition to that, I would do more with my time if I worked rather than stayed at home.
If I had a boyfriend he would probably have an influence on my life too. I may have to be careful not to concentrate on him and to make sure that I still study and make the right choices in my life because he might just dump me later on anyway. I do not think that it is a good idea to let other people distract you from other things. After all, other people can be extremely unpredictable and occasionally they may disappoint you.
Money will probably have a large influence on my life. For a start, the more money I have the more things I can buy. The amount of money I have isn’t the only thing that matters thought. I believe that how you spend your money matters more. For example, there might be a person who is very rich but spends more than she or he earns and becomes poor, while there may also be a poorer person who saves their money and slowly and steadily becomes richer.
Alcohol may influence my future. If I become an alcoholic that will probably change my life forever. If I was an alcoholic I may feel that I need to have alcohol. That would be quite terrible. It is not good to have your life “ruled” by drinking or other unhealthy things. It is your choice whether to be an alcoholic or not, so it is probably a very wise idea to choose to avoid it so that alcohol does not consume your life.
Drugs may also have an influence on my life. Some drugs, for medicine, may be alright as long as you only take them when you really need to take them. Other drugs, such as marijuana and cocaine can be very bad for your health and only one is needed to start the vicious cycle of addiction. An addiction is often extremely hard to overcome and may consume your life for far longer than you think.
If I chose to sniff things I shouldn’t then that may have a negative impact on my life forever. Some odours affect the brain and I think that if you sniff these things too much the end result may be brain damage or even death (some of that may not be correct). Sniffing is mainly your choice. Sniffing is pointless and can have negative effects so I believe that one of the best things that you can do about it is to just avoid it.
Owning a car may have an influence on my life. If I am not careful on the road and get into a lot of crashes then I may lose limbs and my life would have changed because I would not be able to do all of the things that I am able to do now. Life would be far more unpleasant. On the other hand, if I am careful I will get into far fewer crashes but then again, I may not be lucky and crash into someone who isn’t being careful.
Luck will also have an impact on my life. Unfortunately it is not something that I can control. One day I can win millions of dollars from Lotto, while another day I could lose both legs in a car crash. But as my imaginary friend Xikun points out, “It is not the fall that matters- it’s the getting up again that does.” I believe that he is correct, mainly because luck is not something that anyone has control over.
I hope that my essay was enjoyable and enlightened you about how choices influence your future.
NOTES:- Seems to me that I was very materialistic. I would be lying to say that I'm not at all materialistic now, but I think I might be at least slightly less materialistic now, after having all of those experiences of being sick with diarrhoea over panicking about aeroplane toilets so much.
- It also seems to me that I used commas quite sparingly. So, to ma,ke, up, for it,, here, are, a, lot, of co,,mm,as. ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
- I mentioned hard work and studying well in the paragraph about education. Like I even knew what the words meant back then. (I still don't know, but at least now I have a vague idea.)
- In the paragraph about alcohol, I said, "That would be quite terrible." Reading over this essay, I laughed inside. It reminded me of an Uncyclopedia article about Qantas that said, "Qantas airplanes (also known as the exploding bomb) are impervious to all anti-aircraft missiles, rocks, birds or acts of God because it is made of metal, which is very strong."
- I QUOTED XIKUN!!!'
- "I hoped you enjoyed my essay." Seriously?! It wasn't even that well written!
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Two stories and some more bits and pieces
So much about a storm. It lasted for about 10 minutes.
I found these stories (or, to be more accurate, my mum found these stories) in our house dating from when I was 5! Reading them, I thought, "Damnit, I could write better then than I can now!" (However, my mum and I think that at least one might have been a retell or copy of another story.)
Original spelling and punctuation has been retained- however, it's not always obvious whether I've used a capital letter or not, especially with the letters P and S, so in these cases I'll use whatever makes sense. Also, anything in square brackets are things that I've added while typing the stories up.
A Big Mistake [note: this one rhymes, which is why my mum and I think that I've copied something.]
I was painting a line when my Brush leaked a blob. What a mistake! I started to sob. I was so mad, I shook though and though. So I splased on more Paint... Some Yellow, Some blue. I Studied the PaPer and looked uPside down. I blew on the Paint and created a Clown! I Painted Some heads, Some arms, and then legs... and made some new SPlats that looked like fried eggs! What fun! What a blast! I would make this fun last creatures from circus burst into sight... from dreams and from nighttime, from Bright morning light. When my friends saw this art, they asked what it takes. So I told them my seacret... just make some mistakes.
MINE! [I think this one is either a rehash or a copy of another story, given the plotline and my age at that time.]
Isabel went to play with Claudia.
She climbed onto Claudia's rocking horse.
Mine! Shrieked claudia and pushed her off.
Isabel picked up Claudia's Carrot top doll.
Mine! Screamed claudia and Snactched it away.
Isabel saw Claudia's Wooden animals piled up in an old shoebox She took them out and set them up on the Carpet.
"No, no, no!" Cried Claudia "My moo cows. My baa lambs!"
Claudia's mother put on their hats and coats and gloves and scarves.
"What we need is some fresh air." She said
Isabel and Claudia and Claudia's mother walked to the park. Claudia's mother pushed Claudia's new tricycle.
When they got to the park Isabel climed onto the tricycle.
"No no no!" yelled claudia My bike my bike. Me! Me! Me!" She pushed Isabel of the tricycle. "Now Claudia, let Izzie have a turn." Said Claudia's Mother
"No Izzie! no Izzie!" Screamed Claudia.
They Watched the bell fly off and land into a bird's Nest.
"Mine! Mine! Mine!" And she pushed it [I assume the tricycle, not the bell] out of Isabel's reach. It ran down the hill. It ran faster and faster. It ran over and over.
They Watched the handle bars fly off and land in a tree.
They watched the [yes, this was seriously underlined- the makings of The-a, I guess] of and land in the bandstand and the saddle bag in a baby's pram [saddle bag?!]
They watched the Wheels come off and roll one by one, into the road, into the pond and into the park-keepers hut.
They Watched nuts and bolts and Screws and Chains Spray into the air and across the grass and dissapear forever into piles of leaves.
They ran down the hill and stood ["stared" may have been what I was trying to say here] at the battered broken new tricycle frame...
"Yours." said Isabel and went to feed the ducks.
[Blurb]
Isabel went to play with Claudia. She climed on Claudia's rocking horse. Mine! shrieked Claudia and Pushed her off.
Poor Isabel has a hard time, trying to play with her friend. But in the end, it is Isabel who gets the last laugh.
A witty and origanal picture book for the very young.
Isbn 0-340-56698
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
978034056695
The next thing I want to write about is an exercise book I had written in at about that age (possibly younger as the first story makes almost no sense, especially when compared with the two above). It has a lot of story titles, but not a lot of stories. Here are all of the titles, plus the stories, if there are any. There are also a lot of pictures in the middle of the book, which aren't related to the stories, so I won't describe them here.
Betty Who Does Not want to lean the alphebet
Betty Never Leaned the Alphebet. She said she Didn't. That was really Boring. Clara's Sister, Phobia [!!!] Made an Alphebet Chart out of Coragated Cardbord. Betty Didn't Lik it. Clara said she had to read Alphebet At School, Betty's teacher made Everyone (even Betty) To Make an Alphebet book. Alpha mind wasn't on. Potter Marcus hated it. So didn't Betty Dawan. She came from Holland School and wore clogs. She saw some leased English shoes yesterday But now All Leased [sold?] out. They Couldn't Buy it for her best piese summer song. [At about that time I had to play a piano piece called "Dance of the Wooden Shoes" and my mum wanted me to wear clogs and a dress she had made with a tulip pattern. Unfortunately we couldn't find any clogs.] Then they leased Size 12. That was Betty's size. Hopefully She had English Shoes!
The End
Hamilton's Box
Mummy Ummy Ummy Ummy ummy
Stephanie's Naughty Babies (Real story) [For some reason I had this thing about my piano teacher, Miss Stephanie, having really naughty babies. The first story I wrote when I was 3, titled "Oh No No but Where is my Baby" was entirely about these naughty babies. I don't know if she even has children.]
Hattie's great show
The Laybour [The Layabout?]
The Game [I JUST LOST THE GAME!]
Delaby (An Australian Story)
Children Brad Stephanie and Folk
Taller Kyte
Tettie Brutionationafras [it has "nation" in it!]
Liffie Style [it's hard to tell whether it's "Liffie" or "Iffie" because there's so much scribbling out]
No Neat hair
My Grandma
My Mom [so I've just suddenly turned American now, have I?]
Phobia Is Sad [GOOD]
Dear Newly Read Children,
Here are some more excerpts from a few other exercise books I've found.
Special Space [this is dated- I was 6 at the time I wrote this one]
When we were learning about Space, we thought Space was special. So we called Space 'special Space' It is so nice there.
Well Miss Jones said
Space was special
Space was Cool
Space was Shiny
Space was dark
Space was firm
[my goodness, you can make so many innuendos out of this!]
I read a book about...
space
planets
It was special!
It was cool!
It was Shiny!
It was Dark!
IT WAS FIRM!
[and in come the innuendos...]
[Also in this book is a list of languages, or should I say "languases?" The three languages listed are Malay, English and French. If this book is anything to judge by, I must have thought that those were the only languages which existed in the world. I was wrong.]
[A list of games]
No looking
Memary game
Singing
Plays
lego
musical Bobs
word game
Scruffy Millie and Bonkers [where we all pretended to be dogs]
Dancing
troble [the board game "Trouble"]
Raceing
Bogie junior
woof up woof Down
Blue's Clues
Musical Stachuses
Make UP game
Digeridoo
Pretendtoswim [the words are written really close together]
Music
1B-2B-3B-4B
tori animal Boot
Hippopotamas
Furby Phases
Hide and seeks
Netball
Pelloest [I don't know what this is meant to mean]
title your play
Last but not least, there is a page stating that the deputy principal at my primary school can "reed" all writing.
I found these stories (or, to be more accurate, my mum found these stories) in our house dating from when I was 5! Reading them, I thought, "Damnit, I could write better then than I can now!" (However, my mum and I think that at least one might have been a retell or copy of another story.)
Original spelling and punctuation has been retained- however, it's not always obvious whether I've used a capital letter or not, especially with the letters P and S, so in these cases I'll use whatever makes sense. Also, anything in square brackets are things that I've added while typing the stories up.
A Big Mistake [note: this one rhymes, which is why my mum and I think that I've copied something.]
I was painting a line when my Brush leaked a blob. What a mistake! I started to sob. I was so mad, I shook though and though. So I splased on more Paint... Some Yellow, Some blue. I Studied the PaPer and looked uPside down. I blew on the Paint and created a Clown! I Painted Some heads, Some arms, and then legs... and made some new SPlats that looked like fried eggs! What fun! What a blast! I would make this fun last creatures from circus burst into sight... from dreams and from nighttime, from Bright morning light. When my friends saw this art, they asked what it takes. So I told them my seacret... just make some mistakes.
MINE! [I think this one is either a rehash or a copy of another story, given the plotline and my age at that time.]
Isabel went to play with Claudia.
She climbed onto Claudia's rocking horse.
Mine! Shrieked claudia and pushed her off.
Isabel picked up Claudia's Carrot top doll.
Mine! Screamed claudia and Snactched it away.
Isabel saw Claudia's Wooden animals piled up in an old shoebox She took them out and set them up on the Carpet.
"No, no, no!" Cried Claudia "My moo cows. My baa lambs!"
Claudia's mother put on their hats and coats and gloves and scarves.
"What we need is some fresh air." She said
Isabel and Claudia and Claudia's mother walked to the park. Claudia's mother pushed Claudia's new tricycle.
When they got to the park Isabel climed onto the tricycle.
"No no no!" yelled claudia My bike my bike. Me! Me! Me!" She pushed Isabel of the tricycle. "Now Claudia, let Izzie have a turn." Said Claudia's Mother
"No Izzie! no Izzie!" Screamed Claudia.
They Watched the bell fly off and land into a bird's Nest.
"Mine! Mine! Mine!" And she pushed it [I assume the tricycle, not the bell] out of Isabel's reach. It ran down the hill. It ran faster and faster. It ran over and over.
They Watched the handle bars fly off and land in a tree.
They watched the [yes, this was seriously underlined- the makings of The-a, I guess] of and land in the bandstand and the saddle bag in a baby's pram [saddle bag?!]
They watched the Wheels come off and roll one by one, into the road, into the pond and into the park-keepers hut.
They Watched nuts and bolts and Screws and Chains Spray into the air and across the grass and dissapear forever into piles of leaves.
They ran down the hill and stood ["stared" may have been what I was trying to say here] at the battered broken new tricycle frame...
"Yours." said Isabel and went to feed the ducks.
[Blurb]
Isabel went to play with Claudia. She climed on Claudia's rocking horse. Mine! shrieked Claudia and Pushed her off.
Poor Isabel has a hard time, trying to play with her friend. But in the end, it is Isabel who gets the last laugh.
A witty and origanal picture book for the very young.
Isbn 0-340-56698
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
978034056695
The next thing I want to write about is an exercise book I had written in at about that age (possibly younger as the first story makes almost no sense, especially when compared with the two above). It has a lot of story titles, but not a lot of stories. Here are all of the titles, plus the stories, if there are any. There are also a lot of pictures in the middle of the book, which aren't related to the stories, so I won't describe them here.
Betty Who Does Not want to lean the alphebet
Betty Never Leaned the Alphebet. She said she Didn't. That was really Boring. Clara's Sister, Phobia [!!!] Made an Alphebet Chart out of Coragated Cardbord. Betty Didn't Lik it. Clara said she had to read Alphebet At School, Betty's teacher made Everyone (even Betty) To Make an Alphebet book. Alpha mind wasn't on. Potter Marcus hated it. So didn't Betty Dawan. She came from Holland School and wore clogs. She saw some leased English shoes yesterday But now All Leased [sold?] out. They Couldn't Buy it for her best piese summer song. [At about that time I had to play a piano piece called "Dance of the Wooden Shoes" and my mum wanted me to wear clogs and a dress she had made with a tulip pattern. Unfortunately we couldn't find any clogs.] Then they leased Size 12. That was Betty's size. Hopefully She had English Shoes!
The End
Hamilton's Box
Mummy Ummy Ummy Ummy ummy
Stephanie's Naughty Babies (Real story) [For some reason I had this thing about my piano teacher, Miss Stephanie, having really naughty babies. The first story I wrote when I was 3, titled "Oh No No but Where is my Baby" was entirely about these naughty babies. I don't know if she even has children.]
Hattie's great show
The Laybour [The Layabout?]
The Game [I JUST LOST THE GAME!]
Delaby (An Australian Story)
Children Brad Stephanie and Folk
Taller Kyte
Tettie Brutionationafras [it has "nation" in it!]
Liffie Style [it's hard to tell whether it's "Liffie" or "Iffie" because there's so much scribbling out]
No Neat hair
My Grandma
My Mom [so I've just suddenly turned American now, have I?]
Phobia Is Sad [GOOD]
Dear Newly Read Children,
Here are some more excerpts from a few other exercise books I've found.
Special Space [this is dated- I was 6 at the time I wrote this one]
When we were learning about Space, we thought Space was special. So we called Space 'special Space' It is so nice there.
Well Miss Jones said
Space was special
Space was Cool
Space was Shiny
Space was dark
Space was firm
[my goodness, you can make so many innuendos out of this!]
I read a book about...
space
planets
It was special!
It was cool!
It was Shiny!
It was Dark!
IT WAS FIRM!
[and in come the innuendos...]
[Also in this book is a list of languages, or should I say "languases?" The three languages listed are Malay, English and French. If this book is anything to judge by, I must have thought that those were the only languages which existed in the world. I was wrong.]
[A list of games]
No looking
Memary game
Singing
Plays
lego
musical Bobs
word game
Scruffy Millie and Bonkers [where we all pretended to be dogs]
Dancing
troble [the board game "Trouble"]
Raceing
Bogie junior
woof up woof Down
Blue's Clues
Musical Stachuses
Make UP game
Digeridoo
Pretendtoswim [the words are written really close together]
Music
1B-2B-3B-4B
tori animal Boot
Hippopotamas
Furby Phases
Hide and seeks
Netball
Pelloest [I don't know what this is meant to mean]
title your play
Last but not least, there is a page stating that the deputy principal at my primary school can "reed" all writing.
Spelling [Doesn't] Matter- Part 2
After a long post which equates to 5 and a half pages of size 11 Calibri font on Microsoft Word (or 3 370 words, if you prefer), I'm back for more ranting!
Art
I don't remember that much about art in primary school. The amount we did lessened in upper primary school. One thing I do remember, however, was making a paper mache version of Earth in year 6. Basically we applied paper mache on a balloon and when it dried, we popped the balloon, painted the paper mache and stuck white paper coloured green on it for the continents. I had to get someone else to inflate my balloon for me and my globe was the smallest, cutest (in size) and roundest of the lot.
There was a small hole where the neck of the balloon was in every globe and it was in this hole where string was attached so that the globes could be hung from the classroom ceiling. Most people had glued on the continents so that the north pole was where the hole was, but I'd done mine so that the south pole was where the hole was. Consequently, my globe was upside down, compared with the stereotypical globe. When the string was attached to my globe, I held my globe by the string and said to the arts assistant, "My world is upside down."
LOTE (Languages Other Than English, which in my school's case was French)
Nobody liked it, so consequently nobody wanted to do it, so consequently nobody tried. I recall one girl in my class asking the French assistant, "Why is French so boring?" Another memory I have is of someone doing "1, 2, 3, 1, 2" in which they took two steps backwards for every three steps forwards, all because they didn't want to go to French.
In year 7 I annoyed my French teacher by telling him that I was going to learn Chinese in high school. This year I'm going to be doing French and Chinese. Go figure.
Music- Normal class
Most of what we did was sing. Occasionally we had to learn the names of the notes too. Not hard because I could play piano. One game we played involved having to jump onto a musical staff and the teacher would ask what note you had landed on. You could easily rig this by jumping onto the same note every time. That was only a minor flaw, however. The major flaw was that the staff didn't have a clef on it. It was assumed to be treble clef but it could also have been bass clef, alto clef, tenor clef or... percussion clef. "No, Miss, I am not standing on the C line, I am standing on the snare drum line." Or, if you prefer, "I'm sorry, but I've decided to be in alto clef today, so this note is a D, not a C." Unfortunately, back then, I only knew of treble clef and bass clef, so I could only make bass clef jokes (which I didn't, but there was one time I landed on the C space and I said E before quickly changing my answer to C, although E would have been correct in bass clef).
Music- Choir and Community Singing
In choir, the teacher generally spent most of the class yelling at us to shut up. Most people didn't really want to be there, but it was a choice between that and doing work on Behind the News or other fascinating stuff in those non-choir classes.
As for community singing, that was a little better as the class was smaller. Once we had a relief teacher who came around and made sure we were all singing. I easily countered this by mouthing the words when she wasn't nearby and singing when she was.
My neighbour- the husband of the zucchini-loving family- said that when he was in primary school, he would always mouth the words in choir practice, but when they actually had to perform, he would sing really loudly because the teacher couldn't stop him then. Today he is a primary school principal.
Sport
I hated sport, because I never understood the point of getting sweaty and tired chasing after a ball just to score goals. I felt inferior and if I actually tried then people would laugh at me, thus creating a vicious cycle. I was a good runner- both cross-country and sprints- until year 7, when I lost my ability in long-distance running.
Health
Health in year 4 was just listening to the teacher talk. Consequently, it was our favourite class. After that I think we just occasionally touched on topics related to health. Always physical health- never mental health. The first time I did mental health at school was in year 9.
On second thoughts- we did do health as a separate subject in year 6! We learned about wonderful stuff like caffeine and if I remember correctly, nutrition and risk taking. Apparently talking in class is a risk, because it means that you could get into trouble (i.e. have your name written on the board). We also learned about that wonderful thing known as puberty and we got to watch a lovely old video called "What's Happening to Me?"
Last but not least, I have just realised that I have forgotten one part of my music education in primary school. I can't believe that I've forgotten it.
Music- Clarinet
(Speaking of which, I should be practising that thing right about now.)
Another subject in which I learned something! I learned how to play the complete lower register and most of the upper register (the only note I had trouble with was the highest C in the standard range). I also learned how to tongue. I didn't practise very much but somehow I got an A for clarinet both years and my teacher thought that I was "an organised and reliable student who always works well in lessons!"
Other notes on primary school
Art
I don't remember that much about art in primary school. The amount we did lessened in upper primary school. One thing I do remember, however, was making a paper mache version of Earth in year 6. Basically we applied paper mache on a balloon and when it dried, we popped the balloon, painted the paper mache and stuck white paper coloured green on it for the continents. I had to get someone else to inflate my balloon for me and my globe was the smallest, cutest (in size) and roundest of the lot.
There was a small hole where the neck of the balloon was in every globe and it was in this hole where string was attached so that the globes could be hung from the classroom ceiling. Most people had glued on the continents so that the north pole was where the hole was, but I'd done mine so that the south pole was where the hole was. Consequently, my globe was upside down, compared with the stereotypical globe. When the string was attached to my globe, I held my globe by the string and said to the arts assistant, "My world is upside down."
LOTE (Languages Other Than English, which in my school's case was French)
Nobody liked it, so consequently nobody wanted to do it, so consequently nobody tried. I recall one girl in my class asking the French assistant, "Why is French so boring?" Another memory I have is of someone doing "1, 2, 3, 1, 2" in which they took two steps backwards for every three steps forwards, all because they didn't want to go to French.
In year 7 I annoyed my French teacher by telling him that I was going to learn Chinese in high school. This year I'm going to be doing French and Chinese. Go figure.
Music- Normal class
Most of what we did was sing. Occasionally we had to learn the names of the notes too. Not hard because I could play piano. One game we played involved having to jump onto a musical staff and the teacher would ask what note you had landed on. You could easily rig this by jumping onto the same note every time. That was only a minor flaw, however. The major flaw was that the staff didn't have a clef on it. It was assumed to be treble clef but it could also have been bass clef, alto clef, tenor clef or... percussion clef. "No, Miss, I am not standing on the C line, I am standing on the snare drum line." Or, if you prefer, "I'm sorry, but I've decided to be in alto clef today, so this note is a D, not a C." Unfortunately, back then, I only knew of treble clef and bass clef, so I could only make bass clef jokes (which I didn't, but there was one time I landed on the C space and I said E before quickly changing my answer to C, although E would have been correct in bass clef).
Music- Choir and Community Singing
In choir, the teacher generally spent most of the class yelling at us to shut up. Most people didn't really want to be there, but it was a choice between that and doing work on Behind the News or other fascinating stuff in those non-choir classes.
As for community singing, that was a little better as the class was smaller. Once we had a relief teacher who came around and made sure we were all singing. I easily countered this by mouthing the words when she wasn't nearby and singing when she was.
My neighbour- the husband of the zucchini-loving family- said that when he was in primary school, he would always mouth the words in choir practice, but when they actually had to perform, he would sing really loudly because the teacher couldn't stop him then. Today he is a primary school principal.
Sport
I hated sport, because I never understood the point of getting sweaty and tired chasing after a ball just to score goals. I felt inferior and if I actually tried then people would laugh at me, thus creating a vicious cycle. I was a good runner- both cross-country and sprints- until year 7, when I lost my ability in long-distance running.
Health
Health in year 4 was just listening to the teacher talk. Consequently, it was our favourite class. After that I think we just occasionally touched on topics related to health. Always physical health- never mental health. The first time I did mental health at school was in year 9.
On second thoughts- we did do health as a separate subject in year 6! We learned about wonderful stuff like caffeine and if I remember correctly, nutrition and risk taking. Apparently talking in class is a risk, because it means that you could get into trouble (i.e. have your name written on the board). We also learned about that wonderful thing known as puberty and we got to watch a lovely old video called "What's Happening to Me?"
Last but not least, I have just realised that I have forgotten one part of my music education in primary school. I can't believe that I've forgotten it.
Music- Clarinet
(Speaking of which, I should be practising that thing right about now.)
Another subject in which I learned something! I learned how to play the complete lower register and most of the upper register (the only note I had trouble with was the highest C in the standard range). I also learned how to tongue. I didn't practise very much but somehow I got an A for clarinet both years and my teacher thought that I was "an organised and reliable student who always works well in lessons!"
Other notes on primary school
- Too much standardised testing preparation! I remember telling one of the teachers (my year 1 teacher) about my annoyance (she was on duty and I was randomly talking to her). I asked her something like, "You can't fail or anything like that, so why does it matter?" She asked me why not being able to fail causes the tests to not matter. She was probably trying me to change my frame of mind. I think she may have succeeded, which was all the worse for me.
- Homework was generally one sheet due back the next week- that is, if we had homework at all. I decided to finish each sheet on the night I got them. My teacher always seemed slightly annoyed whenever I handed in homework early.
- Every day, in lower primary school, we would have to greet our teachers with a "Good morning, Mr/Mrs/Miss [whatever]" in the morning and a "Good afternoon, Mr/Mrs/Miss [whatever]" in the afternoon. Most times, we would sing our "good mornings" or our "good afternoons." As we progressed to upper primary school, teachers began to tell us to "say it, don't sing it," and eventually we all managed to get over the habit. It was very funny to listen to the school greeting a teacher in school assemblies because the disparity between the two halves of the school was obvious! It was also funny in the first or second week in high school when my S+E teacher said, "Good morning," and a few people started singing, "Good morning Mr..." and then cut off.
- In primary school, I learned two bicycle rules before learning how to ride a bike. In year 1 or 2, we were taught to walk our bikes across the road. In year 7 we were taught to ride on the road as the law says that only children under the age of 12, or those accompanying children under the age of 12, are allowed to ride on the footpath. This isn't a good thing if you learn how to ride a bike over that age as when you can't ride a bike properly, it's probably not a good idea to ride on the road. I will admit, however, that the law is not the fault of primary school.
- I'm currently looking at the school policies listed on my primary school's website and it says on the year 1-3 time-out sheet the first question is, "What did you do?" There are a few checkboxes such as "I was talking too much." After this it says, "I will write a sentence:" The sensible junior primary student would write a random sentence not related to their behaviour. If a teacher tries to punish them further, they can use the badly worded question in their defence.
- Another thing that it says is that physical assault of staff or other students or verbal abuse or harassment of staff will result in suspension. What about verbal abuse or harassment of students?
- If you were part of that group who arrived at school before 8.25am, classmates would say something like, "Wow, you were here early!" At my high school it's normal to arrive at that time although classes in my high school start 10 minutes later than they did in primary school.
- I'm going to go back to the subject of rules yet again. Another rule was that you were not allowed in the buildings at all during recess or lunch unless "wet weather" was called, in which case you had to go into a designated building depending on your year level. There was a time when access to the library was permitted during recess or lunch, but I think that was dropped when I was still in lower primary school.
- In year 6 we had to write down all of the books we were reading. I filled in two sheets. After that, I couldn't be bothered- probably because I was too busy reading.
Spelling [Doesn't] Matter
I think that while spelling matters, it shouldn't count for too much. After all, there are some great books out there containing deliberate spelling/grammar errors: "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" by Mark Twain (*shudder*- I had to write an essay on that book, and books often become horrible when you have to write essays on them) comes to mind and so does the "Chaos Walking" trilogy by Patrick Ness.
In my later years in primary school we had to make our own spelling lists using words which we had spelled incorrectly in our writing. During spelling practice times, it was those words that we would work on. However I'm not sure that was the best way to learn how to spell. It alienated the good spellers who were forced to choose words like "pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis" to fill up their spelling lists. Problems then arose when the teachers asked us to put each of our spelling words into a sentence. We couldn't complain, because complaining would only invite the response, "The point was to pick words that you're going to use in your writing!"
Perhaps there should have been a greater emphasis on grammar. I remember reading some poems or stories written by people in year 6 or 7 in primary school and seeing a few that seemed to be written in Engrish. In all fairness, there might have been some people who spoke English as a second language in that bunch that I wasn't aware of, but by year 7 it shouldn't be necessary to spend so many lessons on quotation marks. We had definitely started learning about those in year 2 because I remember the teacher telling us to put a 66 at the beginning of speech and a 99 at the end. I don't think we ever really progressed past quotation marks, which made me pretty angry when a relief teacher corrected my work by putting a semicolon in place of a hyphen. I was angry not because I was being corrected (for once!) but because I had never been taught how to use a semicolon and therefore should not have been expected to know how. Semicolons, hyphens and commas, to me, come under the category "dodgy pieces of punctuation;" that is to say, their use seems to be a bit arbitrary.
Even the use of words seems a bit arbitrary. Thesaurus.com says that arbitrary can mean "whimsical, chance," with synonyms such as "erratic" and "optional," or it can mean "dictatorial" with synonyms such as "absolute" and "no ifs ands or buts."
Actually, on second thoughts, forget all I have said about schools needing to place a greater emphasis on spelling or grammar. The whole primary school framework needs to be reworked- and desperately, too. Here are some of my random comments on primary school.
Rules
Gosh, the rules. You might think that I am the "too cool for school" type when I say this, but I'm not. No, I was a conformist, I am ashamed to say. Here is a snapshot of some of the rules my primary school had.
I'll break this section up into subjects or bits of subjects (English is a pretty broad subject, so that one will be broken up).
English- Spelling and Grammar
Everything I learned in spelling was by myself. I don't know all of the spelling rules to this day because I spell stuff "instinctively"- that is to say, I don't think about the spelling because I've written or read the word enough times before and also I have a tendency to think in the written word. Where I don't know a word, I spell using a combination of related words that I know and trends in other words that I know. In year 7, we had to write down as many words with the "ee" sound as we could think of. It was only when our work was marked that I remembered that in year 1 or 2 or whatever they had said that e consonant e makes the "ee" sound. There was another time in year 5 when we had to sort words according to spelling rules and I felt alienated because again, I'm primarily a visual speller who writes enough to spell most words accurately without thinking about how I'm spelling them. I told the prac teacher that I didn't learn how to spell phonetically and with her air of superiority, she asked me how I learned how to spell. I couldn't answer that question because I could spell prior to entering primary school and therefore couldn't remember.
English- Comprehension
I've always sucked at reading comprehension. Even in year 3 I was fully aware of the fact- on a self-evaluation sheet, I had written "I need to work harder at comprehension." Yet nobody was there to help me.
In Year 7 I remember on one reading comprehension sheet I picked "sympathetic" (the right answer) but then my eye fell upon the word "indifferent." I didn't know what "indifferent" meant then, but it looked good, so I decided to pick that one instead. Upon learning that "sympathetic" was the right answer, I became extremely unhappy and was bracing myself for the torments from my classmates, which never came and weren't ever going to come, but ever since year 3 I was in the habit of continually expecting them. This is the thread by which I survived primary school.
Aside from that, perhaps my problem was that I have a warped view of life and a warped view of certain word usage. In my early years of primary school I had a tendency to use the word "reason" out of context a lot (well, according to some random samples I've found lying around the house such as "Are we on the reason?"). I also knew the word "phobia" and what a phobia was because I had one of loud noises, but I didn't link those two together. Today I am, like, in, like the like habit of liking to use the, like, word "like" out of, like, context, like, a lot.
Another killing question was in year 5. The teacher had written the questions up on the board from a previous standardised test without the multiple choice answers. One of the questions was, "How has the author described [character]?" My answer was, "The author has described [character] through what the other characters have said about them." Apparently, that was incorrect and all I should have written was "The author has described [character] as weird." What gets me is that my answer was correct- the question was badly worded and so I suffered for it. It is true that in a high school level answer I would have written answers to both interpretations of the question, as in, "The author has described [character] as being weird through the usage of dialogue between the other characters in the text," but I think that in a primary school, if having one half of the answer is considered to be 100% correct, the other half of the answer should also be given some credit, not simply turned down with a shake of the head as my year 5 teacher did.
Speaking of standardised tests, I tend not to do so well in standardised comprehension tests which are multiple choice or short answer. However, I can write essays, which are "extremely long answer" questions. (I'll write more on essays- and other forms of writing- later.) Perhaps it is because standardised tests can have badly worded questions, as shown above. One question I encountered on my test was about a guy called Jacob and one of the questions asked me what distinguished Jacob from the other characters. Was it the way he saw, the way he talked, the way he walked or the way he felt? The text didn't mention anything about the latter three, as far as I can remember anyway. As for the way he saw! The text gave no hint that he may physically see anything differently from the other characters. It was more about his way of thinking. I was tempted to scribble in "E- The way he thinks" and shade in that bubble. In the end I decided to read the first option using the metaphorical meaning for the word "see" and shade in that answer. There was also another question which appeared to have more than one answer and they seemed equally good.
Anyway, I'm going off the topic here. My ramblings about these tests can be saved for another day. On second thoughts, they can be saved for all of the politicians in the world.
English- Writing
In year 7 the year 6s and 7s were set a task- to write a 10-paragraph (or however long it was) essay on how our choices influence our futures. We hadn't been taught how to write an essay. We hadn't really been given any pointers on how to write an essay. The bottom line is: if you're going to make your students write an essay, teach them how to write one first.
Each paragraph had to be at least 10 lines long. We each had our own individual ways of getting around this. I lengthened out all of my contractions and wrote long words in place of short ones (e.g. "gigantic" instead of "big" or "huge"). Also, because I use running writing, I could make a word take up a lot of space. Naturally, the tenth line of most of my paragraphs contained only one word. Some people opted to use headings for each of their paragraphs which transformed into an extra line. Bonus credit, however, goes to the aviation fanatic in my class who only wrote about five words on each line as if he was writing a poem!
Maths (or "mathematics" for you fancy ones)
I think I actually learned stuff in maths. The problems I had with maths were more with my own twisted frame of mind, not with how maths was taught. If I could change anything it would be to at least show the students how many types of maths there is out there besides the ones taught in primary school and algebra (e.g. trigonometry, linear equations) so that those ahead could go in pursuit of more knowledge- that is, if school culture didn't hold them back. Oh and to teach multiplication and division of fractions in primary school. I felt very behind when I went to high school because I hadn't been taught in primary school (we touched on multiplication once, but never division).
I was fortunate, though. At my friend's school, the year 7s had to do year 4 maths because a lot of people didn't know why you had to carry the 1 in subtraction.
Science
Let's do a competition to see how many drops of water we can put on a 5c coin!
No, seriously, that's what science was in years 3, 6 and 7 (perhaps year 4 as well). In year 6 they did a mould experiment but I was away on the day they started it.
In year 4 and 5 we did more varied experiments. Like sit outside and time how long it takes for ice and chocolate to melt. I'm being serious here, but I'm glad to say that wasn't the most exciting one we had to do. We had our fair share of balloon rockets (which I was fine with because the balloons didn't have to be blown up too big) and gliders (it was in this lesson where I made a stupid mistake because I was going to say one thing and out of my mouth came another, making me feel extremely dumb). Aside from the aviation ones, we had to build bridges and towers out of paper straws too.
Social Studies
This was never really taught as a separate subject in upper primary. Not that I can remember, anyway.
Technology and Enterprise
Let's see how much stuff we can make out of cardboard boxes and other recycled materials! Through T+E, I quickly learned the shortcomings of cardboard. I was never an artsy-project type of person, so I didn't like T+E that much, but it was bearable until the balloon car experiment.
When you're powering a model car with balloons, of course you're going to want to make it as big as possible so that your car has more air to power it. The bigger a balloon gets, the more likely it is that it will pop. The bigger a balloon is when it pops, the louder the noise it makes. I, a ligyrophobe, made all of these calculations at lightning-fast speed. T+E for the next week or so was agony. I was given solace on the day when all of the cars had to be tested in a competition. I got sent to a year 4/5 class where I had to explain to the deputy principal (who was taking that class) a bunch of kids two or three years younger than me that I had been sent to that classroom because of my fear of loud noises such as balloons popping.
This has been quite a long post and my computer slows down every time I inadvertently highlight something in it, but unfortunately I still have far more to say about primary school. If you are actually interested in this stuff, then stay tuned for part 2.
In my later years in primary school we had to make our own spelling lists using words which we had spelled incorrectly in our writing. During spelling practice times, it was those words that we would work on. However I'm not sure that was the best way to learn how to spell. It alienated the good spellers who were forced to choose words like "pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis" to fill up their spelling lists. Problems then arose when the teachers asked us to put each of our spelling words into a sentence. We couldn't complain, because complaining would only invite the response, "The point was to pick words that you're going to use in your writing!"
Perhaps there should have been a greater emphasis on grammar. I remember reading some poems or stories written by people in year 6 or 7 in primary school and seeing a few that seemed to be written in Engrish. In all fairness, there might have been some people who spoke English as a second language in that bunch that I wasn't aware of, but by year 7 it shouldn't be necessary to spend so many lessons on quotation marks. We had definitely started learning about those in year 2 because I remember the teacher telling us to put a 66 at the beginning of speech and a 99 at the end. I don't think we ever really progressed past quotation marks, which made me pretty angry when a relief teacher corrected my work by putting a semicolon in place of a hyphen. I was angry not because I was being corrected (for once!) but because I had never been taught how to use a semicolon and therefore should not have been expected to know how. Semicolons, hyphens and commas, to me, come under the category "dodgy pieces of punctuation;" that is to say, their use seems to be a bit arbitrary.
Even the use of words seems a bit arbitrary. Thesaurus.com says that arbitrary can mean "whimsical, chance," with synonyms such as "erratic" and "optional," or it can mean "dictatorial" with synonyms such as "absolute" and "no ifs ands or buts."
Actually, on second thoughts, forget all I have said about schools needing to place a greater emphasis on spelling or grammar. The whole primary school framework needs to be reworked- and desperately, too. Here are some of my random comments on primary school.
Rules
Gosh, the rules. You might think that I am the "too cool for school" type when I say this, but I'm not. No, I was a conformist, I am ashamed to say. Here is a snapshot of some of the rules my primary school had.
- No hat, no play. This was an okay rule and would have stayed okay if it hadn't been reworked during my later years in primary school so that the hatless students had to go and sit outside the staff room during break times. (This rule was waived on school photo days, due to student resistance and staff understanding.)
- Library day is only one day a week and year 3s (or was it 4s?) and younger have a borrowing limit of only one book (maximum is 4 books in year 7). Outside of that time you can't borrow books. In year 3, however, I had heard that someone else had gotten permission to borrow books outside of that time and so I requested that permission too. It was granted to me for a little while, until eventually the librarian questioned me and asked if my teacher (?!) had said it was okay. I replied in the affirmative. Now I'm not quite sure what possessed me to lie, but I think it may have been fear of my teacher as she was very loud and I hated loud noises and plus she had the habit of picking on me for some reason. I think I hoped that the matter would just be dropped and I wouldn't have to confront my teacher and ask her for permission. Alas, it was not- the librarian went and checked with my teacher. I was sent to the deputy principal's office (the deputy principal was far scarier than the principal). The deputy principal then asked me to write an apology letter to my teacher for lying to her.
- Restricted borrowing areas depending on age levels in the library. There were some "Year 7 only" books. There weren't a great number of them, but I still wonder why they were there in the first place. The worst offender was perhaps the little white trolley thing that pre-primaries and year 1s had to borrow from. Later on in year 1 (I think), the teacher would pick some students each week to gain the privilege of borrowing from the shelves like the big kids (not a one-off privilege, a permanent one). Every week she would pick some more students. I don't remember ever being picked and I always wondered why, because I was far past reading picture books at that time.
- 10 minutes eating time! 40 minutes (later shortened to 30 minutes) playing time! An okay-ish rule in junior primary because I understand that a lot of little kids would just want to go and play. However, this alienated the slow eaters, even more so when the teachers had the bright idea of making all of the year 4-7s sit outside the undercover area to eat lunch. I assume that this was because they only needed one teacher to supervise the lot of us rather than different teachers to supervise individual eating areas. Outside the undercover area were the four-square courts, so when the bell rang for playing time, the junior primary would come and play four-square in your food. You might say that it wasn't necessary for everyone to simply run off when the bell went, but in a way it was- after being forced to fit into a given mould for long enough, any kind of freedom was good. The only good thing I can say about this rule is that lunchtime was longer in primary school than it is in my high school.
- When you have finished your work, do not say anything, just quietly go on with unfinished work. This rule wasn't applicable in every classroom, but it was in my year 4 one. It alienates those who finish everything quickly.
- You can only take one book for silent reading. This rule was applicable in my year 3 classroom for the second semester (I think). This alienates and bores the fast readers who can finish several books in the allotted time for silent reading. (I used to be in that category but then in year 7, I tried to feel less alienated by not reading and now I read quickly no more, no more.)
- There was little margin for time to arrive at school. The earliest you were really allowed to arrive was 8.25am (earlier arrivals could sit outside the staff room, but you could sort of tell that this practice was discouraged). The latest was 8.40am, when school started. In my high school, it's normal for people to arrive 20-30min before school starts.
- When you arrived at school you had to go straight to your class (or at least the area outside of it). This alienates those who feel better on their own. I recall one time, in year 6 I believe, I went to the eating area outside of class as the classroom wasn't opened and for some reason I felt overwhelmed by the amount of people there. I went and sought solitude beneath "The Three Trees" on our school oval. This wasn't the first time- I had done this most days for a week or so, until a teacher told me to stop because apparently I could get kidnapped by aliens flying UFOs.
- THE TOILET RULE. No, seriously, this was the worst rule out of all of the rules in primary school. Once, in year 6, I asked for permission to go to the toilet. The teacher replied in the affirmative but told me that I "owed him time after school." Thankfully, he forgot, and despite being a conformist, I did not remind him. I thought this was a one-off incident. Unfortunately, I was wrong. He eventually introduced a "toilet list" on the board. If you went to the toilet during class, your name was added to the list. If you went multiple times, dots were added after your name. This list made me feel anxious and, consequently, I went to the toilet even more. My name was, almost without fail, on that list, sometimes with a dot or two after my name. I believe this has done me some damage because apparently I didn't even talk about this to my parents. According to my mum, all I said was that my teacher "didn't like me going to the toilet during class." Also according to my mum, there's a serious problem when a kid can't talk to her parents about stuff like this (in fact, I'm having trouble writing this now, because I'm worried that everyone will laugh at me because I already talk about toilets too much *cough*aeroplanetoilets*cough*). Perhaps the problem was that I bowed to authority too readily and took a teacher's words as law that you shouldn't speak up against. Thinking of this incident makes me extremely angry that I was a conformist.
I'll break this section up into subjects or bits of subjects (English is a pretty broad subject, so that one will be broken up).
English- Spelling and Grammar
Everything I learned in spelling was by myself. I don't know all of the spelling rules to this day because I spell stuff "instinctively"- that is to say, I don't think about the spelling because I've written or read the word enough times before and also I have a tendency to think in the written word. Where I don't know a word, I spell using a combination of related words that I know and trends in other words that I know. In year 7, we had to write down as many words with the "ee" sound as we could think of. It was only when our work was marked that I remembered that in year 1 or 2 or whatever they had said that e consonant e makes the "ee" sound. There was another time in year 5 when we had to sort words according to spelling rules and I felt alienated because again, I'm primarily a visual speller who writes enough to spell most words accurately without thinking about how I'm spelling them. I told the prac teacher that I didn't learn how to spell phonetically and with her air of superiority, she asked me how I learned how to spell. I couldn't answer that question because I could spell prior to entering primary school and therefore couldn't remember.
English- Comprehension
I've always sucked at reading comprehension. Even in year 3 I was fully aware of the fact- on a self-evaluation sheet, I had written "I need to work harder at comprehension." Yet nobody was there to help me.
In Year 7 I remember on one reading comprehension sheet I picked "sympathetic" (the right answer) but then my eye fell upon the word "indifferent." I didn't know what "indifferent" meant then, but it looked good, so I decided to pick that one instead. Upon learning that "sympathetic" was the right answer, I became extremely unhappy and was bracing myself for the torments from my classmates, which never came and weren't ever going to come, but ever since year 3 I was in the habit of continually expecting them. This is the thread by which I survived primary school.
Aside from that, perhaps my problem was that I have a warped view of life and a warped view of certain word usage. In my early years of primary school I had a tendency to use the word "reason" out of context a lot (well, according to some random samples I've found lying around the house such as "Are we on the reason?"). I also knew the word "phobia" and what a phobia was because I had one of loud noises, but I didn't link those two together. Today I am, like, in, like the like habit of liking to use the, like, word "like" out of, like, context, like, a lot.
Another killing question was in year 5. The teacher had written the questions up on the board from a previous standardised test without the multiple choice answers. One of the questions was, "How has the author described [character]?" My answer was, "The author has described [character] through what the other characters have said about them." Apparently, that was incorrect and all I should have written was "The author has described [character] as weird." What gets me is that my answer was correct- the question was badly worded and so I suffered for it. It is true that in a high school level answer I would have written answers to both interpretations of the question, as in, "The author has described [character] as being weird through the usage of dialogue between the other characters in the text," but I think that in a primary school, if having one half of the answer is considered to be 100% correct, the other half of the answer should also be given some credit, not simply turned down with a shake of the head as my year 5 teacher did.
Speaking of standardised tests, I tend not to do so well in standardised comprehension tests which are multiple choice or short answer. However, I can write essays, which are "extremely long answer" questions. (I'll write more on essays- and other forms of writing- later.) Perhaps it is because standardised tests can have badly worded questions, as shown above. One question I encountered on my test was about a guy called Jacob and one of the questions asked me what distinguished Jacob from the other characters. Was it the way he saw, the way he talked, the way he walked or the way he felt? The text didn't mention anything about the latter three, as far as I can remember anyway. As for the way he saw! The text gave no hint that he may physically see anything differently from the other characters. It was more about his way of thinking. I was tempted to scribble in "E- The way he thinks" and shade in that bubble. In the end I decided to read the first option using the metaphorical meaning for the word "see" and shade in that answer. There was also another question which appeared to have more than one answer and they seemed equally good.
Anyway, I'm going off the topic here. My ramblings about these tests can be saved for another day. On second thoughts, they can be saved for all of the politicians in the world.
English- Writing
In year 7 the year 6s and 7s were set a task- to write a 10-paragraph (or however long it was) essay on how our choices influence our futures. We hadn't been taught how to write an essay. We hadn't really been given any pointers on how to write an essay. The bottom line is: if you're going to make your students write an essay, teach them how to write one first.
Each paragraph had to be at least 10 lines long. We each had our own individual ways of getting around this. I lengthened out all of my contractions and wrote long words in place of short ones (e.g. "gigantic" instead of "big" or "huge"). Also, because I use running writing, I could make a word take up a lot of space. Naturally, the tenth line of most of my paragraphs contained only one word. Some people opted to use headings for each of their paragraphs which transformed into an extra line. Bonus credit, however, goes to the aviation fanatic in my class who only wrote about five words on each line as if he was writing a poem!
Maths (or "mathematics" for you fancy ones)
I think I actually learned stuff in maths. The problems I had with maths were more with my own twisted frame of mind, not with how maths was taught. If I could change anything it would be to at least show the students how many types of maths there is out there besides the ones taught in primary school and algebra (e.g. trigonometry, linear equations) so that those ahead could go in pursuit of more knowledge- that is, if school culture didn't hold them back. Oh and to teach multiplication and division of fractions in primary school. I felt very behind when I went to high school because I hadn't been taught in primary school (we touched on multiplication once, but never division).
I was fortunate, though. At my friend's school, the year 7s had to do year 4 maths because a lot of people didn't know why you had to carry the 1 in subtraction.
Science
Let's do a competition to see how many drops of water we can put on a 5c coin!
No, seriously, that's what science was in years 3, 6 and 7 (perhaps year 4 as well). In year 6 they did a mould experiment but I was away on the day they started it.
In year 4 and 5 we did more varied experiments. Like sit outside and time how long it takes for ice and chocolate to melt. I'm being serious here, but I'm glad to say that wasn't the most exciting one we had to do. We had our fair share of balloon rockets (which I was fine with because the balloons didn't have to be blown up too big) and gliders (it was in this lesson where I made a stupid mistake because I was going to say one thing and out of my mouth came another, making me feel extremely dumb). Aside from the aviation ones, we had to build bridges and towers out of paper straws too.
Social Studies
This was never really taught as a separate subject in upper primary. Not that I can remember, anyway.
Technology and Enterprise
Let's see how much stuff we can make out of cardboard boxes and other recycled materials! Through T+E, I quickly learned the shortcomings of cardboard. I was never an artsy-project type of person, so I didn't like T+E that much, but it was bearable until the balloon car experiment.
When you're powering a model car with balloons, of course you're going to want to make it as big as possible so that your car has more air to power it. The bigger a balloon gets, the more likely it is that it will pop. The bigger a balloon is when it pops, the louder the noise it makes. I, a ligyrophobe, made all of these calculations at lightning-fast speed. T+E for the next week or so was agony. I was given solace on the day when all of the cars had to be tested in a competition. I got sent to a year 4/5 class where I had to explain to the deputy principal (who was taking that class) a bunch of kids two or three years younger than me that I had been sent to that classroom because of my fear of loud noises such as balloons popping.
This has been quite a long post and my computer slows down every time I inadvertently highlight something in it, but unfortunately I still have far more to say about primary school. If you are actually interested in this stuff, then stay tuned for part 2.
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