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GCSE Answers  [message #58089] Mon, 27 July 2009 09:09 Go to next message
JFR is currently offline  JFR

On fire!
Location: Israel
Registered: October 2004
Messages: 1367



Someone sent me some thirty answers that schoolchildren wrote in their examination for the General Certificate of Secondary Education in the UK. I really cannot believe that these are actual answers, even though I am assured that they are. At any rate, any one who has ever been involved in education will find in some of them something to laugh at and in others something to cry about. I shall try to post one answer each day. Please feel free to comment on these. Can these answers really have been written by 15 year olds?

Ancient Egypt was inhabited by mummies and they all wrote in hydraulics. They lived in the Sarah Dessert and travelled by Camelot. The climate of the Sarah is such that the inhabitants have to live elsewhere.

J F R



The paradox has often been noted that the United States, founded in secularism, is now the most religiose country in Christendom, while England, with an established church headed by its constitutional monarch, is among the least. (Richard Dawkins, 2006)
Re: GCSE Answers  [message #58090 is a reply to message #58089] Mon, 27 July 2009 14:24 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Macky is currently offline  Macky

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Location: USA
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"Ancient Egypt was inhabited by mummies and they all wrote in hydraulics. They lived in the Sarah Dessert and travelled by Camelot. The climate of the Sarah is such that the inhabitants have to live elsewhere."

We were discussing, not long ago, the nutty things that adolescent boys do. This answer was likely given by such a boy. Sometimes things like this seem just too witty for a boy to resist. It might also be that the boy had a crush on someone younger at his current school and would be in the same class as his beloved if he were to repeat a year, instead of being sent of to a different school. I switched universities to be near the boy I loved.



Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brothers to dwell together in unity!
Ps 133:1 NASB
Re: GCSE Answers  [message #58098 is a reply to message #58089] Mon, 27 July 2009 22:27 Go to previous messageGo to next message
kupuna is currently offline  kupuna

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Location: Norway
Registered: February 2005
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I teach 15 years olds, and out of a hundred kids there will always be a handful who write answers like these. Although one may laugh at them, or their answers, I feel sorry for them, but some of them can repair and reassemble a motor bike a lot faster and better than most "clever" students. Our brains are different, and which brain is the better depends on the problems we face.

Some kids do have learning difficulties and have not the foggiest idea what the word "hydraulics" means or where "Sahara" is. They are also unable to attach a wheel to their own bike. But they are still allowed to attend the same schools as the other kids. Shouldn't they?
Here's Another One  [message #58103 is a reply to message #58089] Tue, 28 July 2009 14:09 Go to previous messageGo to next message
JFR is currently offline  JFR

On fire!
Location: Israel
Registered: October 2004
Messages: 1367



The Bible is full of interesting caricatures. In the first book of the Bible, Guinessis, Adam and Eve were created from an apple tree. One of their children, Cain, asked, "Am I my brother's son?"

J F R



The paradox has often been noted that the United States, founded in secularism, is now the most religiose country in Christendom, while England, with an established church headed by its constitutional monarch, is among the least. (Richard Dawkins, 2006)
Re: GCSE Answers  [message #58109 is a reply to message #58089] Wed, 29 July 2009 01:41 Go to previous messageGo to next message
saben is currently offline  saben

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Registered: May 2003
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As Macky says some of the answers may have been in jest. I know that I often didn't take my work seriously in High School. Despite that I still got high marks in things I put my mind to- my results were just inconsistent.

Otherwise there could be learning disabilities involved- dyslexia is quite common and often undiagnosed. ADHD is a scapegoat for a lot of behavioural problems nowadays, but it does play a part in some children's behaviour. Also a lot of kids have spelling/ grammar problems because of technology- my opinion on this falls slightly more on the post modern side than the traditional side- but as someone who takes a fairly prescriptive approach to my own language use I can see why some see this as extremely problematic.

I also think in Australia at least, and possibly in other countries, there's been a lot of failed primary school education experiments where some postmodern theory or another has gotten in the way of a sound primary school education. Kids are taught with some new style of learning that just doesn't end up as effective so they miss the fundamentals. I know a lot of 18 year olds that, to me at least, seem to have missed the entirety of grades 4-6. Their knowledge of spelling, grammar and even multiplication and fractions just seems to be missing. Like there is just a big black hole where 4 years of their primary school education should have been.

Really it comes back to politics in my mind, though. Central government and central education policy only ensures that education fuck up an entire generation of school kids, rather than just one school's worth.



Look at this tree. I cannot make it blossom when it suits me nor make it bear fruit before its time [...] No matter what you do, that seed will grow to be a peach tree. You may wish for an apple or an orange, but you will get a peach.
Master Oogway
And Yet Another One  [message #58141 is a reply to message #58089] Fri, 31 July 2009 05:21 Go to previous message
JFR is currently offline  JFR

On fire!
Location: Israel
Registered: October 2004
Messages: 1367



The Greeks were a highly sculptured people, and without them we wouldn't have history. The Greeks also had myths. A myth is a female moth. Actually, Homer was not written by Homer but by another man of that name.

J F R



The paradox has often been noted that the United States, founded in secularism, is now the most religiose country in Christendom, while England, with an established church headed by its constitutional monarch, is among the least. (Richard Dawkins, 2006)
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