In grade 6, we had to take a standardize test. I remember it mostly because of the funny shape of the graph that came back. It tested our skills in a bunch of different areas, and charted them by percentile. Mine was 98, 99, 97, 99, 98, 52, 99, 99, like that.
The 52 was math. After that I had two truly horrible math teachers in a row in Gr. 7 & 8, failed it first semester in Gr. 9 and had an amazing teacher the second semester, followed by a dud, but by the time I hit Grade 12 I was still in algebra and by an odd coincidence my final grade was a 62, which was exactly the lowest number I needed to put my algebra mark into the “we don’t care” category in the university’s admissions structure. It didn’t screw up the average I had in any of my other classes. I remember the guy who gave it to me fondly to this day, because I’m pretty sure I didn’t get the 85% I would have needed on the final to get that grade. I’m also pretty sure he knew I’d never voluntarily try to do anything involving numbers ever again.
I also remember high school English. God I hated that. They’d hand out a book, and I’d read it that night, and I’d have to sit there and wait for months until they handed out the test. I read Chaucer’s prologue to “The Canterbury Tales”. It was nice to listen to the tape of it being read in Middle English, the dude had a good voice and the accent was interesting. Once. The second time not so much, and I could really have done without the recording of him reading it in modern English, or the teacher reading it to us, or us reading it aloud in turn. Now, my Grade 11 English teacher’s presentation of “The Miller’s Tale”, complete with transparencies for the overhead projector, that’s a different story.
In Grade 8, I had a teacher who understood. She handed out John Wyndam’s “The Chrysalids”, and I read it that night, and we talked about it (just her and me) the next day, and while she was doing whatever she was doing with the class I read the book I’d brought. When she asked me a question, I answered it, and when the test came I took it.
Then came Grade 9. Lord of the Flies.
I’d read it. A few times. The teacher handed it out, and I read it again. The next day I cracked my other book open under the desk and she called me on it, told me to pay attention. I explained that I’d read “Lord of the Flies” a few times and would be ready for the test whenever she handed it out.
Apparently, she didn’t believe me. We argued a bit, had different interpretations of the subtext, and basically entertained the whole class until she pulled rank. I went and saw the principal. Corporal punishment can be fun, but only among consenting adults.
I returned to class, and boy, let me tell you, I paid attention. I listened to every word she said, and asked a lot of questions. I asked for clarification whenever she managed a malapropism or a spelling error. I suggested alternate interpretations, and could back them up with text. I was the most attentive and interested student she could ever have wished for, in the “Monkey’s Paw” sense.
I did everything within my power to drive her completely insane without ever giving her anything she could use as a reasonable excuse to discipline me.
Then came the semester break, and parent-teacher conferences.
My parents are well aware of what an asshole I can be when I want to, but they would definitely call someone on a complaint that was based on my knowing the material better than the teacher. My high 90’s mark on the test probably helped.
Day one, second semester, she handed out the book (Julius Caesar), and when she got to the front of the classroom and started to talk I slipped my current novel out of my backpack and opened it under the desk. She didn’t say anything. For the rest of the semester, I read what I wanted to and she taught what she wanted to and I wrote the exams when she handed them out.
I could have used a little help in the math department, and I managed just fine with the English when they’d leave me the hell alone. There were kids in my math classes who could do work well above the level of the teacher without breaking a sweat but would summarize “The Diary of Anne Frank” as “A girl gets caught hiding in an attic”, and I bet they felt the same way. There were some who could do both, and some who couldn’t spell their names right if you gave them 4 out of 2 chances.
Teachers have a lousy job, they have to work within the system. Administrators can’t design a system that’s going to account for individual differences because they have to make it mostly work for most of the people most of the time. You lose the ends of the bell curve that way.
You wind up with the joke about the guy in the ten items or less line with 15 items, he’s either a Harvard student who can’t count or an MIT student who can’t read.
Or a high school graduate who can’t do either.
