Sad that it was not done in class specifically, but the wackiest thing was reported from the high school I used to go in the old country, a group of high schoolers once did enter ninja style in the school campus one night… to steal the final tests.
They made a mint by selling them to many other students, a similar stunt was attempted a few years later, but unfortunately for the later ones, it was not wise to attempt that thing when a civil war is going on and military thugs and guards were trigger happy… (circa 1980’s)
So I have to report on one of the most amusing things I saw in class from those days, remember that there was a civil war going on, the high school was set so the students remained in the classroom and it was the teachers that did go from class to class, and then take into account that it was a high school for well to do students.
Almost like a flash mob of now, students got into the habit of chanting very revolutionary jingles from the leftists revels while the teachers were changing classrooms, of course there is no doubt that most students did not care to make the teachers and even administrators that sometimes gave classes to wince in disgust, they knew that there was very little chance that they would complain to the fathers of most of the students as they were the sons of the elites and military that were then getting rid of syndicalist leaders, priests and university students.
Of course I had to keep my real thoughts inside, because it was clear that most students were anyhow supporters of the then current status and they were just doing what many other students do elsewhere: finding ways to troll and bug teachers in the most disturbing ways possible.
This is stupid but everyone from my class remembers it…
Our American History teacher had put up a bulletin board, something about the GOP (like “GOP THE GRAND OLD PARTY”) and some kids re-arranged it to spell “GOD EATS SPAM.”
It cracked us the fuck up. I haven’t taken the GOP seriously since.
High school, in the time when schools were transitioning from films to VCRs.
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Teacher attempting to show us a video.
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My friends and I sitting in the back of the room with a universal remote from home.
In 8th grade I invented a game called “Class laps”. The objective is to walk around the entire perimeter of the classroom as many times in a row without being confronted by the teacher. During one particular Spanish class that was being taught by a substitute, I set the record at 69 laps.
Per OP, I don’t know about school in general – when I was a teenager we were carpooling going to pick up donations on school time, for the school, and I hit a mailbox, turned around, tried to flee the scene, but Owner came out, was pissed but all, “Hell, I done worse, just pay me for a new one, and let’s see your license.” Changed the tire, but still very bad. With my friends/classmates in the car (“Living, Loving, She’s Just A Woman!” – the whole Zep II [this was 1993 or so]) we drove to a mall, found the same model car, jacked it up, swapped tires, leaving the old tire barely hanging on the new donor car, and made it out just ahead of the security guards roaming the lot in some little golf cart. Broken axle, so it didn’t help, but my father didn’t notice the different brand tire, or pretended not to.
Latest – back in college, taking Chemistry, had some teacher evals, and in a class of 30 or so younger students, asked, “Is ‘Jerk Face’” one word or two? Only one person laughed, and the teacher didn’t seem too happy. And I was going to say “Fuckface,” and toned it down for the kids. Man, and I thought he was cool, too.
This reminded me of one of mine. It isn’t necessarily “wacky” but if fits the jokes-from-school theme.
In my 11th grade US history class, there was one day when the teacher specifically led into a lecture by saying that the material for that day was kind of depressing and he was right. It was all about the horrible treatment of the Native Americans by settlers and culminated with some cheif (Metacomet, I beleive) being publicly decapitated and having his head displayed on a pike. Toward the end of the class, the teacher joked about the need to lighten the mood a little before the period ended and drew a big smiley face on the blackboard. Somebody (it may have been me, I honestly don’t recall) called out “Is that Metacomet’s head?” and the whole class busrt out laughing and groaning.
I think the best ones that happened at my school were both done by the year above me- on the final week before the GCSE exams (age 16- and the end of compulsory school- a lot of kids transfer to a college at that point, but in my school most actually stayed on).
They changed the wallpaper on all computers to pictures of nekkid men (reputedly with the full assistance of the computer teacher, I think I believe it, he had an evil sense of humour) and hit unopened flavoured condoms everywhere they could think of around the school. I remember finding them nearly a year later, they were that thorough.
My prank isn’t hilarious like many of the ones above, but I do think it is a great launching point for a good mystery novel.
My high school graduation class (1976) was only 33 people, so we each got our own full page in the yearbook, which we were allowed to use however we wanted, with the only requirements being that our name and a personal photo be included.
However, the layout “needed” an even number of students (yeah, seems dumb … but keep in mind, this was before desktop publishing. In 1976, layouts were a tedious big deal). So, we invented student number 34: WALTER ZIMMERMAN!
Walter had his own page in the yearbook, complete with photo (taken from another source), his favorite quote, school activities, etc. If you were to pick up my class yearbook today and did not know about the joke, you would have no way of knowing that Walter Zimmerman was not real.
I’m not a fiction writer, but I have often thought about writing a novel in which the imaginary Walter Zimmerman identity is assumed by a real person, who uses that fake yearbook entry as the basis to establish himself.
As for the class of 1976, we got a lot of mileage out of the imaginary Walter. He often signed up for things; for example, once we had an after-school program over mealtime, so the school generously provided us with food from McDonald’s that we had to sign up for in advance. Of course, Walter Zimmerman signed up for a full meal. I drank his strawberry milkshake in addition to my own, and have never been so sick from overeating in my life. (Word: NEVER drink two McDonald’s milkshakes at once, even if you are 17 years old and invincible.)
My high school was a single large one story building. It looked like a small convention center from the outside, with very few windows. This being the 70s, the Principal drove a VW Bug.
The senior class one year ahead of me craned it onto the gym roof just before graduation; Somebody’s Dad ran a construction company & borrowing a crane was pretty easy for him. Getting the Bug off the roof was harder; the Prinicpal didn’t own any cranes. It was up there for a couple of days.
Hardly original, but still fun.
In 8th grade or so my pal & I stuck a genuine US training hand grenade in a teacher’s desk. It looked 100% real because it *was *100% real. It just didn’t have any explosives. He was really cool, our favorite teacher, & we *knew *he’d get the joke.
Demonstrating that even gifted 13 year olds have really lousy real-world planning skills, that’s not at all what happened after he opened the drawer.
We put a hamster in the 5th grade teacher’s desk drawer. She opened it and then SLAMMED it right away, nearly decapitating said innocent hamster and causing shrieks from the hamster’s owner and various hamster lovers in the class. (Yes, it was my idea. Poor hammy!)
Not the wackiest prank that was ever played, but the ending was priceless.
One April Fool’s Day, when I was in high school, we had a music class. It was a band class, and it always started late, as the teacher always went to get coffee just before class. That was no problem, as it allowed us to get our instruments out, tuned up, and so on.
But this day, someone suggested that we play an April Fool’s joke on the teacher: we’ll all switch instruments! So we did, and it was an interesting effect–the tiny girl who played the flute struggled to hold a tuba upright; the big, beefy jock who normally played the tuba was gingerly holding a flute. All the guys on trumpet switched with the girls on clarinet. And so on. The class was full of laughter, as we held the unfamiliar instruments. What a great joke!
Well. When the teacher came back with his coffee, he was not amused. “What the hell is going on here?” he yelled. “Those are expensive instruments! If you don’t know how to hold them, you could damage them. Get your proper instruments now! What a stupid, idiotic, thing to do! This is not funny, and I’m tempted to…” He went on like this for a while longer, threatening weeks of detention and extra-long rehearsals while we sheepishly traded instruments back.
Then he paused his rant. “What day is today?” he asked.
One of the braver of us spoke up. “April Fool’s Day, sir.”
The teacher hung his head. “Boy, do I feel like an idiot.”
I had a friend who described himself as a “High School drop in.” He did show up to school one Monday because on Sunday he and his pals had pried open the school windows and stuck garter snakes in the teachers’ desks and he just had to see the reaction.
My highschool building was essentially a big rectangle with an internal courtyard about 40 yards wide & 50 long. In the centre of this courtyard there was a sunken area (maybe 20x30 yards) with some steps leading down into it.
One morning at the end of the school year (summer in Australia) the senior students arrived early, blocked the drains, pointed 4 or 5 firehoses into it and turned them on.
When the rest of us arrived we found a pool party going on - sun loungers, airbeds floating on the water, beachboys on the radio, guys swimming - the lot.
So my high school had this thing called Senior Shirt Groups. Groups of senior friends would make matching shirts, and each individual in the group would add their own nickname, number, and in-jokes (often a series of initials for a phrase) all over their shirt. A handful of days a year, you’d call all your friends in the group and you’d all wear your shirts the next day.
One group, consisting of guys from the water polo team, had a different idea. Instead of shirts, they all dressed up as Secret Service agents, complete with dark suits, sunglasses, and headsets.
You can probably see where this is going. One day, we had a sub in our government class. She was doing the roll call when one of the guys (Henry–I will never forget his name) walked into the class, a couple of minutes late, in his full Secret Service regalia. As he walked toward his seat, she whipped around and asked “And you are…?”
Without missing a beat, Henry said “That’s classified, ma’am,” and sat down at his desk. The whole class lost it. People were laughing so hard they were crying. And I don’t think the sub ever got his name.
My graduating class in high school, just about all of us gave the principal a marble when we walked up to shake her hand. She was gracious about it; my last name starts with S and there plenty of students in front of me. By the time I got to her she laughed and asked for the marble.
My freshman year I was in Earth Science and the teacher wanted a science article clipped from a newspaper or non-science magazine with a written summary turned in every friday. One week where we had Friday off I knew one of the students, Chad, wouldn’t remember an article so I cut out an article from the paper for the upcoming Wrestlemania. I typed up the summary, including how Refrigerator Perry was calling Big John Studd “Big John Dud.” I slid it in the pile at his desk when I put my paper in and sat back down as nonchalantly as I possibly could. We watched a film that day as Mr. P. graded the papers in the back; I tried to keep an eye on him and Chad without being too obvious about it.
Finally, near the end of class, Mr. P. handed the paper back to Chad. Chad looked a little confused then started laughing along with his lab partner. The bell rang and we were excused and Chad came right up to me and asked if I did it. It was a pretty funny prank, but it also ended up helping Chad out because since it wasn’t a science article, he would be able to bring in one on Monday for full credit.
My great-uncle was part of a group that did something similar, only putting it in the hallway on the 4rd floor of the old school building. And it wasn’t a car, but the principal’s horse & buggy! (This was in the 1920’s, I think.)
They ‘borrowed’ his horse, harness, & carriage from his home, brought them to the school Halloween night, carefully led the horse up 3 flights of steps while others brought the carriage up (it was too big, they had to take the wheels & top off, carry all the parts up those stairs, re-assemble everything, harness the horse, hitch it to the carriage, and leave it outside the office. And they had to do this mostly in the dark, with just lanterns – more lights would have attracted notice. They left it to be discovered the next morning.
Note that horses will go up stairs, but it’s much harder to get them to go down a stairway!
It took most of the school day before it was all removed. The principal had to send messages to various friends to come to the school to help dis-assemble it and carry it down & outside. And most of them were laughing so hard when they saw it that they could barely carry things.
My little brother was in a hiking accident a few months after graduating from high school, leaving him mostly paralyzed from the neck down. Despite this, he volunteered to serve in the navy, and - thanks to his impressive intellect, natural leadership skills and more strength of will than any SEAL team of your choice - was eventually sent to Officer’s School.
One day, his class found out they were getting a new instructor, and he decided to play a prank on him. He had his classmates prop him up in a regular chair, and got his friend to sit in his wheelchair. For the entire two hours, his friend pretended to be him, until the instructor dismissed them… at which point his friend simply stood up and walked out.
My brother says that the look on the instructor’s face was one for the ages.