that math is logical.... ;)

One thing is that the Mayans are not extinct, and though they were decimated as a civilization, they employed their culture and knowledge to survive and now even thrive.   My kids had fun correcting their teachers.

In 14 hundred and 92 Columbus sailed the ocean blue.

And discovered America.

Except - there were already people living here.  They knew where it was - right under their feet.

and, there is lots of evidence that Europeans knew of a large land mass to the west  (remember the Vikings - and the Basque fishermen.)

I remember a line in the history book I studied - probably about grade five.  Something about an explorer (Champlain) spending a winter with the Hurons.   Oh the terrible hardships he must have suffered living in close quarters with this unwashed savages.

No mention of the living conditions of Europeans at that same time period.  How often did they take baths?  And what were their hovels like?  

Many years later I read books about Europeans in the far north of Canada.  As autumn approached they would build big, solid wooden houses to spend the winter.  Some of the men visited nearby native people's dwellings and found them much warmer, cozier, and happier.   I didn't learn that in school.

I learned in elementary school that it was really important to remember everything I learned, which I forgot most of. ;) Then later I was taught that the most important thing to learn was critical thinking, and that's how to learn.

I learned that the settlers were nice good guys who didn't get scurvey because they ate limes, who befriended the 'Indians'- not in so many words, but...certainly, we weren't taught about residential schools. I learned about them from a kids book I got out of the public library when I was 8 or 9 called "A girl named Wendy". I did learn that the colonial settlers introduced diseases to the natives (not on purpose). And that they introduced alcohol to them. I didn't learn that any of the lovely Hudson's Bay blankets that were traded were purposely tainted with smallpox.

I learned cursive handwriting. We practiced until we got it perfect. I was told it's important. Now kids and even teachers don't know it. It's not that important- it's a lost art like calligraphy now- but kids should at least learn how to write legibly with a pen.


One thing I learned was what a fable is- in grade 1. The teacher read us Aesop's Fables. Then, when my parents explained Christmas and Easter stories from the Bible they said they were fables (and they wanted me to know them), and I knew what they meant.

I can't think of anything I learned that was 'correct' at the time and now we know it isn't.  Certainly some of the biology is like that though, I had a few courses that changed everytime they were offered.  There was no textbook, as it would have been out of date too quickly, most of the info came from journal articles published the previous year.

As for things that were just wrong, many.  We use 10% of our brains was something Chemguy and I both believed when we were gullible students.  I told my Dad about how we learned about how when we strike oil it goes everywhere, like in the cartoons.  He ended up coming in and teaching about oil wells to correct the teacher on that.  In elementary school, I ended up teaching a class on unit conversion (metric) as the teacher was doing it backwards going between units larger and smaller than the base.  Sex ed, I think we were outright lied to about the symptoms from the menstrual cycle.  "There may be light cramps' was essentially all of them.

In science, many things are taught as being correct, even though they are simplifications and that isn't explained further along.

A fun one, I remember doing a 'science' experiment reinforcing the tongue map myth.  I couldn't determine a difference at the time.

We learned countries and their capitals - and many of those countries no longer exist.

We learned about borders between countries, and between provinces.  I had the impression that those borders were somehow fixed and that everybody agreed on them.  In some parts of the world borders change frequently and Quebec and Newfoundland-Labrador still cannot agree on the border between the two provinces.

When did the war start?  Ask each country involved and get a different answer.  The US thinks the 2nd World War started when they got involved.

What caused a war (any war)?   Get different answers.

Who won the war?  It might depend upon who you ask.

Maybe we should trade history books every now and then.  Or at least use different sources -- textbooks, newspapers and magazines, and the internet.

I think that the more important thing that we should be teaching our children is critical thinking.   Help them to see the various sides to things, and then let them make up their own minds and defend their point of view.  And teach them that it is ok to change their minds, especially if they get more information. 

Fewer facts - more critical thinking.

We used newspapers quite a bit for social studies, hopefully now the internet is included much more.

I think many of my teachers did a decent job with critical thinking.  In some of my math and science classes we were given time to solve problems without being taught how.  In my metric example, critical thinking was how I got to teach the lesson.  There was no way a few centimetres (gesture with hand) equals many, many kilometres (a long distance).

Hey Chemgal-bet you learnt Pluto was a planet-it's not considered one now-based on size.

That's true, along with borders - the USSR being the major one that was covered in school.  I don't think of those things as being wrong per se though.  I don't know of all of the details about pluto though, was it considered a planet originally because we thought it was bigger than it is?

MANY - Mercury
VERY - Venus
EARLY - Earth
MEN - Mars
JUST - Jupiter
SAT - Saturn
UP - Uranus
NEAR - Neptune
PLUTO -Pluto

Pluto will always be a planet to me :)

Chemgla, as I understand it Pluto's status changed basically due to a quibble over what criteria something has to meet to be considered a planet.

I am sure I learned a lot of things in school that would no longer be considered accurate.  And some things that probably were never accurate in the first place. 

I am old enough to recall when the USSR fell apart for example and all the maps in the school had to be replaced.  There are kids today who probably have no clue what the USSR was or why it was relevant.

One of the funniest things I recall, that is a perfect example of changing opinions of 'the truth', was when I was taking home-ec cooking classes. When I first started the classes we were taught that wooden cutting boards harboured so much bacteria they were totally unsafe, and the school spent a fair bit of money replacing all the wooden cutting boards with plastic ones.  About 2 years later it was decided that wooden cutting boards actually contain natural antibacterial agents and are therefore better than plastic and the school spent another bunch of cash to buy new heavy wooden cutting boards to replace the plastic ones.

Another home-ec one that I am pretty sure was never true was the whole 'if you put too much salt in a stew you can just put in a bunch of chunks of potatoes to absorb the salt then take them out' thing. 

I went looking for that novel I mentioned upthread and can't find it. Maybe I got the title wrong. I remember the book. It was the only time I learned about residential schools as a kid. It wasn't discussed at school.

Nothing else comes to mind when thinking about what may not have been 'true' (except, yes, I learned Pluto was a planet, too.)

I learned

My

Very

Eager

Mother

Just

Served

Us

Nine

Pizzas

As for Pluto's designation it is a new category called a "Plutoid". I'm also fairly sure I was taught that there are seven continents when in fact there are only six. Antarctica is not a continent, (it has no continental shelf) it is a group of islands covered in an ice shield.

I learned that Pluto was a rather scrawney dog. --Never heard of his demise.  Some things never change.

I was told that we lived in a Christian country.

I was taught that Christians are loving, caring people who believe that their founder was crucified and came back to life three days later.

I was taught about many God filled missionaries who went to far away places to tell the people there about Jesus.

I learned that teachers are higher on the pecking order than students.

I didn't really learn the times tables but I did develop coping strategies before I'd heard that term.

I teach my grade threes and fours cursive writing and use it on the board.

I learned that there are seven continents.  Later (first year university) I learned that India was a sub-continent, on its own continental plate.  It was once a separate land mass, much further south of its present location.  Then it drifted north until it rammed into Asia with such force that it pushed up the Himalayan mountains.   I never heard that Antaractica is not a continent.  I am unaware that a continental shelf is part of the definition of a continent.  And I didn't know that rather than one land mass, Antarctica is a group of islands.  (I had heard that Greenland might be two large islands, along with several small ones - but Greenland has always been considered part of North America.)

Naman - funny!

I don't remember whether or not I was ever told in school that we live in a Christian country - more likely it seems I learned at school that Christianity is the dominate religion in Canada. 

I don't remember being taught anything about Christianity at school - not that Christians are loving, caring people, nor anything about our beliefs.  We learned religion in Sunday School and at home.    The only thing I remember learning in school about missionaries was that some Jesuits accompanied Champlain.   I did hear, mainly one-sided, about the Real Rebellion, and the Metis.   I wish I had learned about the residential schools.

I learned that some teachers thought they were higher on the pecking order than the pupils.  I also realized while still in grade school that this isn't always the case.  My mother had been a teacher - I caught on to what she thought of some of the teachers sent to our back-woods school. 

And my mother made sure that I knew my times tables. 

Yeh, I too learned coping strategies before I knew the term.

I'm not saying that your experiences were wrong.  We no doubt attended different schools in different provinces at a different time.   I went to school in NB in the 1940s and 50s.

Sterton - I'm glad that you are teaching your students cursive writing.  It burns me up to know that my 17 year old granddaughter cannot read a simple post card in cursive.  Her 9 year old brother does better - probably thanks to a teacher.

you had to ask teacher for permission to go to the bathroom

funny when i found out i didn't have to at my FIRST CLASS IN COLLEGE :3

We couldn't talk, chew gum, wear pants (except Friday afternoon),The principle read from the bible  at assembly, said the Lord's prayer and sang O canada.

I learned that if you were a male student in Grades 7, 8, and 8, you took wood shop and metal shop and mechanical drawing.  Why?  Because that's the way it is!  If you were a female student you took something called Home Economics.  Cooking, sewing, etc.  For the same reason, pretty much.

I should have lodged a protest at the time.  Over the years I find that I have made more meals and sewn on more buttons (countless times) than I have building wooden bread baskets or shaping metal sugar scoops (never).

Home-Ec - when I think of all the useful things middle-school kids of both sexes could have learned during those three hours a week out of the school year, and realize how much time we wasted on things we would never use, I am ashamed of the system I grew up in.

We could have spent a lot more time on nutrition, meal planning, grocery shopping, budgeting.  Then be given a certain amount of money, given a group assignment of planning a meal, shopping, cooking and sharing a noon meal.   Instead I remember spending a couple of weeks (at least) planning and serving a luncheon for four ladies with members of the class taking the rolls of chef, sous chef, at least two servers, hostess, and three guests.  We did proper place settings with lots of silverware and glassware, place names, table decorations, dainty sandwiches, cups and saucers.  The hostess job was to greet her guests, sit at the head of the table, be served first, start eating first, and have at least three topics of conversation planned.    No last cooking and preparing for the hostess.  No trips to the kitchen.  No clearing away of dirty dishes.   I think I`m pretty typical of the girls in that group - I doubt if any of us have ever had any paid help in preparing and serving a meal for guests.  If someone has, it would have been one hired girl.   Knowing how to prepare a dish for a potluck and get it to the event hot and ready to serve would have come in handy. 

Red Baron - you didn`t miss a lot by not taking home ec.

On the other hand I would have liked to learn a bit of household repairs - how to put up a shelf in the laundry room - how to change a light switch - or install a dishwasher - how to maintain a car, check the oil and tire pressure - how to change a tire.

I`d also like to have learned something practical about gardening - maybe had the class plant and care for a garden in the spring.

and something that one's grandchildren NOW are learning that might be considered wrong or proven wrong at a later date?

pretty much everything :3

with the rise of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, things like handshaking, not wearing masks, playing in the dirt, eating dirt, no proper handwashing techniques might be changed

that bullying is something that happens to rather than with might change

meditation might be taught in schools

books are cool might change to ah, that's way too slow and linear--gotta go with the 'net and wireless brainmodems

your body is a fixed known might change, with GE, stem cell stuff, to 'hey, what do i want to be today?"

you have to learn at a physical location with other students might change to personalized learning from off-site as well

you mustn't fool around with nature will probably be changed to 'hey, let's interact with nature and see what happens?'

you are a Christian/Canadian/human/etc might change to 'Hey, I wonder what it would be like to be a quadriplegic turtle from Botswana for a bit'

fried, high fat foods will be discovered to be a secret to long life

and so it goes

Like that, Inanna

In Home Ec class I was taught that a healthy, nutricious snack was hotdogs baked up in Pillsbuy crescent roll dough.

Funny. When I was in home ec, late 60s, we learned basic cooking, meal planning, basic sewing. Found it quite useful.

The girls in my grade 8class asked the shop teacher for time so one day a week the teachers took girls at lunch for shop and boys at lunch for home ec.

that sure wouldn't happen now

I wish it would. If you eat you should know a little about cooking, guys too. If you drive a car you should know the basics of car maintenance and what to do in an emergency, girls too. One thing I've seen done right is a "teen living" class which is a little sex ed, a little home ec, and a little other basic stuff for life which I think is a great idea. Being in a red state the sex ed is really watered down but at least something gets in.

I learned that you have to fight for your own interests. So in elementary I switched from boring home ed to the boys craft group where we were putting steam engines together.

I learned in high school that there was men out there in important positions that are full of prejudice and sexism. Our Vice principal and math teacher used to say "this is difficult math now- the girls don't need to pay attention, you are going to marry anyway."

I learned that we as a people, have to feel ashamed to be German because of the Holocaust and whoever feels pride for their country is a neo nazi.

I learned to see all the things I was taught critical. Except for the feeling of nationalism- that never grew back. But- that might not be a bad thing.