The general decline in standards today

[Widebrim]

In junior high, most of our male PE coaches were veterans; one was a former POW (Japanese camp). For that reason alone, we kind of feared them...

 

[Flicka]

I hated the gym teacher I had from age 11-16 because she only made us do gymnastics. Nothing but gymnastics three hours a week for FIVE years. I got absolutely zero exercise but if you need someone to somersault, I'm your girl.

Complete and utter idiocy. It took me years after that to realise that physical exercise doesn't have to mean being forced to perform like a circus dog in front of 30 sniggeribg peers while being terrified of breaking your neck. I would like to think she could blame her lack of intelligence but I think it was more her lack of common sense.

 

[John in Covina]

I hated the gym teacher I had from age 11-16 because she only made us do gymnastics. Nothing but gymnastics three hours a week for FIVE years. I got absolutely zero exercise but if you need someone to somersault, I'm your girl.

Complete and utter idiocy. It took me years after that to realise that physical exercise doesn't have to mean being forced to perform like a circus dog in front of 30 sniggeribg peers while being terrified of breaking your neck. I would like to think she could blame her lack of intelligence but I think it was more her lack of common sense.

The thing is when you have teachers you can always get what we call a "Johnny one-note" meaning their focus is singular and excludes all other things. Tie that with the I have the power and authority to do what I want and it's PE hell

 

[LizzieMaine]

Our gym teacher didn't bother me any, but word in the corridors was that she got in trouble for having an affair with one of the kids and disappeared into quiet oblivion. That's how we handled such things in those days.

I didn't much care for any of the usual gym class stuff, except for fleeceball, which was a sort of indoor baseball played with a ball stuffed with fleece scraps. The only home run I ever hit in any kind of organized game came in one of these contests, and after ten years of being picked last for every possible athletic contest, it was rather gratifying. I never told anyone it was just a dumb lucky swing -- my eyes even then were so bad I couldn't see the ball at all.

The teacher we all hated and feared was our junior-high hygeine teacher, who showed us filmstrips about menstruation and greeted us every day with "ALL RIGHT YOU DONKEYS SETTLE DOWN OR I'M CRACKING SOME HEADS." Ah, happy days.

 

[scottyrocks]

Well, I can see where some of you get your opinions, and deservedly so. My apologies on behalf of thoughtful PE teachers everywhere.

 

[sheeplady]

I hated most of gym, but I liked several of my gym teachers. I was good at any sport that involved something I could use as a weapon- field hockey in particular. My favorite gym teacher in middle school was the field hockey coach and she was always trying to get me to join the team. I didn't tell her that I was always put into gym class with the snotty girls who picked on me and my friends, and giving me a stick and putting me on the opposite team had everything to do with my attitude towards those snots and nothing to do with my love for the sport. Lacrosse, which I played a couple times in high school, I was particularly ruthless at because they gave us very few rules. It was basically "Here's a stick, don't purposefully hit anybody." Yeah, ok. I never actually hit anybody directly on purpose, but I was very aggressive and you can really shake somebody if you go after the ball and take some strategically placed hits at their stick.

Our gym teacher didn't bother me any, but word in the corridors was that she got in trouble for having an affair with one of the kids and disappeared into quiet oblivion. That's how we handled such things in those days.

The only gym coach I ever hated (he was the swimming coach and I actually quit the swim team in part because of him) was notorious for flirting with the girls. If you wanted a good event to swim in, it was well known that you had to return his advances. I never heard of it going any farther than the pool (and I seriously hope it didn't because I was 14 when I made the varsity team and there were many under 18's there), but watching him give the girls a really inappropriate rub down next to the pool and the swimmer returning the favor was absolutely too much for me to stomach. It was wildly inappropriate and the jerk should have lost his job, but he got good results from the team. I really wish they had whisked him away like your teacher.

He also used to make us swim so hard that many of the girls would be vomiting and getting clammy in the locker room after practice. He's darn lucky nobody died.

 

[jamespowers]

I think I am the only one here that actually flunked PE one quarter. I absolutely hated the teacher and she gave me kicked me out of the class for playing basketball with a wad of paper. Yeah, like I was the only one. Since I was out of the class I got a withdrawal failure---like I willingly withdrew. Dumbass hippie! That was fun to explain to my parents.

 

[ButteMT61]

I think I am the only one here that actually flunked PE one quarter. I absolutely hated the teacher and she gave me kicked me out of the class for playing basketball with a wad of paper. Yeah, like I was the only one. Since I was out of the class I got a withdrawal failure---like I willingly withdrew. Dumbass hippie! That was fun to explain to my parents.

I got a week off when I refused to wear the uniform. There was an epidemic of jockstrap wedgies going on and I declined the opportunity. Got to sit in study hall all week. lol

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

I think I am the only one here that actually flunked PE one quarter. I absolutely hated the teacher and she gave me kicked me out of the class for playing basketball with a wad of paper. Yeah, like I was the only one. Since I was out of the class I got a withdrawal failure---like I willingly withdrew. Dumbass hippie! That was fun to explain to my parents.

Take another salt tablet and one more lap around the field!

 

[jamespowers]

I got a week off when I refused to wear the uniform. There was an epidemic of jockstrap wedgies going on and I declined the opportunity. Got to sit in study hall all week. lol

I got to sit there for one quarter. You got off easy.

 

[Feraud]

I enjoyed PE. [huh]

 

[1961MJS]

Hi

PE is one of two reasons I wasn't Valedictorian of my graduating class. Typing was the other one. First semester freshman year, I got a C in PE. Dad (Advanced Math (Trig) and Algebra II teacher) asked what the heck I did wrong. I had no clue. Dad asked our coach what I did, he responded, "It's PE, who gives a damn, they go out and play sports for an hour so they're not just dead weight." Dad asked what his grading scale was "Freshman get C's, Sophomores get B's, and Juniors and Seniors get A's." This of course guaranteed that every Valedictorian would be female. Next grading period coach starts the class with "I have a new grading policy, everybody starts with an A, piss me off once and it's a B, twice and it's a C, three times and it's a D, got it?"

Later

 

[Amy Jeanne]

From hippies and teachers in jeans to something that I think is a sign of declining standards (but may be because the increase in written communication is making things evident that I never noticed before): I do wish people would take more care with their spelling on the internet. I'm gnawing my teeth whenever I access twitter or make the mistake of reading comments on blogs. It's most often people whose first language is English too.

A few things that really come across as awfully sloppy to me:

1. Writing "alot" rather than "a lot" (unless of course the person is referring to a big furry monster)

2. Mixing up "your" and "you're", "whose" and "who's" and -- my personal favourite -- the random ' in front of a plural 's'

3. "Here, here" instead of "hear, hear" (you are calling attention to something well said, not trying to summon someone to your side, or even worse, to "you're side")

4. No or random punctuation, mixed with a crippling fear of capital letters

5. Or its peculiar cousin; the random use of capital Letters that make You suspect the Person is channelling their inner german

But yes, it may be because they really are eagles and typing with their talons. At least thinking so makes it a little -- or "alot" -- less annoying.

In my 1930s yearbooks the students had trouble with "your/you're" even back then.

Carrie Cline at the bottom there declares "Your a very good basketball and football player" in 1936:

Every single senior signed this yearbook (it's a GOLDMINE!) and "your" pops up frequently instead of "you're." People just can't grasp it, I guess. THEN and now!! And trust me -- I am the hugest Grammar/Spelling Nazi out there lol

 

[sheeplady]

Next grading period coach starts the class with "I have a new grading policy, everybody starts with an A, piss me off once and it's a B, twice and it's a C, three times and it's a D, got it?"

I would love to institute this policy when I was teaching. I don't think anyone would like it except for me.

 

[Amy Jeanne]

I get so tired of seeing people use the "shorthand" version of our language when they write online - for example, "R u home?" or "Ur dum" and so on and so forth. GAH.

1900 prediction for the year 2000:

"There will be no C, X or Q in our every-day alphabet. They will be abandoned because unnecessary. Spelling by sound will have been adopted, first by the newspapers. English will be a language of condensed words expressing condensed ideas, and will be more extensively spoken than any other. Russian will rank second."

 

[LizzieMaine]

In my 1930s yearbooks the students had trouble with "your/you're" even back then.

Here in New England we avoid this problem by pronouncing them differently: "your" is pronounced "yaw" and "you're" is pronounced "yoah." If only the rest of the world would see the wisdom of this course, there would be no further confusion. Yessah.

 

[Feraud]

They also predicted-

How Children will be Taught. A university education will be free to every man and woman. Several great national universities will have been established. Children will study a simple English grammar adapted to simplified English, and not copied after the Latin. Time will be saved by grouping like studies. Poor students will be given free board, free clothing and free books if ambitious and actually unable to meet their school and college expenses. Medical inspectors regularly visiting the public schools will furnish poor children free eyeglasses, free dentistry and free medical attention of every kind. The very poor will, when necessary, get free rides to and from school and free lunches between sessions. In vacation time poor children will be taken on trips to various parts of the world. Etiquette and housekeeping will be important studies in the public schools.

 

[Amy Jeanne]

Here in New England we avoid this problem by pronouncing them differently: "your" is pronounced "yaw" and "you're" is pronounced "yoah." If only the rest of the world would see the wisdom of this course, there would be no further confusion. Yessah.

Or the Philly way: "YRH"

lol

Will save lots of time in school! lol

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

1900 prediction for the year 2000:

"There will be no C, X or Q in our every-day alphabet. They will be abandoned because unnecessary. Spelling by sound will have been adopted, first by the newspapers. English will be a language of condensed words expressing condensed ideas, and will be more extensively spoken than any other. Russian will rank second."

[video=youtube;cRtyBBiyYhI]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRtyBBiyYhI[/video]

 

[sheeplady]

They also predicted-

Well, that failed miserably.