School Jokes

Freshmen in the general-science class at Mark Twain Middle School in Mar Vista, Calif., were studying astronomy. "What do we call a group of stars that makes an imaginary picture in the sky?" the teacher asked.

"A consternation," one student replied.

Danny was hard to miss at our school. A Civil War buff who forever wore his Confederate overcoat, he was a friend to all. When he was passed over during the vote for senior superlatives, many of us were disappointed; surely there must have been some category suitable for him.

The whole school was pleased, therefore, when the yearbook adviser surprised us with an additional photo. There was Danny, decked out in his gray coat, with the caption: "Most Likely to Secede."

 

 

Most of my English literature classmates thought reading Melville's Billy Budd would be an easy task because the novel is only 90 pages long. One boy, however, complained that the text was heavy and hard to comprehend.

"Hey," another student suggested, "maybe you should try reading Budd Light."

In honor of Memorial Day, the teacher I worked with read the Constitution to her third-grade class. After reading "We the people," she paused to ask the children what they thought that meant. One boy raised his hand and asked, "Is that like 'We da bomb?' "    

According to the Internet: Students in a Harvard English 101 class were asked to write a concise essay containing four elements: religion, royalty, sex and mystery. The only A+ in the class read: "'My God,' said the Queen, 'I'm pregnant! I wonder who did it.'"

 

My friend John came into French class one Monday with a pillow that he placed on his seat. Over the weekend he had been skiing and mildly fractured his tailbone. Our teacher promptly asked him to explain, en français, why he was sitting on a pillow.

To our amusement, John answered, "Sorbonne."

A friend was assigned a new post teaching English to inmates in prison. Feeling a little nervous on his first day, he began by asking the class a basic question:

"Now, who can tell me what a sentence is?"

A police car with flashing lights pulled me over near the high school where I teach. As the officer asked for my license and registration, my students began to drive past. Some honked their horns, others hooted, and still others stopped to admonish me for speeding.

Finally the officer asked me if I was a teacher at the school, and I told him I was.

"I think you've paid your debt to society," he concluded with a smile, and left without giving me a ticket.

 

 

Driving my car one afternoon, I rolled through a stop sign. I was pulled over by a police officer, who recognized me as his former English teacher.

"Mrs. Brown," he said, "those stop signs are periods, not commas."

When I became a licensed chiropractor, I moved back to my hometown and soon had a thriving practice. One morning I saw a new patient whom I recognized as my old high school principal.

"Gee," I said nervously, "I'm a little surprised to see you here."

"Why?" he replied. "You certainly spent a great deal of time in my office."

At the school where my mother worked, the two first-grade teachers were named Miss Paine and Mrs. Hacking. One morning the mother of a student called in the middle of a flu epidemic to excuse her daughter from school.

"Is she in Paine or Hacking?" the school secretary asked.

"She feels fine," said the confused mom. "We have company and I'm just keeping her home."

 

 

Toward the end of the school year, the sixth-grade teachers decide which of their students should be accelerated in certain subjects in the seventh grade. When a child is chosen, his parents are notified. When one boy was accelerated in science and math, his mother wrote to the teacher: "I think this is quite an honor for someone who just tried to make two quarts of lemonade in a one-quart pitcher!"

After registering for his high school classes, my son burst into the house, filled with excitement. "Dad," he announced in one breath, "I got all the classes I wanted. But I have to have my school supplies by tomorrow. I need a protractor and a compass for geometry, a dictionary for English, a dissecting kit for biology—and a car for driver's ed."

 

 

A student in my math course at Ohlone State College in Fremont, Calif., developed a severe case of tendinitis. Since she couldn't write, she brought a video camera to tape my lectures. After three or four classes, I asked her if she found the method satisfactory. She said it was working quite well, even better than note-taking.

"Actually," she confessed, "I have another reason for doing this. When I told my mother you were a widower, she wanted to see what you look like."

The board of education in a nearby town sold off a building that had been a one-room schoolhouse. The buyer converted it to a tavern. One day an elderly man was walking by the place with his grandson and pointed to the building.

"That's where I went to school when I was your age."

"Really," said the boy. "Who was your bartender back then?"

The day before my graduation from Soldan High School in St. Louis, the principal called an assembly. He wanted to say farewell informally, he explained, as he reviewed our years together. There was hardly a dry eye among us as he concluded, "We will remember you, and hope you will remember us; more importantly, we want you to remember each other. I want all of you to meet in this very auditorium 25 years from today."

There was a moment of silence; then a thin voice piped up, "What time?"

My fellow teacher called for help—she needed someone who knew about animals. As a science teacher, I filled the bill. "Oh," she added, "bring a net." Expecting to find some kind of beast as I entered her classroom, I was greeted instead by the sight of excited kids watching a hummingbird fly around. Rather than use the net, I suggested they hang red paper by an open door. The bird would be drawn to it, I explained, and eventually fly out. Later, the teacher called back. The trick worked. "Now," she said, "we have two hummingbirds flying around the room."

 

 

Faculty members at Texas Christian university were urged to become familiar with the timesaving machines of the new computer center. Basic courses in their use were given, and research projects were accelerated.

The faculty was enthusiastic—except for one veteran professor. Not only did he flunk the primer course, but on his first project, when he asked the machine simply to separate the names of students by sex, the cards came out in three stacks.

 

 

The 104-year-old building that had served as the priory and primary student residence of the small Catholic university where I work was about to be demolished. As the wrecker's ball began to strike, I sensed the anxiety and sadness experienced by one of the older monks whose order had founded the college. "This must be difficult to watch, Father," I said. "The tradition associated with that building, the memories of all the students and monks who lived and worked there. I can't imagine how hard this must be for you."

"It's worse than that," the monk replied. "I think I left my Palm Pilot in there."

 

 

Walking through the hallways at the middle school where I work, I saw a new substitute teacher standing outside his classroom with his forehead against a locker. I heard him mutter, "How did you get yourself into this?"

Knowing he was assigned to a difficult class, I tried to offer moral support. "Are you okay?" I asked. "Can I help?"

He lifted his head and replied, "I'll be fine as soon as I get this kid out of his locker."

 

 

Recently I was grading history tests for my fourth-graders. I'd included an extra credit question: "List up to five good facts about Abraham Lincoln."

One of my D students surprised me with this one: "After the war ended, Lincoln took his wife to a show."