Wednesday, May 04, 2005

The Real Reality TV

Every morning, I drive Gavin to school. It's a whole lot easier than making him walk two blocks at 10 minutes till seven am and then riding the bus for 40 minutes. Plus (if he's not too sleepy) we have some interesting conversations in the car.

This morning we were discussing ways to pay teachers more, since Gavin is currently incensed that football players make millions while teachers have barely enough to live on. Gavin immediately turned to TV...

REALITY TV -- IT'S REAL, IT'S NEW, THE HEIGHT OF DRAMA AND SUSPENSE!

Thirty students. One teacher. And NONE of them may leave the room until they have LEARNED CALCULUS!

What the teacher DOESN'T know is that ALL of the students have ADHD*.

What the students DON'T know is that the teacher is an EX-MARINE.

How many will SURVIVE this harrowing experience? Tune in NOW!

*Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder
...

I have only myself to blame for Gavin's skewedness -- he learned to read with The Far Side and Calvin and Hobbes.

18 comments:

Rhodester said...

I LOOOOOOVEd The Far Side! Gary Larson ROCKS!! Yay Gavin :-)

Jodie said...

Dave, you cannot begin to imagine what it's like trying to explain the Far Side to a 4 year old...Gavin actually went as Calvin one year for Halloween. Although his favorite costume ever was the year he went as a Dead Lawyer because everyone gave him double candy.

Tink, I taught one year of school. Give me an inpatient ward full of paranoid schizophrenic people and manic bipolar people over a classroom full of middle schoolers any day...the patients are MUCH more sane.

The Complimenting Commenter said...

That's a great idea! I think history would be even better because it's that much more boring. Great site!

Leann said...

Out of the mouths of babes!

Dave said...

That's a smart kid. I'm not that witty now and it's only downhill from here on in.

Anonymous said...

Heh...that's awesome! A reality show I might actually watch! :)

Anonymous said...

Having too much experience with ADD and ADHD I would say the only way the teacher is going to survive is to make sure all the lessons are part of either an online computer game or a Game Boy game. The kids will be quiet and hyperfocused for hours to the exclusion of all other stimuili and trust me, they will learn what they need to in order to win the game.

Wyrfu said...

I worked with kids like that for five years. What has Gavin got against Marines?

Jodie said...

Gone, the Marine was about the only "type" he could think of who wouldn't be in tears after 10 minutes.

I laughed so hard this morning while he was presenting this idea that I had tears in my eyes.

Anonymous said...

What a laugh! A childhood of Far Side and Calvin & Hobbes. That sounds like my son. He's even tried to replicate some of the snow scenes from C&H. Gotta love a kid with imagination.

Jodie said...

Glod, calculus IS sexy. That's why mathematicians are mobbed by starlets and models every time they go out in public.

Maureen, sounds like our kids are two of a kind. :)

avRAGEjoe said...

The Far Side and Calvin & Hobbes RULE!

Nick Mazonowicz said...

Don't know much about Calvin & Hobbes, but I love the Far Side.

BTW, I could certainly do with an ex-marine at my side when I teach, especially one with a good command of Polish.

Jay said...

That kid is going to give you a lot of grief one day! The smart ones always do.

kath red said...

what a fabulous idea. maybe you could sell it to a big network.

K. Restoule said...

I think a Survivor premise would be better, the person with the lowest test score gets thrown out and has to scrub toilets for the rest of their lives.

Harry said...

Jodie, here we spell Gavin D-a-v-i-d. C & H uses a vocabulary that's out of reach for lots of kids, so we were happy to find that D likes to read it. And TFS just adds to the mix.

Jodie said...

Harry, both of those were just made for boys to read (certainly made a huge impact on Gavin's worldview). :D I can't wait to see what they do when they grow up.