School’s important because it’s where we learn most of the things we know in our early years. But sometimes, our teachers don’t have all the answers. Sometimes, what they tell us might not even be the whole truth .
People on Reddit had some pretty interesting answers when they were asked the question: ” What did you learn in Elementary school that turned out to be false/ a lie when you reached adulthood? “
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“If you touch a baby duck its mother will reject it.” – murphy_girl
As a kid, I believed this and never tried to touch a baby duck ever. As an adult… I’m pretty sure this is just something we were told as kids so we wouldn’t touch baby ducks ever.
Which is probably for the best.
“If someone is picking on you that means they like you…” – archibauldis99
What I learned is that this isn’t always true. Sometimes, kids are mean to you because they’re mean. Plus, even if they do like you, bullying shouldn’t be normalized in that way.
Also, it’s kind of messed up that some teachers’ reactions to kids being mean to us was to just write it off as playful teasing, huh.
“‘That doesn’t/won’t slide in high school.'” – BIGBOT6142
Elementary school teachers are always telling you about how you’re going to have to do XYZ in high school, and then you show up first day and no one cares nearly as much.
And if you go to college, it just gets worse (or better, depending on how you look at it).
“That cracking your fingers gives you arthritis.” – Taylorcurley
I actually believed this until… last year, when I learned that it isn’t true. I feel so cheated out of having such a cool habit, but what can you do. I guess I’ll just have to have other annoying tics.
“That I can’t use my notes in life.” – Kanden_27
I can and will take notes everywhere I go. And then, like, use them.
Not everything in life needs to be as hard as one of those Scantron tests.
“We had a teacher tell us that we only had so many uses before our vocal cords stopped working so wasting it small talking during class would cause us to go mute in our 30s.” – level 1H20fearsme
This is… for sure just something that teacher said to shut the class up. As a kid, I totally would’ve believed it.
As an adult, I think it’s hilarious.
“That I should never stand up to a bully. I should stop reacting so they would get bored and leave me alone.” – LuckyCandle
Ever notice how a lot of the time, it ends up being up to the bullied kids to do something to get their bullies off their backs? Instead of, like, authority figures getting the bullies in trouble?
What’s up with that?
“That all my high school teachers and my professors once I got to college would require cursive.” – machina99
I’m not gonna lie, I kind of hate that no one actually cares about cursive writing anymore. Sure, it’s basically impossible to read quickly, but it’s pretty! And it’s fun to write in cursive!
“‘This will go down on your permanent record.'” – Marionberry-Superb
I swear, this was more something that TV shows drilled into my mind than anything else. And I don’t know about everywhere in the world, but in my neck of the woods, they weren’t a thing. No one cared that much.
“That blood is blue before it touches air.” – W0rm_G1rl
This is such a weird thing to tell kids, rather than, like actually teaching them why veins look blue. I bet you anything, the teachers who told their students this lie were also told the lie as kids, and never learned any different.
“Tastebud zones.” – GrilledStuffedDragon
I honestly haven’t thought about this in years , but yeah, that was a really weird thing. As if we could only taste certain flavors on certain parts of our tongue.
Funny how most of us never questioned this.
“Apparently bears just nap a lot in the winter and don’t take a 3 month mega nap.” – IMNOTBOBFOSSE
It actually took me a long time to figure this out, and I feel like most adults I know either didn’t know this, or learned it pretty late in life.
Bears den , they don’t hibernate. Apparently, mother bears can, like, straight up give birth while denning, too.
“We were taught that platypus (platypi?) were extinct. Not endangered, not almost extinct. Just extinct. Imagine my surprise when I discover the internet.” – kjaark
As somebody who’s been to a zoo before, I can confirm that platypuses are, in fact, not extinct.
Also, yes, it’s “platypuses.”
“Nobody has offered me drugs yet. D.A.R.E made it seem like I’d have to be running away from people in vans offering me drugs every time I went on a walk.” – Minmach-123
It really does feel like we had so many people in our lives acting like everyone we met was going to try and offer us drugs. I made it out of elementary and high school without even being offered alcohol.
“There’s no such thing as a stupid question.” – _Balrog_of_Morgoth_
Look, I think that it’s great when kids ask questions. But some of them… well… you’d think they’d have a little more common sense. You know what I mean.
Adults too.
“My sixth grade teacher taught us that a quarter past 4 was 4:25. She wasn’t joking.” – invalid_uses_of
I have mad respect for anyone who goes into teaching as a profession. But man, there are some people out there who really weren’t meant to be teachers.
“‘You won’t always have a calculator in your pocket.'” – silence_infidel
“Not even that long ago. Smart phones were already a thing.”
As I’m sure is the case for most of you out there, I grew up before smart phones. But even then, I didn’t get why people couldn’t just, like, have calculators around in case they needed one. Or even earlier, slide rules.
“If you don’t go to University, you will end up on the street.” – quadruple_negative87
University education is a wonderful thing. But you don’t need a degree to be successful in life. It bugs me that there was so much pressure on us as kids to go to university, especially when it’s so expensive.
“I before E except after C.” – vintagchk
What a weird rule to teach kids, especially when there are so many examples where that isn’t the case. Do you think science teachers would teach their students to seize such a foreign concept?
English is such a strange language.
“That Wikipedia wasn’t a reliable source for accurate information.” – idkwthtotypehere
Sure, there are some inaccuracies on Wikipedia. But you can find a lot of facts that are 100% true. It may not be as reliable as, like, a textbook, but not by that much.
As long as the Wikipedia entry you’re looking at has proper citations, it’s probably fine.
