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Things you're shocked people don't know

Btw. until I was ~10 or so, I refused to believe that both world wars happened in the 20th century, I thought the first one was around 1800 or so. ;)
 
I have come across Americans who think that the capital of Australia is Sydney.

That is commin in Sweden as well. And we usually are quite decent in geography. Then, of course, ot's not so strange that people assume it's the capital, it's the most famous city there.
 
I have come across Americans who think that the capital of Australia is Sydney.
Until right now, I never even knew that other cities in Australia had names.


This might not be because Americans are less knowledgeable but because they are not worried about showing their ignorance. Maybe people from other countries simply Google rather than inquire.
This is certainly the case for me. I learn better when I ask questions and people give me answers in conversation. One of my biggest pet peeves about this message board is when people say things like, "Why don't you look it up yourself?" Honestly, I don't look things up myself because I know that I'll forget the information. It's one of the reasons I had such a hard time in college despite being a "gifted" student in high school: my professors expected me to learn by reading the textbook at home on my own. I can read the stuff just fine, but the information doesn't sink in for me until I hear it coming out of a persons' mouth.

I much prefer to ask a question and have a real person give me an answer.


At school we covered many countries of the world when we studied Social Studies (History and Geography). This included

1) The great explorers
2) The French Revolution
3) The Kings and Queens of Britain
4) The history of bother India and China
5) World War 1 and 11
6) Some American history - such as the War of Independence and the Civil War
7) The Vietnam War - which wasn't history but going on at the time
8) The Russian Revolution

I remember once we had to choose a major city of the world and do a report on it. I choose Cairo.
I think American education focuses a lot more on its own history and geography rather than stuff that happened abroad.

In high school, US History was a required course. World History and World Geography, however, were electives, and I elected NOT to take them.
 
In high school, US History was a required course. World History and World Geography, however, were electives, and I elected NOT to take them.

I'm not sure it's a smart idea to give average high school student so much freedom in choosing their own curriculum.
 
Believe me, there wasn't much freedom. You only really had room for one or two elective a year. Depending on what particular track you were on, you may not have had room for any.

Most of the kids who took the history and geography classes were the ones who weren't taking 4 years of a foreign language because there just wasn't room for both.
 
What did you do all day long then? Aren't high school students in the US in school from 8am to 3pm or something like that?
 
^Man, am I glad I went to a private school. I had Anthropology (history of the planet?) in freshman year, world history Sophomore and Junior year, and American History Senior year. There was nothing "elective" about it. The only things that we could choose were what language to learn (French or Spanish) and what art to take Senior year (drawing, theater, photography or music). That was it. I had an to do volunteer work as school requirement--every week--and had about 6 hours of homework every night.

Of course, I hated every minute of it, but by the time I got to college, I already had a semester of credits under my belt and was far better prepared than any of my classmate. My last year of high school was far more difficult academically than my first year of college.
 
Something like that. For all four years of high school I took:

Math, Science, English, Spanish, and PE. Each class was about 55 minutes long. We had 7 periods in the day, with one being for lunch.

So...that only left me room for one elective each year. However, you also had to take Government, Economics, and US History in order to graduate. So, really, I'm pretty sure the only elective I ever had room for was Pottery my freshman year.

I certainly could have found room to take lots of history and geography classes, but I would have had to sacrifice either Math, Science, English, or Spanish, and I was not willing to do that.

Frankly, most students in my school (including myself) ended up taking additional summer school classes just so they could fit in all of their graduation requirements.
 
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My public high school seems to be somewhere between Rojohen's and auntiehill's. We had World Cultures/Geography freshman year of high school, World History sophomore year, U.S. History junior year, and Economics/Government senior year. We also had to do community service work our senior year.

I remember hardly anything from my World History class. It was mostly all about Europe but the information didn't stick with me, unlike the AP U.S. History class which I loved.

World Cultures/Geography was kind of a joke. Of course most of my classes that weren't AP level were. We were assigned various countries throughout the year to do reports on. I got Yemen, El Salvador, and I think Mongolia and Greenland.
 
World Cultures/Geography was kind of a joke.

I did honors/AP classes, too, so I never ended up taking the World Geography class. I did have friends who took it, though, and I distinctly remember their homework consisting of coloring maps with crayons.
 
It's short for the older expression “Hear him” which was a popular way to show support of a speaker.
Yes, I've always thought the meaning of the phrase “Hear, hear” is fairly obvious. It means “Hear this man's words” or “You deserve to be heard.”

As for “Here, here,” it's meaningless if the pet in question is a cat.
They could at least say it's Rio, right? ;)
Well, they'd only be out of date by 50 years!
WORLD WAR ELEVEN?! FUCK ME! i missed 3 through 10!
That reminds me of the kid who was studying African-American history and wanted to know more about Malcolm the Tenth.
Btw. until I was ~10 or so, I refused to believe that both world wars happened in the 20th century, I thought the first one was around 1800 or so. ;)
When I was 7 or 8 years old, I tried looking up “World War III” in the encyclopedia because I kept hearing so many references to it on TV, in political satire, etc. I was puzzled as to why I could only find entries for TWO World Wars!
 
There is a lot lacking in the culture and geography education of Americans, but I'd say that the continent we learn the least about is South America. I remember learning about history and culture in Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, but pretty much nothing about South America or Australia. I really don't know why.

For me for sure it was Africa we learned the least about.

I would be shocked if 1 out 10 average Europeans or Americans could correctly point to Sambia or Benin on an unlabelled map of Africa.

Is I remember correctly we only had to be able to identify the 'pink countries' of Africa i.e the Commonwealth countries. This is back when being in the Commonwealth still meant something more than which countries take part in the Commonwealth Games.
 
The naval ensign isn't a junior officer in the Navy.

I told a teacher that we're closest to the sun in winter and farther away in summer and was told by her that I had it reversed.

People who don't take vitamins, do eat primarily junk food and pop and wonder why they're tired all the time. I return from the gym and friends ask why I'm not tired.

The top of Mount Chimborazo, in the Andes is a mile and a half farther from the center of the Earth than the top of Mount Everest, and so is the highest mountain (Latin pride kicks in).

Because the 180th longitude line passes through the Aleutian islands, Alaska is both the most eastern and the most western state (I've won money in bars with that one).
 
We don't speak Spanish in Brazil.

(Honeslty, if I won a penny to every dumbass who thought so...)
 
After reading through this thread, I'm mostly just shocked at the things people expect others to know!
 
There is a lot lacking in the culture and geography education of Americans, but I'd say that the continent we learn the least about is South America. I remember learning about history and culture in Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, but pretty much nothing about South America or Australia. I really don't know why.

For me for sure it was Africa we learned the least about.

I would be shocked if 1 out 10 average Europeans or Americans could correctly point to Sambia or Benin on an unlabelled map of Africa.

Is I remember correctly we only had to be able to identify the 'pink countries' of Africa i.e the Commonwealth countries. This is back when being in the Commonwealth still meant something more than which countries take part in the Commonwealth Games.

My school system covered SA in 7th grade. My final report was on Peru and consisted mainly of Incas and giggling about Lake Titicaca. I can name/find on a map about 50% of those countries now.

I know pretty much nothing about Africa, however, outside of South Africa and Egypt (Egypt is in Africa, right?) and sometimes if I'm feeling particularly smart I can find Ethiopia on a map. Never covered Australia... I'd say most of my knowledge of Australia comes from children's television. And I learned a bit about New Zealand from a Kiwi guy I met online.

I was shocked the other night when I went to the Census enumerator's test ($17/hour? why yes, yes I will knock on doors and quiz people) and nobody could find their own street on a map of the town. Seriously? You either live north of the interstate or south of it, on the water or not. It can't possibly take five minutes to find your street.
 
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