In my freshman year of high school, we had a new history teacher. His name was Mr. Taylor, and he was ridiculously hot. He was just out of college–this was his first teaching job–and he was one of those people that you look at and think “shouldn’t you be modelling somewhere?” On top of being gorgeous, he was also kind, funny, a great teacher, and a huge Lord of the Rings nerd, and the student body worshiped him.
This was a small, private school, and there were only two sections of freshman World History, and he taught both of them. He constantly complained that one section was ahead of the other. As the year progressed, the gap between the two sections widened–as midterms approached, one section was in the medieval period and the other was still lagging at the end of the Roman empire.
Both sections were meant to sit the same exam, so he couldn’t just move up the midterm and have one class sit it first. He needed to get both classes into the same time period.
So for the week before midterms, he hurried the slower class into the middle ages, and went in to depth with the other. He discussed battles in detail, drew regional maps on the white board, and even diagrammed the lineage of the king of Noldor. The class, of course, took diligent notes and asked questions. Everyone wanted to impress him and did their best to learn the material.
During the last class before the midterm, he reviewed the material he’d taught for most of the term, but didn’t touch on any of the things he’d been teaching for the last week.
Finally, one student asked if any of the stuff he’d been teaching for the last week was going to be on the exam.
“No,” he said, “The contents of the Silmarillion will not be on the exam.”
There was a moment of silence while everyone sat there, confused. Someone eventually went “…what??”
Mr. Taylor grinned. “Yeah, I needed to keep you guys busy while the other class caught up, so for the last week I’ve just been teaching Lord of the Rings history. I can’t believe none of you noticed. You need to pay more attention to geography.”
The class was, unsurprisingly, outraged. Mr. Taylor just laughed.
yousharknotpass
turnnoffyourmind
origamiaround
blakekathryn
kaledo-art
dailybridgerton
