most schools do such a bad job of teaching that the kids don’t really take it seriously — not even the smart kids. Much of the time we were all, students and teachers both, just going through the motions. In my high school French class we were supposed to read Hugo’s Les Miserables. I don’t think any of us knew French well enough to make our way through this enormous book. Like the rest of the class, I just skimmed the Cliff ’s Notes. When we were given a test on the book, I noticed that the questions sounded odd. They were full of long words that our teacher wouldn’t have used. Where had
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Learning or just going through the motions
