NationStates Jolt Archive

http://www.lewrockwell.com/spectator2/spec515.html

Let me know if you can pass it.

I'm not English, but I could get a few of them. Still, I doubt that anyone could pass it as that was a different curriculum than now.

Thanks to my Catholic education many years ago, I passed it with a 90%. Sorry Sister Schwartz, I know it was only a B. I'm truely sorry!

Aye. I got some of the geography at least.

I could do the math, but am im not english so I have no need to know ancient english kings
I wonder how many english people 100 years ago could do metric conversions

Grammar was hard to answer, the geography was easy enough, latin...forget it, English history (well i am doing it at uni) was a walk over, but the arithmatic, i got about three right lol


But remember, we get taught different things now, and a wider range of topics. Lets face it, Latin for everyday purposes is a waste, history, good to know but not practically useful, geography is the same, esp the sort in those questions there, grammar and arithmatic are the only ones really needed from those 5.

I could probably pass it, although I'm 32.

Doubts arise in my mind about answering certain questions, though.

What do they mean by "parse the sentence"? I think it means list what part of speech each word is. I don't think many 11 year olds in the UK today could answer that question because they wouldn't know what "parse" means.

Similarly, the entire Latin section of the test and a great deal of the geography section. This stuff is no longer taught in english schools. I don't think that necessarily implies dumbing down, since what is the intelligent reason for teaching kids Latin? Or where silver comes from? Or what the town of Hull is noted for? Currently the town of Hull is noted for a couple of things but those aren't what it was noted for in 1898, nor are they necessarily useful things to know.

Could Humphrey Stanbury's father, who passed the test in 1898, have passed a test like

1. What is the internet and what is it noted for?
2. Explain the meaning of "k m8 cu 2mro".
3. In which of the circuits below would the lamp shine brightest, and in which would it not shine? [followed by some schematic drawings of lamp circuits]
4. What forces are involved in a cart rolling down a ramp? How would you alter either the ramp or the cart to affect the action of each force?

The only transferrable part of the test is the arithmetic section, except of course that it is listed in LSD and now UK money is metric.

the geography was easy enough,

seriously? You know where St Bees Head is and what it is noted for? And you know what Omdurman is noted for? I somewhat disbelieve you.

seriously? You know where St Bees Head is and what it is noted for? And you know what Omdurman is noted for? I somewhat disbelieve you.

St Beeshead - Been there :p famous because its got huge cliffs and crap loads of sea birds. Plus there was the worlds first mineshaft under the sea or something.

Omdurman - Battle in 1898 in the Sudan (A-Level british history) :D

ok, got the grammar (checked by a lecturer at uni :-) (he gave me 15/20 with 4 marks per question)

geography - got the first question, the second i got most of, just not sure where platinum would have come from then... climate easy, british possessions in the US, i got the islands in the carribbean, dont know if they wanted anything else... and the last one, well i dont know where the first two of those are, the others are easy. (18/20)

latin - with some revision before i looked at the questions (cause i hadnt done any latin for 8-9 years) i could get about 1/2 (12/20)

history (16/20)

maths, well if you discount the stuff in imperial (or UK money) (cause i was never taught any of it) there are 6 questions, of which i got 6 right. (20/20)

Therefore i got 65/80 = 81%

if you do count the imperial stuff then i get 68.75%

so i think i did well enough to get in and learn the rest (some again :-) )
If i was 11 i would have had better chance at the latin, less good at the history and possibly less good at the geography/history.

edit: before ppl ask how did i get it marked etc in 30 min, i live with an enlish lecturer, but didnt get their help first :-) (and i got this in a different email a bit before, so its really been almost 3 hours now...)

Yeah, proof of duming down, a test with five topics each with an average of 5 questions each.

btw. did ok on the test (apart from the handwriting question and the Latin part)

St Beeshead - Been there :p famous because its got huge cliffs and crap loads of sea birds. Plus there was the worlds first mineshaft under the sea or something.

Omdurman - Battle in 1898 in the Sudan (A-Level british history) :D

well get you... and if the battle of omdurman was in 1898, asking a kid in 1898 where it is and what for doesn't show a great deal of intelligence on the kid's part. i expect a lot of 11 year olds nowadays know who Saddam Hussein is.

On the general topic, the exam was for entrance to a grammar school, so only the very best of the best were expected to pass. What was the literacy rate among 11 year olds in 1898?

The only transferrable part of the test is the arithmetic section, except of course that it is listed in LSD and now UK money is metric.

WOW, the UK used to use LSD for currency???

<mind boggles over the implications>

well get you... and if the battle of omdurman was in 1898, asking a kid in 1898 where it is and what for doesn't show a great deal of intelligence on the kid's part. i expect a lot of 11 year olds nowadays know who Saddam Hussein is.

On the general topic, the exam was for entrance to a grammar school, so only the very best of the best were expected to pass. What was the literacy rate among 11 year olds in 1898?

No idea about the literacy %.

But something has made me wonder, the Battle of Omdurman was on the 2nd September 1898. If it was an enterance exam, surely it would have taken place before then, as school usually starts around the 7th September.

*googles Omdurman*


meh, not much else about it other than it was the general headquarters of the Mahdi Muhammad Ahmad who fought the british in Sudan, and was since 1884.

One must also remember that western schooling reforms had not been introduced. Without actually knowing, I'd say that the school in question is not just an ordinary boys school in 1898, but one of the more elite boys schools in the British Empire.

http://www.snopes.com/language/document/1895exam.htm

Also, the questions aren't as hard as they seem at first.

I could probably score an 60% or so on the Latin and Math section, but 10% on the English, History, and Geography (as I didn't live in England in the 19th century).

http://www.lewrockwell.com/spectator2/spec515.html

Let me know if you can pass it.

Yeah, I can do some. But I'm sure I can do a hell of a lot more than the average American highschool student. I'm sure better than some of my fellow college students, not the average, but some. At least in college people are a decent bit more intelligent.

Also, the questions aren't as hard as they seem at first.

I could probably score an 60% or so on the Latin and Math section, but 10% on the English, History, and Geography (as I didn't live in England in the 19th century).

Ah, history and geography are where I excel. Though, I'm not the most learned in 19th century British stuff.

Ya, I haven't had a "good education" in about 3 or 4 years. The school I'm at now doesn't even teach Latin. :p

I could easily make a 100% on this test.

Why?

I have something they didn't have back then .... GOOGLE!

Hooked on Google works for me.

only the latin and the maths totally not the geography. Though shockingly i realise that although doing A level maths i have forgotten how to do long division. so not so good. :(

I guess i did okay, up untill the translatingg part.

One must also remember that western schooling reforms had not been introduced. Without actually knowing, I'd say that the school in question is not just an ordinary boys school in 1898, but one of the more elite boys schools in the British Empire.
It's a King Edward's, which makes it a (then) 300 year old boy's grammer school aimed at scholarship kids. Pretty elite, yes.

Yeah, well let's see English 11 year olds from 100 years ago deal with quantum physics, hmm? Ha! Serves 'em right. Smarmy bastards. :p

Yeah, well let's see English 11 year olds from 100 years ago deal with quantum physics, hmm? Ha! Serves 'em right. Smarmy bastards. :p
Never mind from 100 years ago. Let's see some 11 year olds today try to deal with quantum physics.
Oh, that would be the NS General Forum. :p

Pretty hard test, but it's from a different time that can't be compared with today. Besides I doubt kids from 100 years ago had anywhere near the old-lady-mugging skills that todays youths possess

I could easily make a 100% on this test.

Why?

I have something they didn't have back then .... GOOGLE!

Hooked on Google works for me.
It wouldn't help on the hand written part though ;)

Well, that's the generation that got the world into two world wars, so I'm not sure that knowing all that really meant something.

Although I guess back in those days people had less things to learn, more time to learn them and very few resources to learn them from, so it made the whole less complicated.

Thank god the UK got rid of that shillings and pence nonsense and also adopted the metric system. The only thing that should still be taught thoroughly is math and grammar. Those are indispensable in any age.

Did everyone miss the link showing that these types of "documents" are complete hoaxes?!

You are, of course, aware that that test was administered in 1898? What is considered important to learn then is certainly not now. I really don't care where England's raw resource providers were. Nor is Latin nearly as important now as it was back then--especially is one is not a Christian. Not to mention the fact that the English language has changed substantially in many ways over the past century.

Did everyone miss the link showing that these types of "documents" are complete hoaxes?!

I can't speak for everyone, but I did miss that link. However, I did follow the one you posted to snopes.com complaining about how one specific test doesn't really prove and decline in the level of American education. Nowhere do they claim the test is a hoax.

I can't speak for everyone, but I did miss that link. However, I did follow the one you posted to snopes.com complaining about how one specific test doesn't really prove and decline in the level of American education. Nowhere do they claim the test is a hoax.

Yes because back then, we all know that Algebra wasn't invented, so they had to occupy kids by asking them to multiply 5 and 6 digit numbers together, or take the square root of number with 9 decimal places.

Sure, I'm jealous that my Latin wasn't as good when I was 11, but do you honestly think that people would actually be doing pointless things like that in school?

Yes because back then, we all know that Algebra wasn't invented, so they had to occupy kids by asking them to multiply 5 digit numbers together.
Yes...talk about pointless.

i dont want to have to write that test.

Ah yes, well obviously we are all dumber because we don't learn Middle English contractions or Latin.

methinks me smart.......not no more i toldly faild that test..........*sigh* its ok it not the first!

I'm not so sure learning latin is such a waste of time. It's handy if you go into medicine, biology, law, the catholic church, or European linguistics. Although, I'm sure I would've found it to be a considerable waste of time at age 11, but that wasn't much of an issue at my American public school.

Depending on which King Edwards School in Birmingham this is (there's a few) I think I may have taken that test. Well, not that test, but I did take the entrance exam for King Edwards Camp Hill (IIRC) when I was 11. I remember it being a bitch, even though I passed. Can't remember many specifics, it was 14 years ago, but I seem to recall literary appreciation, history, geography and mathmatics being on there. Latin definitely wasn't. My impression is that it contained more analytical questions than the test cited and I definitely recall it included some creative writing.

I didn't go, though. Chose a less presitigious school with better sports facilities. It was crap and I didn't get into any teams. Bloody liberal parents.

English Grammar - didn't do too badly...around about 75% I reckon.
Geography - did pretty well (90%), though it really depends on the margin of error allowed for marking the positions of places. Most likely did well on it because of A Level Geography now.
Latin - I did GCSE Latin, so a bit of an advantage there. With the exception of English-Latin translation, got 100%.
English History - reminded me too much of 1066 and all that. Despite laughing at each question, still got over 90%. But doing History at university probably helps.
Arithmetic is piss easy. It's all simple addition, subtraction, long multiplication and long division. I'd expect the average 11 year old to know how to do the addition, subtraction and multiplication questions now, and at least have some idea of doing the long division. I certainly did when I was 11. 100% on that, despite the use of £.s.d. (I knew how to use that when I was 11 as well, and I'm only 19 now. I was born in 1985 - 14 years after the introduction of decimalisation).
Depending on the mark needed to pass, I probably would have passed.

Yeah, proof of duming down, a test with five topics each with an average of 5 questions each.

As an entrance exam, I'm willing to bet that a lot of the answers would have been used as indicators, rather than absolute pass/fail marks. It wasn't OCR/computer marked in those days and evidence of neat handwriting in the first question (sustained throughout the test) and the ability to at least touch on every subject would probably have given the examiner an excuse to up the score of somebody they thought would make a good student, even if they currently appeared to be mixing up cities. (In contrast, if they really did not want a boy they could probably have pointed to his handwriting or sentencial structure in explaining why the final mark was a failing one. A lot of room for bias, of course, but then who said life was fair?)

From what I know of that era, though, the Latin section may well have been sacrasant with no room for error... Different priorities in those days... :)

WOW, the UK used to use LSD for currency???

<mind boggles over the implications>

It certainly explains their continued acceptance of royalty.

>_<

Did everyone miss the link showing that these types of "documents" are complete hoaxes?!
I highly doubt that this particular document is a hoax, especially considering the fact that it was published in the Daily Telegraph some time mid-last week.

The document may very well be real BUT calling it a hoax would be innacurate. ILLUSION would be a better definition of what this is. 100+ years ago the curriculum was focused on different things (they didn't even have the World Wars yet!) and kids would have crammed for these tests. We wouldn't even use the archaeic english they did in the test. It just makes us SEEM less educated. An ILLUSION, plain and simple.

I'm Canadian and would fail easily, but when I first read "Bound France" I thought they wanted to tied up and beat the French exchange student. Since those were unlikely I realized they must mean "Draw France" and 'Bound" meant in relation to "Boundaries".

Anywho, that my 2 pence.