NationStates Jolt Archive

I'll get right to the point. Yesterday (Friday), in my Spanish class, we got our tests back after they had been graded. There was one question that, apparently, the class thought was a little hard. The question was this: ____ tiene veinte y ocho días. (___ has 28 days). The choices were enero (January) and febrero (Febuary). First, it's just sickening that people got that wrong. But, it gets worse. It...gets...worse. An 'average' student raised her hand and said to the teacher, word-for-word, "I don't think that number 13 is a fair question, because you didn't tell us how many days in each month." What are your thoughts on this horrendous state of public high school?

I think it's because for some reason, people seem to ENJOY being stupid.

wtf.

I don't even know that month rhyme-thing and I can tell you the ONE MONTH that has 28 freaking days.

I think you're in a class of morons or something. Because really. wtf.

Trex, as appalling as it is, its still fucking funny. Will you please use this thread to post more hella amu-erm- appalling things?

Also, what's sad is that it's a Sophomore class (I'm a Freshie by the way)

So, which one is it? :)

Rule #1 about high school:

You will hear the stupidest things ever spoken by mankind, at least until you get into college.

They're being fucking stupid, that's all I have to say.

Rule #1 about high school:

You will hear the stupidest things ever spoken by mankind, at least until you get into college.

First day of my sophomore year of high school (10th grade):

World History Honors Teacher: Okay class, what country did we fight in WW1?
About 5 kids collectively in different areas of the room: Umm...Japan?

When I first read it I thought it was a fill in the blank question with no choices. It seems to me you are not in the second or third grade. I just can't beleive the students thought it was a hard question. I guess the students would have complained if the question was, "What month has 29 days." (sorry my Spanish isn't very good so I can't write the question in Spanish.)

That's what you get when you raise a generation to expect that they deserve everything handed to them on a silver platter, and that you can never criticize them even for the most egregious mistakes, or bad intentions. Geez.

Well, at least you didn't get it wrong. Did you?

Perchance they were looking ahead at leap year.

Oh, and by the way, every month has 28 days. Some may have more, but they still have 28.

Rule #1 about high school:

You will hear the stupidest things ever spoken by mankind, at least until you get into college.

Don't know about that. I've heard some pretty stupid things in college classes. :eek: Not to many in grad school though.

In my American History class someone asked if slavery was real. (We're all very worried about her. Some how she manages to be in AP Chemistry)

Maybe it's because I was born in feb, but I'm sure that's something everyone knows when they're about 6?


Fine, I'll stay in my bubble..

I have deslexia and I have trouble keeping track of month rhyme, month order and the order of the alphabet (I also cannot read round clocks and can barely read cursive writing). Just pointing out that just because a person has trouble with time and dates, that does not mean they are stupid.

I have deslexia and I have trouble keeping track of month rhyme, month order and the order of the alphabet (I also cannot read round clocks). Just pointing out that just because a person has trouble with time and dates, that does not mean they are stupid.
Be that as it may, I doubt that each and every student has dyslexia.

The question was this: ____ tiene veinte y ocho días. (___ has 28 days). The choices were enero (January) and febrero (Febuary). First, it's just sickening that people got that wrong.

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but all months have 28 days, no?

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but all months have 28 days, no?
No one likes a smart-ass. You know what it meant.

In my American History class someone asked if slavery was real. (We're all very worried about her. Some how she manages to be in AP Chemistry)


Dude.. They need a watchlist for people like that. :eek: Doesn't take much chemistry knowledge to make a bomb, does it? "Is slavery real? ".... christ.:eek:

Be that as it may, I doubt that each and every student has dyslexia.

Just pointing something out I felt needed to be mentioned.

No one likes a smart-ass. You know what it meant.

I know what it said, what it means is an entirely different matter.

Dude.. They need a watchlist for people like that. :eek: Doesn't take much chemistry knowledge to make a bomb, does it? "Is slavery real? ".... christ.:eek:
She was in my German III class last year. Once assingment was placing several scientist in order by their contributions to science. First on her list of Alzheimer and Einstein, von Braun, and others were much lower on the list. He named a fucking disease...that's it.

Dude.. They need a watchlist for people like that. :eek: Doesn't take much chemistry knowledge to make a bomb, does it? "Is slavery real? ".... christ.:eek:
Imagine MacGyver...with an IQ of 61.

I know what it said, what it means is an entirely different matter.
Since the answer was febrero, it is not an entirely different matter

Since the answer was febrero, it is not an entirely different matter

Ah, but we only know that the answer was febrero in retrospect. According to the information given to us by the question itself, then january (or its spanish name) would have been equally valid.

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but all months have 28 days, no?

Yes, and all but one has 30 days. :D

Yes, and all but one has 30 days. :D

Indeed.

All months can have 29 days.

First of all, you can't expect the students to be very well educated when the teachers are stupid, too.

28 in spanish is 'veintiocho' not 'veinte y ocho'.

Here's a cute little way to know whether a month is a short month or a long month....without remembering silly rhymes.

Make a fist, as you count months, start at your index finger knuckle and count it as January. Then move to the dwell in between the knuckles and count February. The middle finger knuckle is March...in between knuckles is April. When you get to the end of your fist, start back over at the index finger knuckle.

Knuckle months are 31 days, dwell months are shorter (30, or in the case of February, 28 or 29)

Indeed.

All months can have 29 days.

Only every ____ years.

Uno
Dos
Tres
Quatro
Cinco

Only every ____ years.

Uno
Dos
Tres
Quatro
Cinco

Ah, but it isn't as simple as that - remember the caveat about years ending in two zeroes only being leap years if they are divisible by four-hundred.

Ah, but it isn't as simple as that - remember the caveat about years ending in two zeroes only being leap years if they are divisible by four-hundred.
You can't be serious. An exception that small is not worth mentioning in this context.

First of all, you can't expect the students to be very well educated when the teachers are stupid, too.

28 in spanish is 'veintiocho' not 'veinte y ocho'.

Here's a cute little way to know whether a month is a short month or a long month....without remembering silly rhymes.

Make a fist, as you count months, start at your index finger knuckle and count it as January. Then move to the dwell in between the knuckles and count February. The middle finger knuckle is March...in between knuckles is April. When you get to the end of your fist, start back over at the index finger knuckle.

Knuckle months are 31 days, dwell months are shorter (30, or in the case of February, 28 or 29)
The teacher was born and raised in Puerto Rico and speaks fluent Spanish.

You can't be serious. An exception that small is not worth mentioning in this context.

The devil is in the details.

Ah, but it isn't as simple as that - remember the caveat about years ending in two zeroes only being leap years if they are divisible by four-hundred.

No, I wasn't. Seriously, I never head that.

The devil is in the details.
Sure, whatever you say.

Sure, whatever you say.

No, I wasn't. Seriously, I never head that.

See: NS as an educational experience.

First of all, you can't expect the students to be very well educated when the teachers are stupid, too.

28 in spanish is 'veintiocho' not 'veinte y ocho'.

Be careful about calling people stupid. Formal Spanish in Spain is viente y ocho however the vernacular is vientocho.

See: NS as an educational experience.

It can be, and you should be proud of teaching something to someone who is 62 years of age. By the way, how often does that 00 divide by 400 thing happen?

It can be, and you should be proud of teaching something to someone who is 62 years of age. By the way, how often does that 00 divide by 400 thing happen?

Well, 1900 was the last example since calendar reform where a year divisible by four wasn't a leap year. Next one scheduled for 2100.

Quatro

My eyes...

It can be, and you should be proud of teaching something to someone who is 62 years of age. By the way, how often does that 00 divide by 400 thing happen?

..I would imagine every 400 years...:D

See: NS as an educational experience.

Again, you can't possibly be serious. If a teacher asked you how often leap years occured, you would have about a 50/50 shot of getting it right with your answer ["Ah, but it isn't as simple as that - remember the caveat about years ending in two zeroes only being leap years if they are divisible by four-hundred"--since it doesn't actually contain the word "four" and thus, does not contain the answer], depending on the teacher. Whereas, if you answer "four" and drop the stupid, pointless, trying-to-look-smarter-than-you BS you'd have a 100/0 shot, which is remarkably better.

Again, you can't possibly be serious. If a teacher asked you how often leap years occured, you would have about a 50/50 shot of getting it right with your answer ["Ah, but it isn't as simple as that - remember the caveat about years ending in two zeroes only being leap years if they are divisible by four-hundred"--since it doesn't actually contain the word "four" and thus, does not contain the answer], depending on the teacher. Whereas, if you answer "four" and drop the stupid, pointless, trying-to-look-smarter-than-you BS you'd have a 100/0 shot, which is remarkably better.

That all depends on the pedantry of the teacher involved, and whether you are primarily concerned with getting gold stars for their own sake or indulging in the complexity of the real world.

Given the choice between chosing one of five incorrect answers or sticking my neck out and pointing out how interesting the question actually is, I'd tend towards the latter. Mea culpa.

EDIT: sidenote - I can certainly remember being taught the 100 and 400 rule concerning leap years when I was at primary school. Maybe I was taught a simplified version without that clause when I was very young, but I cannot recall.

Again, you can't possibly be serious. If a teacher asked you how often leap years occured, you would have about a 50/50 shot of getting it right with your answer ["Ah, but it isn't as simple as that - remember the caveat about years ending in two zeroes only being leap years if they are divisible by four-hundred"--since it doesn't actually contain the word "four" and thus, does not contain the answer], depending on the teacher. Whereas, if you answer "four" and drop the stupid, pointless, trying-to-look-smarter-than-you BS you'd have a 100/0 shot, which is remarkably better.

Meh. I don't care what a teacher might say. I care about being correct.

Meh. I don't care what a teacher might say. I care about being correct.
Yeah. Truth be told I agree with you on that one; but unfortunately being correct and making it through the American Public Education system are oftentimes at odds. I got a 45% on my senior thesis because I was able to write it off the top of my head more or less, and my bibliogrpahical secion was somewhat lacking. I had expected to lose points for that, of course, but not fifty five of them. I had to pull straight A's for the rest of the semester to pass that class.

I'll get right to the point. Yesterday (Friday), in my Spanish class, we got our tests back after they had been graded. There was one question that, apparently, the class thought was a little hard. The question was this: ____ tiene veinte y ocho días. (___ has 28 days). The choices were enero (January) and febrero (Febuary). First, it's just sickening that people got that wrong. But, it gets worse. It...gets...worse. An 'average' student raised her hand and said to the teacher, word-for-word, "I don't think that number 13 is a fair question, because you didn't tell us how many days in each month." What are your thoughts on this horrendous state of public high school?
My teachers would have said something along the lines of "It's your own fault for not asking during the test."

Rule #1 about high school:

You will hear the stupidest things ever spoken by mankind, at least until you get into college.
Very true. Where else will you here "I don't have my discman on to listen to it, just so I can hear it"

Be careful about calling people stupid. Formal Spanish in Spain is viente y ocho however the vernacular is vientocho.


Wrong. I lived in Spain. I have an advanced degree in the language. the "y" configuration only begins with treinta y uno.

check any dictionary or translation program. Veintiocho is correct. Even if someone is fluent in a language, they might spell something wrong.

Wrong. I lived in Spain. I have an advanced degree in the language.

check any dictionary or translation program. Veintiocho is correct. Even if someone is fluent in a language, they might spell something wrong.

Hmm. A quick google search turns up pages such as this one (http://www.rcaguilar.com/spanish/vocabulary/numbers/20-59.htm) which gives "veinte y ocho (... or veintiocho)".

Was it the transposition of the I and the E that you were complaining about in Celtlund's post?

The quality of public education is awful. To really learn something you have to research things for yourself.

It doesn’t help that the school system wastes time on unproven methods of education, involving group projects where the students are supposed to “teach themselves.” All this has done is create a generation that is generally incapable of self-reliance and that lacks individual motivation. Essentially, the public school system is making us all fucking lazy.

Hmm. A quick google search turns up pages such as this one (http://www.rcaguilar.com/spanish/vocabulary/numbers/20-59.htm) which gives "veinte y ocho (... or veintiocho)".

Was it the transposition of the I and the E that you were complaining about in Celtlund's post?

I edited my last post to be more specific.

Because veinte ends in 'e', the e+y allocutes to 'i'.

From 30 on up, they end in 'a', thus allowing the a+y to remain.

Its kinda like the English rule to ad an N between the article 'a' and a noun that starts with a vowel. It allows the language to flow more easily.

I edited my last post to be more specific.

Because veinte ends in 'e', the e+y allocutes to 'i'.

From 30 on up, they end in 'a', thus allowing the a+y to remain.

Its kinda like the English rule to ad an N between the article 'a' and a noun that starts with a vowel. It allows the language to flow more easily.


Sorry, its more like the rule where you change a y to i when adding a suffix.

Easily, not easyly

Im sure theres an even better example, but that should give you the idea.

I edited my last post to be more specific.

Because veinte ends in 'e', the e+y allocutes to 'i'.

From 30 on up, they end in 'a', thus allowing the a+y to remain.

Its kinda like the English rule to ad an N between the article 'a' and a noun that starts with a vowel. It allows the language to flow more easily.

I'm not entirely sure that I follow here - not being a Spanish speaker - so, are you claiming that all the web pages I come up with when I do a search for "veinte y ocho" are in error?

Yeah. Truth be told I agree with you on that one; but unfortunately being correct and making it through the American Public Education system are oftentimes at odds. I got a 45% on my senior thesis because I was able to write it off the top of my head more or less, and my bibliogrpahical secion was somewhat lacking. I had expected to lose points for that, of course, but not fifty five of them. I had to pull straight A's for the rest of the semester to pass that class.

Poor baby. Screwed off on his/her thesis and had to pay for it by working his/her ass of for the rest of the school year. My heart pumps purple panther piss for you. :eek: Poor thing.

Wrong. I lived in Spain. I have an advanced degree in the language. the "y" configuration only begins with treinta y uno.

check any dictionary or translation program. Veintiocho is correct. Even if someone is fluent in a language, they might spell something wrong.

Yo viven en Espana por tres anyos en Madrid. Never learned to write it well, spoke enough to get buy, and could read a little. Loved living in Spain. Wonderful people and great food.

It doesn’t help that the school system wastes time on unproven methods of education, involving group projects where the students are supposed to “teach themselves.”

Your statement is not supported by the research. Get your degree in education, do your research, then come back and we will discuss the matter in another thread.

Your statement is not supported by the research. Get your degree in education, do your research, then come back and we will discuss the matter in another thread.
Maybe it isn't supported by research conducted by those just looking to make a name for themselves through some sort of "breakthrough", but it is backed up by my personal experience. Group projects just make students lazy and only one kid ends up doing all the work.

How 'bout not knowing what censorship is after a three month unit on it?
Thinking the Austria-Hungarian Empire was an Umpire?
Thinking that you get tax cuts for being stupid?

Ah, but it isn't as simple as that - remember the caveat about years ending in two zeroes only being leap years if they are divisible by four-hundred.

Even that is not completely accurate. You have to remember also that for better accuracy every year evenly divisible by 4,000 (for example, 4,000, 8,000, 12,000, 16,000, etc.) should never be a leap year. Then you have it correct.

So, February should have 29 days every 4 years, except:

-When the century is not divisible by 400 and,
-Every 4000th year

I'm not entirely sure that I follow here - not being a Spanish speaker - so, are you claiming that all the web pages I come up with when I do a search for "veinte y ocho" are in error?


Yes. Actually, I am claiming that if you do a search for a misspelled word, you can find it.

but unfortunately being correct and making it through the American Public Education system are oftentimes at odds.

K-12 public education in the United States is completely worthless. However, my local public community college and university are excellent for a few reasons:

1) Attendence is not required by law - Those who don't want to be in class don't have to be there, leaving the instructor free to teach and student free to learn.
2) They're expensive - Sure, public institutions are subsidized. Even so, having to pay several hundred (community college) or several thousand (university) dollars of one's own hard earned money in fees, supplies and books every quarter/semester makes for excellent motovation. This is what the advocates of "free" college/university education do not understand: a) there is no such thing as "free," and b) without an immediate, expensive, and painful cost, people will not place any value in their college/university education.
3) They work with, and recieve funding from, the private sector - I doubt this is really true of my community college, however, the public university I am currently attending recieves only around 30%-40% of it's funding from the state. The rest comes from corporations, business, private individuals, student fees, etc.
4) One can actually choose one's subject of study. - One does not have to repeat the same material over and over and over. People are more motovated to learn when they can study what interests them (!!!!!).

To fix public K-12 education, apply the above four points to it. Doing so will put a lot of bureaucrats out of business, however, so I'm not holding my breath. Public K-12 education is more about daytime curfew than it is about education, anyway.

K-12 public education in the United States is completely worthless. However, my local public community college and university are excellent for a few reasons:

1) Attendence is not required by law - Those who don't want to be in class don't have to be there, leaving the instructor free to teach and student free to learn.
.


Are there places that have compulsory community college/university?

In the US school is only compulsory till you're 16.

So, February should have 29 days every 4 years, except:

-When the century is not divisible by 400 and,
-Every 4000th year

Theoretically, yes, but I seem to recall that over a period of 8,000 years or so (ie. two 4000 year cycles) you have variations in orbit which cannot be accurately predicted at present, and so a third subclause has to be added:

- unless orbital variations occur so as to require rejigging the whole system somewhat

Yep, it would seem more observations are needed. Even if variations do not exist, I think with the 4,000 year clause it is still 4s out, so it would need to skip another leap year later on, many millenia later (about every 86,400 years we need to remove a day?).

Yep, it would seem more observations are needed. Even if variations do not exist, I think with the 4,000 year clause it is still 4s out, so it would need to skip another leap year later on, many millenia later (about every 86,400 years we need to remove a day?).

Newsflash: nobody gives a damn! Humanity is not going to fucking be here in 86,400 years to give a shit about how accurate the leap year system is.

Newsflash: nobody gives a damn!

Speak for yourself.

Humanity is not going to fucking be here in 86,400 years to give a shit about how accurate the leap year system is.

Hey, we were here easily 86,400 years ago, and so providing that we don't fuck up and die out completely we're most likely going to be about in another 86,400 years.

Speak for yourself.

I usually do. I just assume everyone else thinks like I do, but nobody else is this great all the time.

Hey, we were here easily 86,400 years ago, and so providing that we don't fuck up and die out completely we're most likely going to be about in another 86,400 years.

yes, but we will fuck up. Hell, we already are. Nature is going to kick our ass like she did the dinosaurs, only faster. If we don't fuck it up in the next 86 400 years, I'll buy you a beer.

Oh, and even if we are still here, we won't be on the same calendar. Or I'll buy you some peanuts to go with the beer.

Now you know why teachers often times have headaches.
*mutters something about "Yesterday I was soccer, I am soccer, tomorrow I will be soccer"*

Maybe it isn't supported by research conducted by those just looking to make a name for themselves through some sort of "breakthrough", but it is backed up by my personal experience. Group projects just make students lazy and only one kid ends up doing all the work.
Yes, because we all know how valid the personl experience of one student in a limited situation is in blowing away all the research built up over the years on group work.

Wrong. I lived in Spain. I have an advanced degree in the language. the "y" configuration only begins with treinta y uno.

'veinte y ocho' is not incorrect, but it's anachronic. That's the form that was used a few decades ago, before the Academy decided to "modernize" the language and introduced spellings like veintiocho and treintiuno, or setiembre.

Many of these proposals didn't find much acceptance, but the veinti... for some reason did. Although in some countries they do say treintiuno and setiembre.

I guess that if you're just learning Spanish it's easier to remember veinte y ocho than veintiocho. After all, when you say it fast it sounds just the same.

Maybe it isn't supported by research conducted by those just looking to make a name for themselves through some sort of "breakthrough", but it is backed up by my personal experience. Group projects just make students lazy and only one kid ends up doing all the work.
Well, then it's good life training, because that's been my experience in every job I've ever had.

It can be, and you should be proud of teaching something to someone who is 62 years of age. By the way, how often does that 00 divide by 400 thing happen?


It happens in 3 centuries out of 4. 1600 was a leap year, 1700, 1800, and 1900 weren't then 2000 was. 2100, 2200, and 2300 won't be, etc.

1600 was a leap year...

Only in some countries.

I'll get right to the point. Yesterday (Friday), in my Spanish class, we got our tests back after they had been graded. There was one question that, apparently, the class thought was a little hard. The question was this: ____ tiene veinte y ocho días. (___ has 28 days). The choices were enero (January) and febrero (Febuary). First, it's just sickening that people got that wrong. But, it gets worse. It...gets...worse. An 'average' student raised her hand and said to the teacher, word-for-word, "I don't think that number 13 is a fair question, because you didn't tell us how many days in each month." What are your thoughts on this horrendous state of public high school?

If I were that teacher, I might have been amused by the observation that EVERY month has 28 days. But yes, the "I'm not responsible for flubbing it" response is all too common.

I told my students 3 weeks ago we were having a vocabulary quiz last week. Then on Tuesday I reminded them that we were having a vocabulary quiz that week.

When I gave it on Wednesday one student actually complained that I had not told him I was giving the quiz ON WEDNESDAY.

Only in some countries.


No, in all countries, unless they used a calender not based on AD/BC. In countries that hadn't switched from the Julian to the Gregorian calender, 1700 was a leap year.

I'll get right to the point. Yesterday (Friday), in my Spanish class, we got our tests back after they had been graded. There was one question that, apparently, the class thought was a little hard. The question was this: ____ tiene veinte y ocho días. (___ has 28 days). The choices were enero (January) and febrero (Febuary). First, it's just sickening that people got that wrong. But, it gets worse. It...gets...worse. An 'average' student raised her hand and said to the teacher, word-for-word, "I don't think that number 13 is a fair question, because you didn't tell us how many days in each month." What are your thoughts on this horrendous state of public high school?

I think there are much more significant things to get upset about in this world.

Yes, and all but one has 30 days. :D

Thirty days have September, April, June and November
All the rest have thirty-one
Except February which has 28, and in leap year, 29.

No, in all countries, unless they used a calender not based on AD/BC. In countries that hadn't witched from the Julian to the Gergorian calender, 1700 was a leap year.

Apologies - I had things ass-backward there: I was thinking of 1700 being a leap year as you surmised in those countries which were still using the Julian calendar.

The quality of public education is awful. To really learn something you have to research things for yourself.

It doesn’t help that the school system wastes time on unproven methods of education, involving group projects where the students are supposed to “teach themselves.” All this has done is create a generation that is generally incapable of self-reliance and that lacks individual motivation. Essentially, the public school system is making us all fucking lazy.

Right. You have absolutely no responsibility to do anything for yourself. :rolleyes:

Excuses, excuses.

Rule #1 about high school:

You will hear the stupidest things ever spoken by mankind, at least until you get into college.
It doesn't stop at college.

Story time:
We were presenting a design review for a big project to a government lab. This was a very technical project with a lot of input necessary from all the disciplines. I was presenting the RF and guidance sections and had finished my presentation. I answered a few questions about how we were going to characterize the system before we started to work on it and how much loss we would see through the radome. Pretty stock stuff.

The software guy gets up and does his presentation about how we were going to interface to the aircraft computer and some modifications that were necessary. He finishes and starts answering questions. They're pretty stock too, until one of the avionics types gets up and asks "How much is all that (software) going to weigh?".

Our software engineer was a little quicker on his feet than I think I would have been. He looked at some notes and then answered, "It's hard to tell right now, because it really depends on the 0 to 1 ratio". Everyone just died laughing. That avionics engineer never did like us after that, though.

I'll get right to the point. Yesterday (Friday), in my Spanish class, we got our tests back after they had been graded. There was one question that, apparently, the class thought was a little hard. The question was this: ____ tiene veinte y ocho días. (___ has 28 days). The choices were enero (January) and febrero (Febuary). First, it's just sickening that people got that wrong. But, it gets worse. It...gets...worse. An 'average' student raised her hand and said to the teacher, word-for-word, "I don't think that number 13 is a fair question, because you didn't tell us how many days in each month." What are your thoughts on this horrendous state of public high school?

Probably the number one argument for socialism - because half the populace is apparently intentionally too stupid to keep breathing air without being reminded to by the state.

To all of the people in the veintiocho v. veinte y ocho debate:
I spell it veintiocho, but the TEST had veinte y ocho. I was just telling exactly what happened.

If I were that teacher, I might have been amused by the observation that EVERY month has 28 days. But yes, the "I'm not responsible for flubbing it" response is all too common.

I told my students 3 weeks ago we were having a vocabulary quiz last week. Then on Tuesday I reminded them that we were having a vocabulary quiz that week.

When I gave it on Wednesday one student actually complained that I had not told him I was giving the quiz ON WEDNESDAY.
I'm surprised the student didn't complain that you did not provide him/her with the answers in advance. :D That’s the problem these days, it's called personal responsibility. There isn't any. I failed the quiz and it is not my fault because...is the attitude.:(

Right. You have absolutely no responsibility to do anything for yourself. :rolleyes:

Excuses, excuses.

You are a teacher, and must be a very good one.

They're pretty stock too, until one of the avionics types gets up and asks "How much is all that (software) going to weigh?".

Our software engineer was a little quicker on his feet than I think I would have been. He looked at some notes and then answered, "It's hard to tell right now, because it really depends on the 0 to 1 ratio". Everyone just died laughing. That avionics engineer never did like us after that, though.

ROFLMAO. :D :D I can appreciate this as I have over 40 years experience in avionics and aviation.

Well, Trexia, how old are you and your classmates?

Be careful about calling people stupid. Formal Spanish in Spain is viente y ocho however the vernacular is vientocho.

I have to disagree, my friend. I am from Madrid, and I always say "veinti...", never "veinte y...". Maybe the official way is "veinte y..." but nobody uses it; it even sounds strange.

Hmm. A quick google search turns up pages such as this one which gives "veinte y ocho (... or veintiocho)".

Hum, I fear that webpage is wrong. It is always spoken and written contracted. In addition, some accents are wrong (veintiuno and veintiseis).

Yo viven en Espana por tres anyos en Madrid. Never learned to write it well, spoke enough to get buy, and could read a little. Loved living in Spain. Wonderful people and great food.

Thank you very much, you're always welcome.

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Finally, if you go out by the streets, I recommend you to pronounce it "veintiuno", etc.

I also recommend you to come here for a weekend!!!! :D :D :D :D :D :D

[QUOTE=Aplastaland]I have to disagree, my friend. I am from Madrid, and I always say "veinti...", never "veinte y...". Maybe the official way is "veinte y..." but nobody uses it; it even sounds strange.[QUOTE]

I will admit that I never heard the vient y when I lived in the Madrid area, but I never learned formal Spanish.

I lived in Alcala de Henaries and Torrejon for three years with my family. I was in the US Air Force and stationed at Torrejon AB. Out of my 26 years in the AF I will say that that assignment was the best we ever had. The Spanish people were wonderful to us. Your country is so full of history and culture. We did a lot of sightseeing while we were there and enjoyed it immensely. Oh, and the food was absolutely great. Thank you so much for having my family and me as your guests for three years.

Ah, but it isn't as simple as that - remember the caveat about years ending in two zeroes only being leap years if they are divisible by four-hundred.
Thank you! whenever I mention it everyone looks at me like I am crazy lol I am glad I am not the onley one that knows that rule

I will admit that I never heard the vient y when I lived in the Madrid area, but I never learned formal Spanish.

I lived in Alcala de Henaries and Torrejon for three years with my family. I was in the US Air Force and stationed at Torrejon AB. Out of my 26 years in the AF I will say that that assignment was the best we ever had. The Spanish people were wonderful to us. Your country is so full of history and culture. We did a lot of sightseeing while we were there and enjoyed it immensely. Oh, and the food was absolutely great. Thank you so much for having my family and me as your guests for three years.

LOL You'd fit perfectly in tourism ads :p

When did you live here?

Ah, and most of spanish you learnt I assure you it was "formal"; not reaching the level of a writer -neither me nor most of the population (or even politicians)- but I'm sure that you could communicate with almost everybody wherever you go, excepting, of course, those non-spanish speakers villages in the mountains!!

[QUOTE=Aplastaland]I have to disagree, my friend. I am from Madrid, and I always say "veinti...", never "veinte y...". Maybe the official way is "veinte y..." but nobody uses it; it even sounds strange.[QUOTE]

I will admit that I never heard the vient y when I lived in the Madrid area, but I never learned formal Spanish.

I lived in Alcala de Henaries and Torrejon for three years with my family. I was in the US Air Force and stationed at Torrejon AB. Out of my 26 years in the AF I will say that that assignment was the best we ever had. The Spanish people were wonderful to us. Your country is so full of history and culture. We did a lot of sightseeing while we were there and enjoyed it immensely. Oh, and the food was absolutely great. Thank you so much for having my family and me as your guests for three years.
I'll throw this out to anyone.

I just finished reading Iberia by James Michener. I used to think that Italy was the only country in Europe that I wanted to visit. Now, I need to add Spain to that list.

If I were to visit in the winter, where are the best places to go? I'm not a nightclubber, so nightlife more exciting than a quiet place for a drink isn't necessary. I do want to visit places where I can meet people instead of see things. So smaller is better than bigger.

Any suggestions?

Newsflash: nobody gives a damn!
No. You don't give a damn, this doesn't mean that no one gives a damn. Clearly some people do.

Humanity is not going to fucking be here in 86,400 years to give a shit about how accurate the leap year system is.
Maybe they will, maybe they won't. Unlike you I'm not a crystal ball gazer and in any case, I really don't care if humans will still be around 86,400 years from now.

The simple fact is, assuming no variations in earth's orbit, even if we leave out every 4,000th leap year each average year will be 365.24225 days.

This gives an average error each year of 0.00005 days, or 4.32 s (since each tropical year is 365.2422 days). Therefore every 20,000th year (not 86,400th, I miscalculated the error as 1 s per year instead of 4.32 s per year) we will probably need to omit one day.

However, the tiny variations in the year probably make this pointless, as because of tiny orbital effects the average tropical year varies by about .00005 days per 1,000 years.

Thirty days have September, April, June and November
All the rest have thirty-one
Except February which has 28, and in leap year, 29.
Really? I always learned it was:
30 days have September, April, June, and November
All the rest have 31
Except for February which has no idea what it's doing
And every four years it gets worse :D

But then again, I have a proven track record for demented teachers, probably why I am one myself.

Well, Trexia, how old are you and your classmates?
I'm a Freshie, and everyone else in the class are Sophomores, Juniors, and Seniors. I tested out of the first year class, and I want to test out of this class too, but I'm afraid that the people get stupider as they get older in my school.

I have to disagree, my friend. I am from Madrid, and I always say "veinti...", never "veinte y...". Maybe the official way is "veinte y..." but nobody uses it; it even sounds strange.
I just said, the teacher is full Puerto Rican and she wrote the test, and the question was "veinte y ocho".

No. You don't give a damn, this doesn't mean that no one gives a damn. Clearly some people do.

Did you miss the part of this thread where someone who isn't a twat already did this?


Maybe they will, maybe they won't. Unlike you I'm not a crystal ball gazer

We know what kind of balls you gaze at.

and in any case, I really don't care if humans will still be around 86,400 years from now.

You are clearly a waste of academic talent.

~~YAWN~~

Didn't we already establish that I don't give a fuck?

I'll get right to the point. Yesterday (Friday), in my Spanish class, we got our tests back after they had been graded. There was one question that, apparently, the class thought was a little hard. The question was this: ____ tiene veinte y ocho días. (___ has 28 days). The choices were enero (January) and febrero (Febuary). First, it's just sickening that people got that wrong. But, it gets worse. It...gets...worse. An 'average' student raised her hand and said to the teacher, word-for-word, "I don't think that number 13 is a fair question, because you didn't tell us how many days in each month." What are your thoughts on this horrendous state of public high school?

My bigger question is this; why are people, who obvious suck at languages, learning a language? When I was at college/high school in NZ, we had French, Spanish, German etc. etc. - there was a simple rule; if you suck at the subject, then don't take it; let those who are actually GOOD at languages take the subject rather than wasting the teachers time with people who have no desire to learn the language.

My bigger question is this; why are people, who obvious suck at languages, learning a language?
American colleges and whatnot want two years of language, even if you are already fluent in more than English. There's also the factor where people want to speak a language, but not put in the effort to learn it the way it is being taught.

My friend went to Sweden and speaks fluent Swedish, but when she applied to college in America the college pretty much said, "Fuck you!" because she didn't have two years of studying a language.

American College Entrace Requirements = suckzores

I much prefer the non-American way of foreign language instruction, but my opinion is just from my experiences however. I'm living in Finland, so I feel I can give my two cents on this.

On the whole Spanish 26 or whatever debate, I write it as one word, but learned it as the "veinte y seis" thing. When I went to Spain (excellent country, as others have recognized) everyone urged me to spell it as one word, so I do. They spoke Spanish before my Spanish teacher spoke Spanish, so, in my opinion, they are correct.

Ya know, I've been looking at this whole debate on the correct way of writting it in Spanish with much amusement. While I never studied Spanish, perfering to study Japanese, I DO remember a class on ligusitics in my university's English department. There we were arguing over whether or not there is a standard or true English and came to the conclusion that there is not. My professor noted that right now, the field is consentrating on World English and also remarked that Spanish is also in the same boat. Many different ways of speaking and writting and no one area able to really claim it has "pure" Spanish or the right way.

And also, if memory serves, isn't Puerto Rico also known for having a weird mixture of Spanish due to its colony status?

Did you miss the part of this thread where someone who isn't a twat already did this?
Clever, aren't you? Now go away, the computer is for grown-ups.

We know what kind of balls you gaze at.
We know what level of intelligence you possess. It isn't flattering.

You are clearly a waste of academic talent.
A moron isn't qualified to make such an assesment.

Didn't we already establish that I don't give a fuck?
Did you not notice that I don't care what you think? Maybe I didn't make that salient point quite clear enough. The post was obviously for the benefit of others, so go away if you aren't interested. Quite frankly you are a sad waste of space, obviously feeling empower to flame others from the safety of your computer. You are a coward.

Feel free to respond to this post, I won't be responding to you. I have better things to do then enter into pointless exchanges with witless imbeciles like yourself.

bump

My bigger question is this; why are people, who obvious suck at languages, learning a language?

Where is the evidence that these people suck at languages?

You should tyr being in my classics class, as I will impart. I attend one of the top three state sixth forms in Britain, Colchester Riyal Grammar School, and in my classics class we have a multitude of pupils who, having elected to read the Iliad, are not aware who Paris, Hector or Achilleus are. Fucking morons.

Where is the evidence that these people suck at languages?
It is indescribable (is that a word?) how awful they are in that class. I dread going to that class every day. It's pretty much the same thing taught everyday for two weeks; then we'll take a test on that stuff. It's been two weeks of repitition and the majority of them still failed the test. I am going insane in that class. That is how much they suck at Spanish.

I'll get right to the point. Yesterday (Friday), in my Spanish class, we got our tests back after they had been graded. There was one question that, apparently, the class thought was a little hard. The question was this: ____ tiene veinte y ocho días. (___ has 28 days). The choices were enero (January) and febrero (Febuary). First, it's just sickening that people got that wrong. But, it gets worse. It...gets...worse. An 'average' student raised her hand and said to the teacher, word-for-word, "I don't think that number 13 is a fair question, because you didn't tell us how many days in each month." What are your thoughts on this horrendous state of public high school?I saw an episode of a local quiz show where two sisters from Germany's northernmost state nearly failed that one (they bungled the "4+2 contracts" which Germans their age should know about). One of them was a teacher...

[QUOTE=Celtlund][QUOTE=Aplastaland]
If I were to visit in the winter, where are the best places to go? I'm not a nightclubber, so nightlife more exciting than a quiet place for a drink isn't necessary. I do want to visit places where I can meet people instead of see things. So smaller is better than bigger.

Any suggestions?

Well, the town of Alcala de Henaries outside of Madrid is nice. Torrejon de Ardoz also just outside Madrid is nice although I prefer Alcala. Go to any bar in the early evening. The local population will be in for drinks, the kids will be playing outside the bar or sipping wine with their parents inside. Lot's of conversation. This goes on in any small town or village. You can even find these local bars in the big cities like Madrid and Zaragoza but you have to look for them.

Go, explore, do some site seeing, and enjoy.

LOL You'd fit perfectly in tourism ads :p

When did you live here?

Ah, and most of spanish you learnt I assure you it was "formal"; not reaching the level of a writer -neither me nor most of the population (or even politicians)- but I'm sure that you could communicate with almost everybody wherever you go, excepting, of course, those non-spanish speakers villages in the mountains!!

My wife and I will be more than happy to accept an all expense paid trip back to Spain to make some tourism ads. :D

We were there from December 1979 to November 1982. A long time and many wonderful memories ago.

American colleges and whatnot want two years of language, even if you are already fluent in more than English. ...snip...

This is no longer true for most colleges. Many no longer require a foreign language. It all depends on your major.

Where is the evidence that these people suck at languages?

Yes, I did or thought I did. I almost flunked French in high school. Managed to make it out of the class with a D. Then I lived in Spain for three years. What a difference living in a country that doesn't speak English can make. You do one of two things, either live in an English enclave and don't enjoy the country you are living in or say, "hey, I'm here to learn and enjoy the culture." Hell, I even learned enough Thai to get buy when I lived in Thailand for a year.

American colleges and whatnot want two years of language, even if you are already fluent in more than English. There's also the factor where people want to speak a language, but not put in the effort to learn it the way it is being taught.

My friend went to Sweden and speaks fluent Swedish, but when she applied to college in America the college pretty much said, "Fuck you!" because she didn't have two years of studying a language.

American College Entrace Requirements = suckzores

I much prefer the non-American way of foreign language instruction, but my opinion is just from my experiences however. I'm living in Finland, so I feel I can give my two cents on this.

On the whole Spanish 26 or whatever debate, I write it as one word, but learned it as the "veinte y seis" thing. When I went to Spain (excellent country, as others have recognized) everyone urged me to spell it as one word, so I do. They spoke Spanish before my Spanish teacher spoke Spanish, so, in my opinion, they are correct.

Well, thats evidence alone that the US education system is broken.

Who gives a shit whether the person can speak another language; the only results that should matter are getting a minimum standard in the pre-requisits required for the subjects that they're interested in studying that year at college/university.

Where is the evidence that these people suck at languages?

Not everyone can do everything; some people suck at maths, others suck at religious education whilst others suck at languages - you might as well accept the fact that we're not all made equal; we all have different strengths and weaknesses.

Yay! For stupidity!