Jayeless

I am becoming increasingly sure that my History teacher’s goal in life is to establish his own Democratic People’s Republic. How do I come to a crazy conclusion like this, you ask? One thing: “re-education classes”. After school, every afternoon, for those year 11 History students¹ who aren’t “good citizens”.

It all began on Tuesday, when we were given a wonderful assignment. In pairs (”like on Sesame Street”), we were to research and formulate a ten-minute presentation on a topic which would be assigned to us. It could take any form so long as we got the information across “in a coherent format understandable to the populace at large”, was “pretty”, and used primary sources and more than one viewpoint. It was then that one of my classmates, Terence, noticed the unusual heading at the bottom of the page — “Why are we doing this?” Read on…

1. No one else! [↩]

My History teacher is, at present, engrossed in an effort to indoctrinate the whole school with Cold War propaganda.

It all started when he was trying to find “educational materials” for his year 11 History class — that is, my class. He found a great archive of “social guidance” films, produced in the 1950s to guide young, responsible Americans. With such titles as How to be a Good Citizen at School and How Quiet is Beneficial in the Classroom¹, he just knew this was something his year 11 History class should see. And, hey, why stop there? The connection between these films and the Cold War was pretty strong, but he was sure there was a connection between them and the American Revolution (duh, America!), and another one between them and year 8 English (after all, what language are the films in?). He downloaded as many as his laptop would fit, and then he probably cackled evilly as he thought about how he was going to put his master plan in action. It sounds like something he’d do. Read on…

1. Note: I do not remember the exact title of this film, but that’s close enough [↩]