Ancient test from 1895 Kansas

[oggbashan]

I copied this from a geneaology site:

Remember when grandparents and great-grandparents stated that they only had an 8th grade education? Well, check this out. Could any of us have passed the 8th grade in 1895?

This is the eighth-grade final exam from 1895 in Salina , Kansas , USA . It was taken from the original document on file at the Smokey Valley Genealogical Society and Library in Salina , KS , and reprinted by the Salina Journal.

8th Grade Final Exam:
Salina, KS, 1895

Grammar (Time, one hour)

1. Give nine rules for the use of capital letters.
2. Name the parts of speech and define those that have no modifications.
3. Define verse, stanza and paragraph
4. What are the principal parts of a verb? Give principal parts of "lie", "play", and "run."
5. Define case; illustrate each case.
6. What is punctuation? Give rules for principal marks of punctuation.
7 - 10. Write a composition of about 150 words and show therein that you understand the practical use of the rules of grammar.

Arithmetic (Time, 65 minutes)

1. Name and define the Fundamental Rules of Arithmetic.
2. A wagon box is 2 ft. deep, 10 feet long, and 3 ft. wide. How many bushels of wheat will it hold?
3. If a load of wheat weighs 3942 lbs., what is it worth at 50cts/bushel, deducting 1050 lbs. for tare?
4. District No 33 has a valuation of $35,000. What is the necessary levy to carry on a school seven months at $50 per month, and have $104 for incidentals?
5. Find the cost of 6720 lbs. coal at $6.00 per ton.
6. Find the interest of $512.60 for 8 months and 18 days at 7 percent.
7. What is the cost of 40 boards 12 inches wide and 16 ft. long at $20 per meter?
8. Find bank discount on $300 for 90 days (no grace) at 10 percent.
9. What is the cost of a square farm at $15 per acre, the distance of which is 640 rods?
10. Write a Bank Check, a Promissory Note, and a Receipt

U.S. History (Time, 45 minutes)

1. Give the epochs into which U.S. History is divided
2. Give an account of the discovery of America by Columbus .
3. Relate the causes and results of the Revolutionary War.
4. Show the territorial growth of the United States .
5. Tell what you can of the history of Kansas .
6. Describe three of the most prominent battles of the Rebellion.
7. Who were the following: Morse, Whitney, Fulton, Bell, Lincoln, Penn, and Howe?
8. Name events connected with the following dates: 1607, 1620, 1800, 1849, and 1865.

Orthography (Time, one hour) (Do we even know what this is???)

1. What is meant by the following: alphabet, phonetic, orthography, etymology, and syllabication.
2. What are elementary sounds? How classified?
3. What are the following, and give examples of each: trigraph, sub vocal, diphthong, cognate letters, and lingual.
4. Give four substitutes for caret 'u.' (HUH?)
5. Give two rules for spelling words with final 'e.' Name two exceptions under each rule.
6. Give two uses of silent letters in spelling. Illustrate each.
7. Define the following prefixes and use in connection with a word: bi-, dis-, mis-, pre-, semi-, post-, non-, inter-, mono-, and sup-.
8. Mark diacritically and divide into syllables the following, and name the sign that indicates the sound: card, ball, mercy, sir, odd, cell, rise, blood, fare, last.
9. Use the following correctly in sentences: cite, site, sight, fane, fain, feign, vane, vain, vein


How would you do?

Og

 

[rgraham666]

I'd flunk miserably.

 

[cheerful_deviant]

I'd do ok on the arithmetic section, (I am an engineer after all, one would hope I was at least fair at math) and although some of the terms look strange, (rods for example, about 16') but turn up occasionally in old property deeds and are thus are still part of most surveying class in college.

It would have been interesting to see how the answers for the history section would look compared to the answers we would expect to see today.

 

[neonlyte]

You know you're in trouble when you have to use a dictionary to look up words in the questions

 

[Rumple Foreskin]

I'd get in my wagon loaded with wheat and head west.

However, I did get all the historic names right, that is assuming the "Whitney" they're asking about is Eli Whitney (invented cotton gin) and not the singer, Whitney Houston. And I can "figger out" all the dates except 1800.

Rumple Foreskin

 

[walkerlong]

probably fail

But I couldn't pass some of the tests I took in 8th grade either. They made us memorize all sorts of information that I forgot as soon as possible.

 

[The_Fool]

I'd get in my wagon loaded with wheat and head west.

However, I did get all the historic names right, that is assuming the "Whitney" they're asking about is Eli Whitney (invented cotton gin) and not the singer, Whitney Houston. And I can "figger out" all the dates except 1800.

Rumple Foreskin

I can only come up with two events. One is that the US capital moved from Philly to D.C. and the other is the crazy election with Tom Jefferson and Aaron Burr.

 

[fieryjen]

Arithmetic, I think I'd do pretty well, even though I'd have to guess what they're actually asking for some of them.

Next would be grammar. I didn't know all the words, but since I learned English as a second language, I've had to deal with some of this stuff before. I'd at least be able to give it a good try, even though I'm sure I'd be able to answer less than half.

I know what ortography is , and I think I'd do well on the prefixes. I also know the meanings of most of the words in #9. Again, I think I'd be able to give it a good try.

The history I'd fail completely, utterly and miserably.

 

[Rumple Foreskin]

I can only come up with two events. One is that the US capital moved from Philly to D.C. and the other is the crazy election with Tom Jefferson and Aaron Burr.

I'd love to know what they considered the "correct" answer. I'm guessing the election of Jefferson due to the La. Purchase. But that seems like a stretch. If that were the case, 1803, would seem to be a more logical choice.

Maybe Sarahh will come up with the answer. She's a University of Kansas Jayhawk.

Rumple Foreskin

 

[Stegral]

7. What is the cost of 40 boards 12 inches wide and 16 ft. long at $20 per meter?
Og

I didn't think they had Meters in 1895....

 

[R. Richard]

U.S. History (Time, 45 minutes)

2. Give an account of the discovery of America by Columbus .

"It was a really clear day when Columbus discovered America. [Columbus never discovered America, the stupid son-of-a-bitch thought he discovered India. In any event, it wasn't called America until later.] It was so clear that the lookout in the crows nest called out, 'It's so clear I can see all the way to Ohio, Columbus.' Columbus replied, 'That's Columbus, Ohio! [Then, sotto voice, 'It's so hard to get good help.']

 

[R. Richard]

I didn't think they had Meters in 1895....

The metric system was officially adopted by the French government on 7 April 1795.

 

[thebullet]

I didn't think they had Meters in 1895....

Absolutely. The postage meter didn't come along till much later.

I would have aced the history, passed the math. What were all those other questions about?

I'm going to make sure that my next story is chock full of diacritical orthography.

 

[Boxlicker101]

I did not attend eighth grade in Kansas in 1895. I'm old, but not THAT old. I did attend eighth grade in wisconsin in 1953, and I could have passed the test, even aced it. There are some exceptions, such as the history of Kansas, and the "rod" which is a linear measurement, rarely in use in 1953.

I would have passed the English part easily. I would pass the History test easily also, although I am unsure of some of the dates, and I don't know if "Howe" would be the inventor of the sewing machine or the English General who did not show up for the Battle of Saratoga. That was actually the decisive battle of the American Revolution, for various reasons, and his non-appearance was a major factor in the Amrican victory.

1607 was the first permanent English settlelment (Jamestown, VA). 1620 was the landing of The Pilgrims at Plymouth. 1849 was the Mexican-American War. 1865 was the end of the Civil War and the death of Lincoln. I'm not sure about 1800. I believe Jefferson was elected that year, but that might not be considered all that important.

 

[cheerful_deviant]

I'm not sure about 1800. I believe Jefferson was elected that year, but that might not be considered all that important.

1800 was the year of one of the first major slave rebellions (in Richmond if memory serves). Could be that.

 

[egelante]

I'd probably fail on most of that... and I have one of those seriously serious degrees that means I really should not be failing. I suppose that this is what happens when you work in an abstract field.

But then, I've never looked into much of this, and only glanced at the questions for long enough to skim them.

Being from the UK stands against me in the historical and arithmetical sections.

The British use of English has declined into the far-from-great: in general, we know so little about our own grammatical structures that, in spite of having spent a little time trying to fill in some of the gaping fissures in my knowledge, I would probably fail most of those bits too!

How exciting.

 

[thebullet]

You unsophisticated and/or historically inept readers probably think that the important events of 1800 were moving the capital to Washington DC or some slave rebellion.

The knowledgeable among us, though, realize that 1800 was the year that a shoemaker right here in the city of Philadelphia started making shoes for both the right and the left foot.

Another proud Philly first.

 

[3113]

So...you're saying they didn't have Google in 1895 to answer all these questions?

Reading over them and comparing them to the present day and the "smarts" we need (8th grade or older) for the 21st century, I find that few of the English and Orthography questions are of much use. The rules of punctuation and capitalization might be put into practice, but most of the others are just facts memorized by rote, not anything that can teach a kid how to be a good writer. The spelling is especially useless as the best method for teaching good spelling is phonetics...and that's no good if the kid is dyslexic.

As for the math questions, they depend on things most of us don't know like just what is a bushel of wheat? We can't answer #2 if we don't know. I'm sure, in relationship to this, that I could easily ask a question that 1895 couldn't answer: "a box is 1 foot deep, 2 foot long and 3 foot wide. How many video iPods will it hold?" See? The question isn't all that "smart"--it just relies on what you do or do not know. A kid in modern class room might very well know the dimensions of his ipod.

As for the history questions, many of them have radically changed from what, I'm sure, would be acceptable to a 1895 history class (i.e., U.S. History is no longer, I believe, divided into epochs and if it still is there must be more now, and the American Revolutionary War question is a very long and involved answer, and territorial growth includes Alaska and Hawaii AND, if one wants to get political, a few other places that aren't states--does the moon count?).

And I'm not the least bit ashamed that I didn't learn certain historical dates and names in my classroom. Unlike 1895, my history class had to include the 20th century and I'm guessing that it decided to forgo the events of 1849 in favor of the events of 1939, and replaced Robert Fulton with Robert Oppenheimer.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

The 1895 school curriculum was different from what it is today. Nineteenth Century scholars got heavy doses of readin, ritin, and rithmetic. A few schools added Latin and elocution. Private schools tossed in French, piano, dancing, and literature. But most schools offered meat & potato courses, and the school term was much shorter than it is today.

Someone recently sent me his ancestor's diary. His ancestor was a teacher. His ancestor taught the children of my ancestor at my ancestor's plantation. So I know what he was teaching. Math, reading & writing, Latin, and French.

 

[Guest]

I'd love to know what they considered the "correct" answer. I'm guessing the election of Jefferson due to the La. Purchase. But that seems like a stretch. If that were the case, 1803, would seem to be a more logical choice.

Maybe Sarahh will come up with the answer. She's a University of Kansas Jayhawk.

Rumple Foreskin

I assume it would be the presidential election of 1800.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1800



But Rumple, at first I thought this thread might be about KU Football. (Not that Og is concerned, of course.)

The last time KU was 10-0 was in 1899.

In fact, one of the headlines in the area paper today was "Party like it's 1899!"

 

[Boxlicker101]

1800 was the year of one of the first major slave rebellions (in Richmond if memory serves). Could be that.

I wouldn't think so. The 1800 election was important because it resulted in Constitutional changes and ended the Federlist Party and their efforts to negate the Bill of Rights. Historically, that would be more important than a failed slave rebellion. I don't believe moving the capitol was all that important either. It had been moved earlier from NY to Philly, so the subsequent move was more of a natural progression than a change.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Wasnt 1800 the first year America had two political parties?

 

[Weird Harold]

I didn't think they had Meters in 1895....

They did have Meters in 1895, but the version of this test that was posted on the GB in June 2006 has that questions as:

7. What is the cost of 40 boards 12 inches wide and 16 ft. long at $.20 per inch?

That original GB discussion is at http://forum.literotica.com/showthread.php?t=440980 and includes links to the snopes confirmation of authenicity and IIRC, a link to the original Salinas, KS newspaper article that brought it to national notice.

The difficulty most people have with this test is the same thing that makes "Are you Smarter Than a Fifh Grader" such a success for Fox television -- what you don't use or were never taught you can't pass a test on years after the class is over.

What is remarkable to me is how much of this test is aimed at the needs of the community; something that modern educational systems seem to have forgotten how to do.

 

[3113]

I assume it would be the presidential election of 1800.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1800

See? Google! The internet allows us all to be geniuses. God bless the 21st century!

 

[Boxlicker101]

Wasnt 1800 the first year America had two political parties?

It was. Washington was basically elected and re-elected by acclimation, with Adams as VP. Adams was elected in 1796, with no opposition, with Jefferson as VP, but the excesses committed by the administration led Jefferson to run against him in 1800. The parties are usually known now as Federalist and Anti-Federalist, with Jefferson leading the latter. Adams was so disliked, he had no chance of winning, but managed to delay the inevitable through chicanery, which was legal at the time. Constitutional amendments changed that.

1800 marked the first genuine election, which was why it would be considered an important date.