19 Times Students Hilariously Misunderstood Their Assignments And Had Teachers Laughing Behind Their Desks
It's never a dull moment in the classroom.
Educators face the task of managing different personalities each day while trying to impart wisdom and knowledge to the next generation.
It's a daily challenge, especially since not one student is the same as the next. Not to mention, a lot of students learn differently.
Earlier this month, I asked the teachers of the BuzzFeed Community to share the times when their students hilariously misunderstood a lesson, and here's what they had to say.
1."I taught daycare, and would often dismiss the kids to their next activity by telling them to move like a certain animal; this was to prevent the kids (toddlers) from running and knocking each other over. After reading a book with a llama in it, I told them to 'walk like a llama,' to see what they’d make of it."
"Most of the kids figured llamas would walk on all fours like any other farm animal, but one kid decided llamas slithered and belly-crawled the entire length of the classroom. We did not correct them."
2."'Name 3 hardships for Christopher Columbus.' Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria."
3."I taught high school Spanish. On a number assignment, I told students that they could write the Spanish numbers using Arabic numerals (i.e. cuarenta y seis = 46) rather than word form. One student wrote all the numbers using Roman numerals — and they were correct."
4."I teach kindergarten to bilingual children in Japan. One day, we were studying the traditional dance of another country and I said to 'link arms' with their partner. One of my students gave me a look of bewilderment and did not proceed to do so, so I instructed him again. 'Please link arms.' Still looking at me strangely, he proceeded to pick up his partner’s arm and LICK down the length of it. The partner boy expressed disgust; the licking boy began laughing. I and the rest of the students also could not contain our laughter."
5."I once had a fourth grader during a social studies lesson swear that immediately after the colonies of the future US won the Revolutionary War, everyone began speaking a language other than English known to her as 'American.' I asked her what language they spoke in Mexico."
"Answer: Spanish. What language is in Canada? English. When I asked her why not Mexican and Canadian then? Answer: They aren’t in America. She was one of the brighter kids in my ENGLISH CLASS. This may have come from a parent…"
6."There was a problem on a math assignment that said name the numbers. It showed three numbers, and the student answered by writing Bob, Joe, and Pat."
7."In a drama class, doing an improv game, a student was given the occupation of a 'florist' to act out silently. He got down on his hands and knees and started pretending to lay flooring. Definitely a misunderstanding."
8."One time, I was teaching a probability lesson to ninth graders. It was about how to find the probability of selecting a particular object from a given group of objects. The textbook used the word 'urn' for the container holding the objects. At the end of the lesson, a student came up and asked why we were talking about urine all period."
9."We had been studying the three states of matter. Over and over, we said it. When the test came, it said to name the three states of matter. One student answered Texas, Arkansas, and Oklahoma."
–Science, Grade 5
10."I teach eighth-grade English, and my class was reading The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. One day, my warm-up question was simply, 'Describe Tom Sawyer.' One student turned in their paper with the response, 'I don’t know about the character, but the song by 'Rush' is really good.' I gave them full marks because I didn’t specify that I meant for them to describe the character, and it’s still my favorite response I’ve ever received."
–English, Grade 8
11."I gave the students a vocabulary list of words related to map reading skills. One term was 'cardinal direction.' One student wrote the definition of cardinal direction: A direction from a high-ranking official in the Roman Catholic Church."
–Social Studies, Grade 4
12."My student had a spelling test where one of the words was 'knock.' One student forgot the letter 'n,' and I marked it wrong. When I passed the tests back, the student in question looked at her answers, and yelled out 'Oh, I wrote COCK!'"
–English, Grade 3
13."At the time, there was a proposed law dealing with euthanasia being discussed. On the exam, a student wrote, 'There is much discussion about 'youth in Asia' and wanting to die.'"
–Political Science, College
14."I assigned each student a different garden herb — an easy-to-grow, low-maintenance plant. They had to create informational brochures to distribute various information (recipes, nutritional info, history, etc.) to our school and community. One of my students was assigned the herb dill."
"And to offer some background on this student, he had such a sweet heart but was pretty dense…think Kelso from That 70s Show. Well, as I was circulating the room, assisting students, etc. I came to this student's desk and saw what he was researching, and I quote, 'How to grow dill pickle.' My students and I never let him live that down."
–Farm to Table Hydroponics, Grade 10
15."The class was assigned to write five paragraphs about peasants. One poor kid wrote a wonderful paper all about pheasants."
–Social Studies, Grade 6
16."We were creating anti-drug posters for the local police poster contest. The slogan they were supposed to use or tweak was, 'I’d rather hug a slug than do a drug.' We were brainstorming beforehand, and one of my favorite, wacky second graders raised his hand. I braced myself because his answers were always off the wall or inappropriate. Instead, he offered, 'I’d rather do lots of homework or run a marathon than do a drug.' I told him that sounded great, and they all went to work."
"When he handed his in, there was an image of himself with a pile of books and running, and under that, he had written, 'I would rather do lots of homework, then run a marathon, and then do lots of drugs.' I absolutely hung it up for the contest."
–Art, Elementary School
17."We sing for Baccalaureate every year and one of my sopranos was having trouble finding parking at the church where it was being held. She came up to me about ten minutes before the show, visibly frustrated. I asked her what was wrong and she said, 'I kept asking people where we were supposed to go, but nobody knew what I was talking about!' I asked her what she'd said, and she replied, 'I told everybody I was looking for the bachelorette!'"
"I explained the difference to her, and she said, 'Oh, THAT'S why that old couple said I was in the wrong part of town!'"
–High School Choir
18."We were reading a nonfiction article about social class separation on the Titanic. Instead of reading the article and writing an argumentative essay, the student WATCHED The Titanic movie and wrote a three-page paper about the class differences between Rose and Jack."
–Literature and Composition, Grade 8
19."I assigned weekly homework where students are asked to find a professional ceramics artist and an image of their work (a clearly laid out objective, with examples), then answer three short open-ended questions about the artwork. All of this is meant to inspire creativity and get them to actively look for art outside of the classroom. In good fun, the assignment was called 'Dirt of the Week.' No joke, I had a student who, for weeks, turned in pictures of actual dirt and wrote (not well) about its color and how it made them feel emotionally."
–Ceramics, High School
Are you a teacher with your own hilarious story to share? Drop it in the comments or fill out this anonymous Google form! Your response could be featured in an upcoming BuzzFeed Community post.
Note: Submissions have been edited for length/clarity.
