[redwitch]

I hated book reports! Always saw them as just as a way to prove to the teacher that I'd read the book (and it usually wasn't what I wanted to read, anyway). I'd been a reader since I was 3, loved learning but really resented anything I saw as wasting my time. Book reports were high up there. As to reading my report in front of the class, I despised doing that (standing in front of the class was true torture) -- would rather be sent to the principal's office than get up there (and frequently had that occur).

What's funny is I don't remember having to do book reports overseas. We'd get lists of books we had to read and have group discussions (and our word that we'd read a certain book was frequently sufficient) but I really don't remember ever having to write a book report in another language, so don't think we did them.

The other thing that I couldn't see doing was diagramming a sentence. Never even heard of that until I was in 7th grade. Teacher told me to diagram a sentence on the blackboard. I told her I didn't know how. She thought I was being smart, threw an eraser at me when I flat out refused to do something I'd never even heard of previously and sent me to the dean's office. I got out of that class real fast and into the classroom of my favorite teacher of all time. To this day, I still think fondly of Mr. Artz and his joy when we could discuss books with him in a semi-intelligent manner.