Sandra Dodd

For those of you who went to a school with bells, how many do you
think you heard? Try to guess without doing the math.

I told the story of the first time Kirby and Marty heard a school
bell. It's here:

http://homeschoolingisfreedom.blogspot.com/2009/05/always-learning-sandra-dodds-interview.html

It wasn't "an interview," but that's a different topic.

So I told that story, and thought about how many I might have heard by
those ages. Huh. Half of what I had heard altogether by the time I
stopped teaching. (Not that those are the only bells I've heard,
because I've done programs at schools about history of English and
medieval demonstrations and such, and I've gone to see friends in
plays at schools, and I didn't count my pre-student-teaching semester
or my student teaching, nor the two summers I went to summer school.
So my figure turns out to be low, and I rounded it down anyway because
I questioned my math.

When I rechecked it, I thought it was interesting enough to bring here.

So...
How many bells do you think you've heard?

Sandra

Jenny C

> For those of you who went to a school with bells, how many do you
> think you heard? Try to guess without doing the math.
>


I'm going to guess a few thousand bells! Ok, so I was kind of doing
math, 12 times a 100 several times a day. That was the first thing that
popped into my head, sorry, I couldn't help it. I tried not to do the
math, but it's like asking someone to NOT think of a black cat!

Robin Bentley

I figure about 26,000. Without figuring <g>.

Robin B.

>
>
> So...
> How many bells do you think you've heard?
>
> Sandra
>



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Pam Sorooshian

*

*Minimum number:
8, 820 in elementary school
19,440 in junior and senior high school

Total of 28,260.

No "bells" though - we only ever had "buzzers."

And that does not count the very very frequent special "buzzers" that
were to call the janitor to the office, or to announce a fire drill,
earthquake drill, or (in elementary school, nuclear attack drills).

And, sorry, but I don't know how to estimate or guess without doing a
little math in my head - so I thought about how in elementary school we
had a 5-minute warning buzzer, a school start buzzer, morning recess
start and stop buzzers, lunch start and stop buzzers, and school's out
buzzer. That's 7 per day times 180 days times 7 years. In jr and senior
high school, we had 8 periods a day with a buzzer to start each and
another buzzer to end each, plus a 5 minute warning before school and a
5 minute warning before lunch period was over - so 18 per day for 180
days per school year times 6 years.

People used to say community college was "high school with ash trays." I
used to add, "And no buzzers."

My mom taught a lab preschool program at a high school and I hung out
there a lot when my children were little. The buzzers and announcements
going all the time were extremely distracting and annoying to me - I was
very very bothered by them. They didn't just have buzzers, but they had
speakers in every room and the "office" would be constant interrupting
and making announcements throughout the day. Not just once or twice, I'd
say more like 10 times per day - more than once per class period. Drove
me nuts.

-pam
On 5/18/2009 7:55 AM, Sandra Dodd wrote:
> When I rechecked it, I thought it was interesting enough to bring here.
>
>

[email protected]

>>>> For those of you who went to a school with bells, how many do you
think you heard? Try to guess without doing the math. <<<<

You know those kids in school who didn't listen? Me. Those bells
could wake the dead and probably have. I tuned them out. I got my
stuff together to change classes when I saw others packing up and
shuffling around en masse (something like 10 minutes before the bell
rang and the teachers complained but oh well). I only got up to leave
after I noticed other students making like a bee line to the door; it
was a crush anyway, may as well wait and be last out. Bells for
changing rooms in middle & high school... gives you something else to
do. Now imagine doing that in elementary school. I can just see kids
in the hall looking like fish out of water, caught out as the crowds
thin and forgetting where they're next room is or still sifting through
their lockers like they don't care. :) Bells for sitting down: the
official start of class. Bells for taking roll in homeroom. I liked
the homeroom teachers who tactfully refrained from calling names out
loud and just checked you here. Bells for the end of the school day;
two of them... first bus riders, then everybody else. That's about 20
bells for one full school day.

~Katherine

diana jenner

so the numbers just poppped into my head:
178 school days, 10 periods each day, for 3 years
I'm actually scared at how close to 60,000 that number might actually be!
DAMN YOU PAVLOV! ;)
~diana :)
xoxoxoxo
hannahbearski.blogspot.com
hannahsashes.blogspot.com
dianas365.blogspot.com


On Mon, May 18, 2009 at 7:55 AM, Sandra Dodd <Sandra@...> wrote:

>
>
> For those of you who went to a school with bells, how many do you
> think you heard? Try to guess without doing the math.
>


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

diana jenner

oh wait, I forgot it was *6* years of bells! eeeeeeeek!
~diana :)
xoxoxoxo
hannahbearski.blogspot.com
hannahsashes.blogspot.com
dianas365.blogspot.com


On Mon, May 18, 2009 at 10:48 AM, diana jenner <hahamommy@...> wrote:

> so the numbers just poppped into my head:
> 178 school days, 10 periods each day, for 3 years
> I'm actually scared at how close to 60,000 that number might actually be!
> DAMN YOU PAVLOV! ;)
> ~diana :)
> xoxoxoxo
> hannahbearski.blogspot.com
> hannahsashes.blogspot.com
> dianas365.blogspot.com
>
>
>
> On Mon, May 18, 2009 at 7:55 AM, Sandra Dodd <Sandra@...>wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> For those of you who went to a school with bells, how many do you
>> think you heard? Try to guess without doing the math.
>>
>
>


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

g-liberatedlearning

> I can just see kids
> in the hall looking like fish out of water, caught out as the crowds
> thin and forgetting where they're next room is or still sifting
> through
> their lockers like they don't care.


I had anxiety dreams well into my 20's of forgetting where my high
school classes were, or my locker combination, or which class was
next. Ugh! After college those dreams changed to getting lost on
campus. I don't think my kids have ever had such anxiety dreams and I
hope they never will.


Chris
Radically Unschooling in Iowa



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Robyn L. Coburn

I still hear bells - from the elementary school to the north and the high
school across the street to the east.

Robyn L. Coburn
www.Iggyjingles.etsy.com
www.iggyjingles.blogspot.com
www.allthingsdoll.blogspot.com

Robin Bentley

>
>
> I had anxiety dreams well into my 20's of forgetting where my high
> school classes were, or my locker combination, or which class was
> next. Ugh! After college those dreams changed to getting lost on
> campus. I don't think my kids have ever had such anxiety dreams and I
> hope they never will.
>
I still have those dreams and I'm in my 50's! And I even liked school.

Ugh.

Robin B.

Sandra Dodd

-=-I still have those dreams and I'm in my 50's! And I even liked
school.-=-

Ever since my kids were little I've hoped someday someone will find
out how that dream manifests itself in people who didn't go to school.

About once a year I dream that I'm on the campus where I went to
college and that either it's time for a final and I hadn't attended
the class at all, or that I'm missing a final, or can't find the right
building or room, or am deciding to just ditch a final test.

Sandra

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Leah Little

> Ever since my kids were little I've hoped someday someone will find
> out how that dream manifests itself in people who didn't go to school.
>
> About once a year I dream that I'm on the campus where I went to
> college and that either it's time for a final and I hadn't attended
> the class at all, or that I'm missing a final, or can't find the right
> building or room, or am deciding to just ditch a final test.
>
> Sandra

Please share if you ever figure it out! My husband and I still have those same dreams, too. I wonder if they're the remnants of school stress popping back up into our lives.

Jenny C

> -=-I still have those dreams and I'm in my 50's! And I even liked
> school.-=-
>
> Ever since my kids were little I've hoped someday someone will find
> out how that dream manifests itself in people who didn't go to school.
>


Chamille told me, in all seriousness, that her scariest dream was like
the movie "Idiocracy", that everyone became very very stupid. That is
her anxiety nightmarish dream! I think I mentioned that once in a chat.
I told her that she needed to counteract that by having babies. She
didn't like that answer at all! I was mostly teasing because I know how
much she doesn't want to have any kids, at least that's how she feels
now!

So, no schoolish anxiety dreams here with my kids!

Nancy Wooton

On May 18, 2009, at 1:47 PM, Sandra Dodd wrote:

> -=-I still have those dreams and I'm in my 50's! And I even liked
> school.-=-
>
> Ever since my kids were little I've hoped someday someone will find
> out how that dream manifests itself in people who didn't go to school.

When Alex started driving, he dreamt his size 13 feet grew even
larger, so he couldn't get his giant foot off the accelerator and onto
the brake. I guess anxiety manifests itself even in the unschooled <g>

Nancy

Pam Sorooshian

On 5/18/2009 1:47 PM, Sandra Dodd wrote:
> About once a year I dream that I'm on the campus where I went to
> college and that either it's time for a final and I hadn't attended
> the class at all, or that I'm missing a final, or can't find the right
> building or room, or am deciding to just ditch a final test.
>

Roxana barely ever went to school - never a school with bells or buzzers
(an experimental ungraded, no textbooks, no assignments, no homework, no
lessons, no tests, no grades multi-age program for 5 and 6 year olds).
But now she's 21 and in college and just today she told me that she
checks the final exam schedule over and over. In fact, she said that
sometimes she checks it and then blinks and then checks it again. And,
at night, she has dreams about missing her final exam because she's
gotten the time wrong. Ironically, her French teacher got the time wrong
for their final, today. Showed up 30 minutes late and only after
students had gone to the office and the office had called him.

-pam

Erin

Sandra said,
"About once a year I dream that I'm on the campus where I went to
college and that either it's time for a final and I hadn't attended
the class at all, or that I'm missing a final, or can't find the right
building or room, or am deciding to just ditch a final test."

I have those same dreams maybe once every year or two! I'm usually in high school, though, and I can't find my classes, I can't remember my schedule, I can't remember where my locker is (or the combination). I usually have missed a huge portion of classes and I'm in danger of failing...UGH!

It's nice to know I'm not the only middle aged woman having such dreams! We need a dream interpretor :)

[email protected]

In a message dated 5/18/2009 10:56:15 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
Sandra@... writes:

<<<For those of you who went to a school with bells, how many do you
think you heard? Try to guess without doing the math.>>>



Wow, that is really surprising. I guessed "thousands", started doing the
math and found "tens of thousands" just for high school-and we didn't have
as many classes as lots of other schools-just 8 a day, (unless you count the
"elective class" for things like marching band, then it was 9-which I
didn't)! We had 2 rings before school, a "tardy warning" before class, a "you'd
better be in class, now" bell, a bell at the end of a class. High school
alone rang up about 21,000. Even though I had more actual years in grade
school, there were less switching of classes and thus less bells, but still, it
could easily be around the 50,000 mark... astounding.

I forgot about the lunch bells until I read Pam's mention of them.

I've been thinking, as I read the replies, how liberating no bells would
be in retrospect. But that's having had them and being freed from them.
There has to be no blip on the radar at all for that for my kids, I'm thinking.
I feel like I've gotten a wee, tiny peephole into the concept of how
different my children's perception of not just *education* is, but also growing
up, childhood, and family. Wow.

Peace,
De
**************An Excellent Credit Score is 750. See Yours in Just 2 Easy
Steps!
(http://pr.atwola.com/promoclk/100126575x1221823248x1201398651/aol?redir=http://www.freecreditreport.com/pm/default
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Tammy Curry

Maybe I am not as twisted and demented as I thought. Though the dreams do seem to pop up more frequently when I am stressed out. But lost on college campus the day of the big final which I have to pass in order to graduate, definitely is a familiar one.


Tammy Curry, Director of Chaos
http://tammycurry.blogspot.com/
http://crazy-homeschool-adventures.blogspot.com/

"If a child is to keep alive his inborn sense of wonder, he needs the companionship of at least one adult who can share it, rediscovering with him the joy, excitement and mystery of the world we live in."

Rachel Carson




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Adrean Clark

Without a hearing aid or "auditory trainer" -- zero. ;) I just watched
everyone or the clock.

At the deaf school, there were no bells. We just followed the clock.
The community was very close. I've been told they had to forbid
hugging in the halls because it slowed down the transition time
between classes... Five minutes really isn't enough for chat-prone
deaf people!

My anxious dreams usually have to do with getting a job but having no
idea what it's supposed to be or what the responsibilities are... :P

Adrean

Sandra Dodd

-=-Even though I had more actual years in grade
school, there were less switching of classes and thus less bells, but
still, it
could easily be around the 50,000 mark... astounding.-=-

When I was in elementary school even if I didn't count the many Jr.
High bells which we were to ignore (those were mounted on other
buildings, but we could all hear them all), we had recess bells--one
bell to go to recess and one to come back in. Morning and afternoon.

I remember being a teacher and seeing the bell schedule, but at that
time it was only Jr. High (same building), and there wasn't the
confusion of which bells to ignore, though by then I was ignoring a
lot of them, and they never startled me.

Sandra

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Nancy Wooton

On May 18, 2009, at 9:50 PM, Erin wrote:

> Sandra said,
> "About once a year I dream that I'm on the campus where I went to
> college and that either it's time for a final and I hadn't attended
> the class at all, or that I'm missing a final, or can't find the right
> building or room, or am deciding to just ditch a final test."
>
> I have those same dreams maybe once every year or two! I'm usually
> in high school, though, and I can't find my classes, I can't
> remember my schedule, I can't remember where my locker is (or the
> combination). I usually have missed a huge portion of classes and
> I'm in danger of failing...UGH!
>
> It's nice to know I'm not the only middle aged woman having such
> dreams! We need a dream interpretor :)
>

My always-unschooled son is in his second semester at community
college. He went to the wrong psychology class for more than a week;
he discovered the error after we'd sold the bargain-priced book we'd
found on Craig's List, as he thought it was the wrong book, not the
wrong *class*! Doh! Luckily, the instructor was absent one of the 3
days he'd missed, so he'd only technically missed two.

BTW, for those who wonder how unschoolers do in college... Well,
other than that snafu, he's done very well. He enjoys his classes, is
learning all sorts of things people assume kids need to drill to learn
(like writing papers), and, for what it's worth, is getting good
grades. He's considering majoring in Japanese, he likes it so much.

Nancy

Sandra Dodd

-=-It's nice to know I'm not the only middle aged woman having such
dreams! We need a dream interpretor :)-=-

Really? Let me give it a shot:

When your body chemistry comes to a panicky point for some reason, and
you're asleep, you think of crazy "do or die" moments, and it might
involve stopping a speeding car when you're not actually in the
driver's seat, or finding people you're separated from in an
emergency, or being by yourself and not knowing exactly what time and
where, and because of this you're going to FAIL.

But the dream might be about your pajamas being wrapped around your
arm, or that you forgot to go to the grocery store and if you don't
remember early the next day the dinner plan isn't going to work.

Whatever stirs the biochemistry of sudden "oh no!" will add pictures
for sleeping people.

Sandra

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Brad Holcomb

> -=-It's nice to know I'm not the only middle aged woman having such
> dreams! We need a dream interpretor :)-=-
>


If you have metaphysical interests, I've used this book for several years
and have learned a lot from using it:

http://www.amazon.com/Dreamers-Dictionary-Translations-Universal-Language/dp
/0944386164

There are 2 basic premises to the book:

1. Every person in the dream represents an aspect of Me. The entire dream
is Me having fun, creating, and learning. The dream is all about Me. Every
person in the dream is Me.

2. All elements in the dream are universal symbols (not dependent on
language or culture), and these symbols can be understood and used to
understand our waking life better.

Besides the symbol dictionary, the book has a good chapter about using them
to interpret the overall dream. -=b.

Jenny C

> I forgot about the lunch bells until I read Pam's mention of them.
>


What about recess whistles? Do those count as bells? I just heard one
when I was outside a moment ago. We live half a block from an
elementary school, so I still hear bells and whistles, and have been for
the last 5 yrs that I've lived here!