Parents... one of the first life lessons you should be teaching your children is the art of discretion. Children have loose lips. That's why inappropriate four letter words could come flying out of their mouths at any given moment. Family secrets should be explained as such. I know when I was a kid I was a treasure trove of stories. I knew all about the family and neighborhood news because adults assumed I wasn't listening. The surprise was on them. Especially when all the news is aired to educators.
Redditor u/reasonable_doubt1776 couldn't wait to hear from the educators out there who've discovered some "surprising" facts about their pupils by asking... Teachers of Reddit, what amusing family secrets did you accidentally learn from your overly talkative students?Children are highly observant. And once they commit to memory something they've seen or heard, all bets are off. I would constantly call out people without knowing. Once, I heard my babysitter tell a friend she hated their other friend because said friend was a skank and she never wanted to see her again. So imagine my surprise a few days later when said friend shows up to hangout. I was confused. So I asked... "Isn't she the skank you never want to see again?" I believe the people sharing on this thread understand the awkwardness of it all.
Chemistry GIF by memecandyIn the middle of a library summer reading program, I picked a little girl, probably about 4-5 years old, to come up and be my volunteer for a magic trick, which then you explained the science of after it was done. I asked what her name was, she said it into the mic, zero shyness in front of approximately 200 kids and adults. I asked if she had ever heard of the "trick" we were going to do and she said, "Nope!
My favorite dinosaur is a triceratops! And I like your shoes! My dad is back there HI DAD but my mom couldn't come tonight because she got a shot in her butt and can't sit on the hard chairs this place has." Dad (and all the other adults in the audience) were dying.
Grandpa Died
8th grader, excitedly: Mrs. Rosiedokidoki, guess what I found out? My grandpa was a nazi!
Me: do you know what a nazi is?
8th grader: no!!
Me: maybe you should go talk to your mom about that.
She came in the next day and went, "yeah my mom told me I can't tell people about my grandpa anymore."
On the Swings
I had a child once playing on the tire swing. He was a veeeeeeeeerrry serious kid and he looked me dead in the eye and said how much he liked the swing at daycare and how when he grew up he wanted to have a swing just like his mummy and daddy did in their bedroom... Looking his parents in the eye that day telling them he had a good day and keeping silent was difficult.
Teachers hear the craziest things. Someone needs to compile a comedy list of "overhearings" from educators and publish it as a coffee table book. The profits could single handedly fund schools in underprivileged areas for decades. It must make teachers like part of the family, at least for the day.
Congratulations!
If someone in your family is pregnant, and you've told your child, I already know.
That's Quite a Tree
GiphyWorked at an afterschool program run by the YMCA. Once had a 4th grader explain to me in detail how her sister was also her cousin.
edit: they had the same dad and their moms were sisters, so half siblings through dad and 1st cousins through moms. having a 9 year old run you through that is quite a trip.
Show & Tell
My daughter's kindergarten teacher told me about how one child entertained them at Show and Tell with a complete report on the new alarm system in their house including the code and where the keypad was located behind the curtains!
Save the Water
Kudos going out to all the teachers for glossing over the home stuff they learn!
My sister wrote in her daily journal in grade 1 that our parents had a shower together the night before. Teacher wrote "What a great way to save water!"
I remember when I was about twelve and had just figured out sex on my own, I was at a friend's house and she mentioned offhandedly that her parents bath together. I was like, "that's a thing people do? When their kids are around to know?"
My parents have always been very private, and I thought that was how everyone was.
How many times do you think teachers take and use what they hear? like if it's not a horror story but a funny tagline... you know they use good comedy in real life or the class the following year. They probably owe some royalties for certain witty wisdoms that endeared them to others. The best writers steal, so do teachers. I can feel it.
I'm the DJ
Here's a cute and lighthearted one—I had a girl stay for some help after school one day. At the time I was teaching geometry (10th grade) in a mostly Hispanic school. She told me about growing up in Peru until about the age of 10 or so (I can't remember the exact age she told me). She was telling me that she worked with her uncle sometimes on the weekend. I asked what kind of work—many of our kids worked construction with their families.
"He's a clown... I'm his DJ." That really gave me a smile.
In the Kitchen
We were talking about calling 911, but what a real emergency is. This is tricky with 10 year olds because you want to use real emergency examples but not freak them out. One kid... "so if your mom gives birth in the kitchen, that's an emergency"
Sure enough mom picks him up with his baby brother who was born last week in their kitchen.
Nunna Yo!
None Of Your Business No GIF by Late Night with Seth MeyersGiphy4th grade. A student on Zoom the other day asked why another student had been gone a few weeks, and we all heard his mom in the back yell, "Boy, that is nunna yo damn business!" before he muted. I almost burst laughing but I held my composure.
High Tea Lady
One of my students once said "Mummy wants to know if you want to come round for tea because daddy is away at work."
The mother couldn't look at me for weeks on the playground, cause I think she heard her daughter ask me.
Well, what's wrong with a bit of tea? She probably just wants another grown up around to talk to.
Puff Up
I did a placement once and students had to talk about what they would do with a million dollars. One kid gets up in front of the class and goes "My mum said if she had a million dollars, she would buy lots and lots and lots and lots of weed."
Lord the world is a mess for the youth isn't it? If kids had even half a clue about what they're saying... they'd be too mortified to leave the house.
11th grade blues...
An 11th grader was talking about how he moved back with his grandparent's when his mom dies. He mentioned that his mom also attended this school and so did his dad, but he never met him. He only new his dad's first name. So he says the name in my "get to know other students first day ice breaker." A freshman girl asked a few pointed questions, pulls out her phone and calls their dad. Dad is there within 15 min.
Turns out the dead mom's family moved mom out of the city to hide the pregnancy and the dad only knew the child's first name. Dad spent years trying unsuccessfully to track his kid down. The dad settled down becomes an EMT, gets married, has 3 daughters, the oldest daughter was the freshman. There was a GD family reunion in my ice breaker on the first day of school.
Edit:Thanks for the awards everyone. Some points: the boys mom and dad were high school students when she became pregnant. I don't think that was clear. Mom moved from (downtown major northern city) to Alabama or Louisiana to be with her (grand)fathers, the boy got the (grand)fathers name (not sure if it was the moms father or grandfather). The dad would not have had the money or resources to trace the mom's movement, this would be in the pager/cassette days not cell phones and Facebook.
"Kid Beer"
While I taught 4th grade, I had a kid tell me that his dad works on car rims at night. Another one told my friend, the bilingual teacher, that she came back from visiting family in Mexico over the weekend by going through the river. Edited to add, another one! I taught the son of a 2nd grade teacher.
He came in one weekend talking about drinking lots of "kid beer" over the weekend at his dad's house. His mom stopped by later and I mentioned the story, she shook her head and said, "It's apple juice, I keep telling his dad to stop calling it kid beer!" Thanks for the awards! These are my very first ones!
Now that is Drama
Okay, so not a teacher but in grade 9 there was a girl who got completely plastered in the girls bathroom. And my 14 year old self had one too many slushies at lunch so I ran into her there. This girl's makeup was a complete mess and since I was at the peak of social anxiety problems I just tried to slip away.
As usual I was too late and this girl clung to my arm and fell apart sobbing to me about how her boyfriend had gotten her mother pregnant. I ended up missing the rest of the day to sit in the corner of the bathroom with this girl I had never met before in my life, and we never talked again. But man, I feel bad for that disfunction family.
Mrs. A
hemorrhoids GIFGiphyUsed to teach prekindergarten. I had one kid who would tell me every month when her mom was on her period. "Mrs. A, my mom is bleeding from her butt again." 😅 At least, I hope that is what was going on or that poor lady had some severe hemorrhoids lmao.
If I was a teacher I bug my classrooms. Then I'd go home and wrote everything down, change some names and wrote a novel, heck a series of novels. I'd be a millionaire. In fact...
Dad's Anatomy Issues
Several years ago, I did a brief stint teaching junior high (I now teach high school). In that time, I learned a lot of information from students that, I am sure, parents would prefer I had not learned.
The one that stands out the most to me was the boy who accidentally let it slip to the entire class that dad has a small penis.
The bell hadn't rung to start class yet, so I was letting the kids (seventh grade) be a little crazy and get some of their pent-up energy out before we began class.
I hear one boy say to another "shut up, you'll always have a tiny penis."
The kid, in a moment of suicide by words, just said "I've seen my dad naked. He's tiny. You're probably right."
Thank God the bell rang and I was able to move the kids onto their actual lessons.
Road to Hell
A bit different but nonetheless hilarious. My step brother was in kindergarten & his teacher overheard him say to about 5 other kids, "I've been to hell & back & let me tell you, it's freakin scary!" The teacher had to discipline him but then right after stepped out of the room & proceeded to laugh her butt off.
Quit the Smoke
mothers day smoking GIFGiphyIt was my own child actually. My husband had just quit smoking and my daughter was in kindergarten had proceeded to go and tell everybody that her father had quit doing drugs. Tobacco=drugs. I had quite a number of coworkers and parents come asking me if everything was okay at home.
Children are always going to surprise you. That is the only fact you can count on when you go into education. I remember several times in school my teachers shushing me when I wasn't appropriate, but with a smirk. I once announced my mother's age to the class and that was when my teacher, Mrs. Klein, informed me that gentlemen never discuss a ladies age. But I know she found it amusing and she used it as wisdom. Good on Mrs. Klein.
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Do you ever wonder what it must've been like to experience major events throughout world history when reading about them in text books?
But if you take pause and actually think about it, we're living through many newsworthy current events that succeeding generations will be talking about long after we're gone.
Reading about them online or in newspapers is one thing. But seeing them happen unfold before our eyes is another.
Curious to hear from those who'll have anecdotes to tell in the future, Redditor "What is the most historically significant event you witnessed IN PERSON?"
People recall the natural disaster events they've witnessed.
Tremors
"1964 Good Friday Earthquake 9.2 Richter. Was a boy in Cordova, Alaska at the time."
– KitchenLab2536
"My father was skipper of the USCG cutter stationed there. He was inport, and when the quake struck shortly before 5:30pm, he and my mom gathered me and my three siblings on the front porch. At first, it felt like the house was crumbling at the foundation, but on the porch we could plainly see our whole world was shaking. I remember watching telephone poles swaying, and the wires snapping and crackling in the street. The quake lasted about five minutes initially. My dad got his ship underway to avoid the tidal wave which was sure to come. We had several aftershocks in the coming weeks, some of which were quite strong, though nowhere near as strong or as long as the quake itself. I was seven at the time."
– KitchenLab2536
Collapsing Freeway
"October 17th, 1989. I watched the 880 Nimitz freeway collapse during the San Francisco earthquake. The Honda in front of me had the upper deck crush her front-end engine compartment. The mother and her daughter were shaken up but completely fine."
"I was driving a convertible Triumph Spitfire, which was scratched up slightly from debris. However, I walked away unscathed. Aside from the fact I pissed my pants, which I didn't notice until much later."
– CatDaddyWhisper
Thar She Blows
"I sat on the roof of our house and watched Mt. St. Helens erupt less than 100 miles away."
– stinkykitty71
"This must have been fascinating and terryfing in equal measure. What a thing to witness."
– runrossyrun
"It was amazing! The ash that covered everything like snow was interesting to kid me, but less so to my parents."
– stinkykitty71
People recall seeing major catastrophes as a result of malfunctions or judgement errors.
Bomber Crash
"The b-52 crash that led to changing what large military aircraft are allowed to do for airshows."
"I didn't see the plane, but immediately saw the fireball. It was just a perfect, bright red turning to black mushroom cloud."
"Fairchild is a nuclear air base and there were a few minutes there where I was sure the world was about to end."
"A few years before a KC-135 doing the same thing crashed near the school while we were in class."
– goffstock
Tragic Takeoff
"I was standing on my front porch watching the launch of the Challenger."
– StarChaser_Tyger
"Was riding in my parents car to a basketball game in the next town over in north texas when we saw a shooting star and thought that was neat."
"It was the Columbia..."
– Misdirected_Colors
Demolition Gone Wrong
"The failed implosion of the Zip feed mill in Sioux Falls, SD in 2005."
"They hyped it up, sold tickets to it, had a big 'BOOM' marketing thing, and broadcast it live on TV."
"The explosives took out the main supports on the first floor, and the rest of the building above it just plopped down 10ft or so and came to a rest. It was a massive failure, and was a funny little blurb on news stations around the world that day. Definitely not major news, just the rest of the world taking 20 seconds to laugh at us."
"The building sat like that (the leaning tower of SuFu) for quite a while until they figured out how to safely demolish it."
"Here's a clip of the failed demolition."
– KitchenBandicoots
These well-known historical events were seen by very few who are alive today.
Historical Remnant
"The tumbling of the Wall in Germany… along with people selling bits and pieces of it on tables in lobby in front of commissary and px in the following weeks and months. I had picked up a chunk about the size of an oreo and kept it… has blue spray paint on the flat side. Wonder if anyone is buying them now?"
– SingedPenguin13
Major Upheaval
"I would have to say the LA riots. I lived about two blocks from where it started. I was on my way home from school and saw someone throw a brick through a window. I didn’t even wait. I just started running the whole way home."
– Scarlaymama0721
Day Of Infamy
"9/11, I could SMELL the collapse of the towers."
– go4tli
"A friend of mine was there. One day in the warehouse we worked in together there was an odd electrical burning smell. He stopped in his tracks and went 'this is what 9/11 smelled like.'"
– mantistoboggan287
I didn't physically witness the fall of the World Trade Center but I was living in New York City at the time.
However, I did see the smoke.
I was living up north in Washington Heights at the time and knowing what happened, uncertain of what was to come, and seeing the plumes of smoke from the attack site was the most ominous sight I've ever seen in my life to date.
Have you ever lived through a historic moment or witnessed something sure to be noted in history books? Let us know in the comments below.
