Colonies vs. Countries

My class was taking a test today. This test covered the writing of the Declaration of Independence to the U. S. Constitution. This particular test had a question: What two states did not ratify the U. S. Constitution? The answers are North Carolina and Rhode Island. As I was walking around the room, I saw that one of my new favorite student wrote North Carolina and Korea. I gave her a bit of a hint...Korea is another country. I told her that these answers had to be one of the original 13 colonies. Her reply was one of "Oh, now I get it!" I walked away assuming that I had righted her wrong. I was wrong. I strolled by a few minutes later to see that she had changed her answer: North Carolina and Canada. Fail.

Closing Time, Eh?

This one came out of nowhere today:

7th Grader: Mr. H, does Canada close at 9:30?

Royal Mama Drama

In class, we've been talking about different types of governments. This happened:

7th grader: What happens if the queen dies?

Mr. H: Her son or daughter will take over.

Another 7th grader: Is her grandson the one that got married this summer?

Mr. H: Yes. William and Kate

7th grader: You talking about the one with all them kids?

Homophones Gone Bad

My class is currently studying Spain/Portugal. Tuesday, the students were labeling and coloring a map of the region. This random question was asked:

7th Grade Student: Mr. H, is lesbian the capital of Portugal?

Mr. H: Umm...no, it's Lisbon. Moving on...

Really Fake Zombies

On Fridays, my students watch a student news video that reviews the world news of the week. Most episodes are about 10 minutes long, with the first 9 minutes being serious stuff. The last minute is usually a funny or cool news story to lighten the load of the first 9 minutes.

Well, this particular funny story involved a march in San Diego (I think). The participants in the march were dressed as, and acted like, zombies. One of my students asked me this question:

7th Grade Student: Mr. H, are those real zombies?

Mr. H: Yes?