Listen, teachers aren't perfect. Sometimes, they're flat-out wrong when it comes to the education they're passing down to their students.
Redditor u/authorized_join31 recently asked the people of Reddit, "What’s a fact that was taught in school that’s been disproven in your lifetime?" Perhaps you'll recognize some of these from your own experiences:
1. "That strangers will give me free drugs on street corners and on Halloween candy."
2. "I learned about tongue taste maps at school. Turns out it’s complete nonsense."
—u/TimmyMTX
3. "All fat was bad for you. Thus, fat-free foods became a thing for a while."
—u/SpewPewPew
4. "In pharmacy school around the turn of the century, we were taught that people in legitimate pain don't get addicted to opiates and opioids."
—u/PayEmmy
5. "That George Washington’s teeth were made of wood."
6. "Once you get to high school, nobody will accept papers not written in cursive."
7. "The Food Pyramid."
8. "Your permanent record will follow you into adulthood."
9. "You won't always have a calculator on you."
10. "I once asked one of my elementary school teachers what a rainbow was, and she told me scientists hadn't figured it out. I walked around until my early 20s thinking that. Also, I think it was this same teacher who told me Columbus thought the Earth was flat. They were training teachers a different kind of way in the '70s and '80s. It's honestly one of the reasons I'm thankful for the internet, because depending on your teacher or an outdated encyclopedia for answers could be a real roll of the dice."
11. "You only use 10% of your brain each day."
12. "My primary school teacher told me our bodies can't make new blood and we're born with all the blood we'll ever have. As someone who got nosebleeds, I knew it was bollocks. When I questioned that adults are obviously bigger so have more blood, she said it's watered down."
13. "The whole 'A meteorite killed the dinosaurs' thing wasn't yet the accepted theory when I was a kid."
—u/senefen
14. “No one is going to wait for you to look up information in the real world, you have to know it.”
—u/cheezturds
15. "The United States government prevents abuse of power through a well-engineered system of checks and balances."
—u/RookieCards
16. "That we would all but run out of oil by the year 2000."
—u/fatbongo
17. "That lemmings commit suicide."
18. "That Canada didn’t ever have slaves. What's worse is, to my knowledge, they still don’t teach this. I had to look it up myself."
19. "Hiding under your desk at school at 10 a.m. on the last Friday of the month while the teacher placed a name tag on your wrist would protect you from an atomic blast."
—u/cstickar
And finally...
20. "If you study well and have excellent grades, you will end up with a nice job and lots of money."
Got your own? See you in the comments!
These entries have been edited for length and clarity.