Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson for September 03, 2019

8th grade? You’ve been stuck in the first grade for 4 years!

I’ve read that in Amish customs, the children stop school at eighth grade. They then learn a trade which’ll eventually become their business.

Oh don’t worry about the contents of the CFSB cereal Susie.

Good luck getting to 8th grade, Calvin.

That would be a pretty good public school if they actually offered foreign language instruction in the first grade.

You could probably motivate Calvin to learn another language if you presented it as a way to keep secrets from his parents.

In their own ways, they both need to check on their medicine dosage.

“Grade 8” and not “8th grade”? Since when is Calvin a Canadian?

Not while you’re living under Mom’s roof!

Future President of the United States.

Here he sounds like a Trump ‘base supporter’.

I dare say Calvin has an aptitude for language. He’s certainly learned his first language rapidly and well. His English vocabulary is already better than that of many, maybe most, 8th graders and even that of some presidents…

Quite a civil conversation between the two for once – Calvin’s mood not withstanding.

Since I’ve lived in several different parts of the world, I’ve had to put in the effort to be able to manage at least the basics of the local languages. (Enough order beer and pick up girls, at least.) So I agree with Calvin. Indeed, I will go further.

Everyone in the world should not only speak English, they should speak it exactly the way I speak it.

Build a wall and keep Calvin inside it.

Have you had the dubious pleasure, as I have, of encountering one of those “wonderful” folk who believe (and I’m not joking) that everyone in the world should speak English because “That’s what Jesus spoke in the New Testament”. Boy, oh boy, did she get peeved when I asked her how she managed to graduate from high school!

Unless you live in England, English is a foreign language.

In Japan back in 1952 I met a kid (maybe second grade) learning English in school. They used a picture of a baseball glove for ‘glove’.

I’m sure it has been said before but Calvin needs a competent therapist.

Susie never learns anything about Calvin, does she?

Clavin is “out” of school even when he’s supposed to be “there” – more adventures of the intrepid Spaceman Spiff!

I’m quite proud to be able to say I speak three languages, Scottish, English and fluent Rubbish and at times of high stress Gibberish …..

Don’t worry Calvin at some point in primary school, you will pick up pig latin which will be added to your repertoire of alien space languages.

I’m afraid that’s more wishful thinking, Calvin!

Suzie… you really ought to know better by now.

No way Calvin could be Amish. I’ve always been told the Amish only go until the 8th grade. Fact or fiction???

Google “8th grade final exam 1880”. How is your ancient Greek and Latin?

The official language of the United States is: nothing. There isn’t one.

The founders of the United States debated the issue. German was a leading contender, but they decided NOT to declare an official language.

Because of the internet, commerce and science, English might become the de facto language of the world. I sure hope that local dialects don’t die out.

Wait til you have to press one Calvin.

they really should start teaching other languages in elementary school actually, I didn’t get foreign language classes until middle school and I never picked it up, younger kids can learn languages easier. Also it’s kind of weird seeing Calvin not only act like an ignorant racist, but apparently aspire to be an ignorant racist.

The active ingredient in his cereal is sugar, and it’s already making him manic.

Learn yourself good stuff. My motto.

This doesn’t sound like any particular public official official, does it?

The chemical content of his breakfast cereal? That’s simple. It’s 99.5% sugar.

Living and working in the DC area, it really helps to be multilingual, or have a translator line on speed dial. Speak Amharic anyone? Urdu, or Mongolian? I once had a wonderful pantomime conversation with two elderly Korean gentlemen.

And then, there was the group of young Salvadorian men. Only one of them spoke English. “Why don’t you speak Spanish?” he asked me. “Why don’t you speak Norwegian?” I countered. After that, we got along quite easily in English.

I’m not sure what I would have done if the guy had called my bluff. Even though my dad was fluent in both Nynorsk and Bokmål, his kids never learned either.

A local church near me offers free ESL classes evenings. An acquaintance of mine asked what “ESL” meant. When I told him it was “English as a Second Language,” he thought for a moment and asked if it was for people who didn’t learn it the first time? I told him, yes, and he might benefit from a few brush-up lessons himself. He might have attended at last one class, because he hasn’t spoken to me since. 8>)

I though Calvin was American. Last I checked England is a foreign country. Thus by definition English is a foreign language.

English is the international language of civil aviation.

Sally Brown vowed that she wouldn’t learn Latin.

I wish now that I knew more than one language. Getting too old for it now. When I was in Europe many years ago I couldn’t believe how many people there could speak three or more languages. They spoke English better than a lot of people here in the US.

Of course Susie is all excited to start the new year.

I considered learning a foreign language. Then I realized English is still pretty foreign to me. I mean… who figured out the spelling for this silly language anyway? Daniel Webster, I hope to meet you some day simply so I can beat you senseless with your own dictionary…

New Orleans used to offer French in second and third grades. Calvin, you may want to rethink your idea of quitting school after 8th grade. My dad had to quit school after 8th grade and struggled all his life.

Surely the chemical content of Calvin’s breakfast cereal is sugar.

So Calvin apparently figures he’ll be 18 by the time he gets out of 18th grade? Hmm.

growing up in RI, had a friend who did not do well in school at all, in fact, in grade 7, he used to drive to school! (he’d get in trouble all the time for taking the principal’s spot)

Learning a second language can be desirable, but, a lot of schools go about it incorrectly. My daughter was taking an into to Mandarin, and she loved it. Her teachers did not allow her to continue, and she was forced to take Spanish.

My opinion (and only that) is that schools should provide and introduction to a 2nd language, and it should not be graded. Then, if a child shows a skilland desire to continue it, then, allow them to enroll in an actual class, that is graded, etc.

I was basically forced to take French for 10 years, starting in 1st grade. At the time, ADD was not recognized, and I was always told I “didn’t try hard enough, didn’t apply myself,” etc. I could read French as though I was born to it, but, had almost no idea what I had just read. I was not diagnosed with my ADD until I was about 45 yrs old. Kind of just a tad late, but…

The bottom line is, forcing a student into a language that they may not have a desire, or ability for, is probably the best way to turn them away from doing their best at it, and actually learning it.

I took French in 5th through 8th grade. I could basically converse with a French two year old.

I love Calvin’s sarcasm. When you are cold and waiting for school bus on a holiday you will react this way. His cereal in the morning had right ingredients.