Tim ClancyRezensionen

In the same vein as Anguished English and other such "students write the darndest things" books, this is a collection of very funny excerpts from high school student essays. Very enjoyable.

If you've ever been a teacher, you will get a kick out of this book. It is filled with quick, little, one to two sentences written by students with funny moments. Most of these are easily recognizable as typical types of students who just didn't put quite enough effort into their writing, but the results are quite amusing. I'd recommend this book to anyone who has ever been a teacher or just finds students funny.

Review of Best In Class: Essential Wisdom from Real Student Writing by Tim Clancy

I'm torn.

Tim Clancy's Best in Class: Essential Wisdom from Real Student Writing is at once a minuscule but delightful collection of one- or two-sentence clips of student writing, but also a book that does not properly rise to the level of a book.

To Mr. Clancy's credit, he kept for years a folder filled with the funniest and most interesting gems of student writing from the high school classes he taught. We should all take a cue from him. I myself have a collection of notes and sayings starting from when my kids were very young. Sadly, it is woefully incomplete. I did, however, include the context of each quotation where it is warranted. For many of the snippets here, I wish Clancy had included some brief contextual information, perhaps an intro to each chapter. What was the assignment? Was this snippet from Class Clown or Front-Row Girl?

That aside, it is a fine little collection. Here are a few of my favorites:

SPOILERS BETWEEN THE ASTERISKS:
**************************************************
She lost the use of her legs and her boyfriend.
If you're quiet enough you can hear a pin drop in a haystack.
Everyone may not see it my way, but I know that they are wrong.
If it weren't for the Age of Reason, we'd still be hunting witches and wearing powdered wigs.
All of a sudden sheep were surrounding me, going "baah" and whatnot.
If life throws you a packet of Kool Aid, make some Kool Aid.
You should take time to get to know people before you hate them.
**************************************************

What troubles me is that this collection is more appropriately published as an essay, or as a list on social media. Most of us have scrolled through collections similar to Clancy's in our Facebook feed. Frankly, many of them were even funnier than his. Should this really be a book?

Probably not.

Granted, I own some books of this size: On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century by Timothy Snyder; On Bullshit by Harry Frankfurt; Joseph Gordon-Levitt's collection of Tiny Book[s] of Tiny Stories. But the first two, despite being essay-length, are self-contained expositions of serious matters. And the Tiny Stories books are, well, self-described, and while they may exhibit a bit of marketing gimmickry, you can't say they aren't what they purport to be. To have a Tiny Book of Tiny Stories, you probably need a tiny book.

Best in Class, however, is mostly padding. Clancy wrote 321 words for his Introduction, but after that, it's just quotations. There are about 168 quotes spread over 136 pages. You will read it at approximately the speed at which you can turn the pages. Of the 136 pages, only 104 contain quotes; the other 32 pages are the front material and the blank pages and headings for the 12 chapters. In other words, this book consists mostly of, well, nothing. Exacerbating the problem: it is almost certainly impossible to justify separating these quotes into 12 chapters; the themes for the chapters simply are not that distinct.

But perhaps this is just the rantings of the pedant who rules my internal dialogue. Although I maintain that this should have been a list on Mr. Clancy’s blog, what content there is really is very funny.

BEST IN CLASS by Tim Clancy shares words of wisdom from his high school students.

For decades, Clancy collected writing assignments from his high school students. From thought-provoking prose to silly stories, the collection contains a wide variety of short compositions reflecting the perspectives of teens. The book is divided into a dozen short chapters that explore themes such as romance, the natural world, and advice.

Those who have children or have worked with young people will relate to this collection of nearly 200 examples of authentic youth writing.

ARC courtesy of the publisher.

While there were some funny quotes, I was often, as another reviewer commented, "scratching my head" at many of the quotes the author included in this slim volume. Maybe it was a case of "you had to be there" to understand why the quotes were included, because so many of them were either "meh" or "why?"

I received this book as part of the Early Reviewer program.

This was a collection of hilarious quotes from real students that Tim has been collecting over the course of his teaching career. Some of these quotes had me in stitches, I would highly recommend this book if you're looking for a gift, or something for yourself to make you smile.

A collection of funny and strange quotes from high school students writing assignments.
This is a fun little book. I don’t normally go into the physical quality of a text book but in this case the physicality of the book is part of the fun of it.
It’s a small size, roughly 6” X 11” and the quality is excellent. My copy is hard cover which is sturdy, and the texture reminds me of some of the text books from my childhood. It’s in a bright, cheerful, Ticonderoga yellow, the spine looks like a #2 pencil, eraser and all and the font is a metallic green. It’s just cheerful to look at and feels good in your hands.
There are about two quotes per page, with a few illustrations scattered throughout the book and it is separated into themes, book reports, romance, is that a word and so on.
There is no context given for the origin of each quote, which I did sometimes find frustrating as I really, really wanted to know what inspired many of them, though their brevity and out of context nature is part of what makes them all work so well as a collection. Not really a sit down and read cover to cover book, but it is fun to skim through and share some of the best with friends and co-workers.

This is a fun little novelty book that would make a great gift for teachers and professors. Basically the author, a veteran high school English teacher, has for years collected the funniest, craziest, and dumbest things his students have written and compiled them in this short book. The book is very loosely organized by topic (e.g. "Deep Thoughts," "The Natural World," "Book Reports") and the short 1-2 line quotes from student papers are presented without context for maximum comedic effect. Obviously this is not a heavy read - I recommend not rushing through it, perhaps reading a few pages a day because reading blurb after blurb causes them to run together in your head.

OMG! This book was not what I expected, but it was far, far better than anything I could have imagined. The author, a veteran English teacher, compiled some of his students' "best" work and put it in this book. I sat on my couch with a cup of tea laughing out loud at some of the truly amazing words of wisdom from his students. My favorite - "My grandma died last July. She was never the same after that." How can anyone not love a book with this in it? In this age of negativity, this book was a welcome release. I loved it!

Author Tim Clancy shares a collection of tidbits collected over his years of teaching. Some are quite funny, others are clever, while other are... I suppose you have to an educator to understand. Considering it is a collection of short quotes, typically just a single sentence, the book is quite short. I was hoping for more content, but considering what it is, it is put together well and the illustrations are nicely done. It would make a nice gift for a current, or retired teacher.

This book is a small collection of funny one-liners from student essays collected over the years by high school teacher Tim Clancy, illustrated by Johnny Sampson. Mostly enjoyable and funny, a few cringe-inducing quotes, a few head-scratchers (both in the "what was the student thinking" sense and the "why was this included" sense."

Would make a good gift for an English teacher, and my kids enjoyed several selected quotes.
I received this as an Early Reviewer from Library Thing.

Received this as an ARC copy from Library Thing.. It's a collection of funny things that a teacher has collected from his students works over several years. Is a very quick read most pages are one to two one sentence excerpts per page. Fun way to pass a little bit of time.

This small book is a collection of funny things from student essays collected by a high school English teacher. The book is divided into 12 categories, such as That's Deep, Romance, and Good Advice. Some of the quotes are illustrated with black and white drawings of the witticism. While this book is a good idea in theory, the result leaves a bit to be desired. Overall, there are very, very few quotes included. For instance, the section titled Whoops has 11 quotes (each consisting of one sentence) spread out over 8 pages of the book. It quickly becomes apparent that there just isn't much substance to the book. In the introduction, the author sets expectations high when he stated that he collected these funny quotes over the years and would save them as a treat to share with students on the last day of class. Oh the merriment he describes of students laughing out loud and sharing the examples with each other. But honestly, the quotes just weren't that funny. I failed to find even one that I would want to share with someone else because it was just so hilarious. I didn't think there was enough material here (in either quantity or quality) to merit an entire book. I received this book for free as part of the LibraryThing Early Reviews program.½

As a teacher, I often find humor in the not-quite-right things my students often say, so I fully expected to enjoy this slim volume immensely. This book did indeed have several humorous anecdotes; however, it was not a readable as I had hoped. While the book was divided into categories, and each statement fell into that category, it seemed rather disjointed as a whole work. Sometimes it was hard to see the humor, and instead I just wondered, "why?" I think that knowing a little more about the assignment or background of what the blurb was in relation to would have made it easier to see the humor, rather than just the errors. That said, there were a few gems in here, and I will pass it on to a teacher who needs a laugh.

I received a copy of this book from LibraryThing Early Reviewers.

Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book via a Librarything giveaway.

If you teach, it is that time of the year. The time when questions such as, “I know I didn’t do any of the work, but can I still pass the class” get asked. It is the time when you read essays that are done at the last minute so students write things like “I think that it is the title of the movie” or “two other sources that I didn’t right done”.
It is way teachers always ask for booze.
Clancy’s collection of strange writings from students is a balm to the soul. You, dear teacher, are not alone. You haven’t failed at teaching; the students just have not been paying attention.
Clancy’s collection of student writings includes intelligent sayings like, “Music is the aspirin of the soul” (43) as well as head banging sentences such as “Contrary to popular belief, Canadian women are no more hairy than their American counterpoints” (41).
The book is loosely divided into sections that include misspellings, made up words, historical musing and comments about literature. The accompanying illustrations by Johnny Sampson are clever.
While this is an ideal present for any teacher, it would also be a good aid in teaching, not only in terms of the importance of proofreading, but also because of the Sampson illustrations that showcase what the sentences means as opposed to what it intends.