15 School Memories That Never Faded, Unlike Math Facts (July 23, 2025)

We have grown up, we have our adult problems, but our school memories are still with us, and now we also share our children’s school days. All these stories are like old photographs: they make us smile, surprise us, and sometimes make us sad. There are moments that will be remembered with family and friends many times over. Here are 15 of them.

• When I was at school, I hated school lunches because of tasteless, lumpy porridge and icy soups combined with very hot drinks. One day I realized that the food at our school was still good.
  And it happened after my cousin, who studied in another school, showed me a video of her lunch — a block of mashed potatoes with a fork stuck in it, which nobody could pull out, and they couldn’t get the mashed potatoes off the plate either. © Overheard / Ideer
• What I hate is my kids want to do most of the work themselves. They feel so proud of the accomplishment, only to have it smooshed when some other parent basically does the project for them. When they should feel awesome for being self-sufficient, they feel like a loser because they’re comparing themselves to an adult. © Opandemonium / Reddit
• My daughter had a hard time in first grade. If math was okay for her, writing was a nightmare. She didn’t want to write or learn letters. But one day she came home from school and said that she urgently needed to learn how to write because she liked a boy and Kate had written him a note “You + I = love” today.
  From that day on, my child stopped being like herself. Every day she sat over her primer. She came home one day, all happy, and said, ’I gave Dennis a note where I wrote: ’I learned to write, and now you are my boyfriend.’" © Mamdarinka / VK

• My younger sister was assigned to write a story about her favorite person at school, and she wrote about me. I was so proud of myself, and then I decided to read the story, and my happiness immediately disappeared.
  Here’s what she wrote: “My favorite person in the world is my sister. She’s older than me, but she’s not very smart. She doesn’t know how to hide candy that I’m not supposed to eat. I always find them and eat them. It’s a good thing she doesn’t realize anything.”
  Actually, I’ve never noticed the missing candy! © Not everyone will understand / VK
• My kid’s in third grade. He says they have to sew a soft toy for their craft class. I go, “Let them give you an F — I’m not sewing anything.”
  He goes, “I can’t. I already told them today that I forgot it at home.” © Eternal Carantine / Dzen
• Parents’ meeting, 10th grade. The psychologist reports that she has conducted a survey about the students’ professional plans.
  Our daughter wrote that she dreams of marrying a wealthy man and never working. My husband and I are shocked beyond description. All the parents, the teacher, the psychologist look at us.
  A pause, my husband gets up and says that tomorrow he is going to the school principal with a question about the psychologist’s professional suitability, and then to court with a petition for moral damages and disclosure of professional secrets.
  He then attacked me, saying that I couldn’t bring up our daughter right, and then our daughter for the fact that she shouldn’t make fun of a psychologist. The next day, my daughter (an excellent student, winner of all kinds of Olympiads) was offered friendship by all the girls and boys, saying that she turned out to be a normal girl, and her popularity rose sharply. © Natalia Sipay / Dzen
• I don’t know how it ended up this way, but I’ve never really done homework with my daughter. I’m a lazy mom — I did my time! Sometimes the best I can do is give her a quick hint. I remember helping her with a project just once, but that’s it.
  Back when I was in school, no one did homework with their kids, as far as I remember. I did it myself, and now my daughter does too. I don’t get involved. And I’m not letting myself get dragged into it. © Avocado Hedgehog / ADME

• I used to get nervous even over regular quizzes at school — don’t even get me started on tests or exams. When it was time to take my final exams, I spent about 3 months on every calming remedy imaginable. I couldn’t sleep, spent my nights studying, had meltdowns, and cried over literally anything.
  By the time the exams rolled around, I was pale as a ghost. But in the end, I passed everything just fine. The questions weren’t even that hard, and I realized I’d put myself through all that stress for nothing. © Caramel / VK
• My son was assigned an essay about his future profession. He didn’t want to write it, didn’t know what to say, and just grumbled, “Leave me alone — I’ll be a street cleaner!” I was tired of his whining too, so I said, “Fine, write whatever you want.” And he did.
  He explained it all so well: how this profession helps people, how he’d get fresh air, how it’s good physical exercise, and how he’d set an example that littering isn’t okay because this is our common home. I only polished the text a little. He got a B, and the teacher left a note in pencil, “I think I chose the wrong profession.” © Name -Ulyana / Dzen
• At school, I was assigned to make a herbarium. You know, pressed plants under glass. So I smashed a windowpane to get the glass for my herbarium.
  My dad just laughed and didn’t even get mad. Definitely one for the memory bank. © Anna Antonova / Dzen

• Homework is insane to me. They give kids 8+ hours away from home Monday through Friday, and when I was in high school all 8 of my teachers would boast their class would assign 3+ hours of homework a night. Essentially boasting about wearing students down and burning them out before they hit 16. Not cool. © Unknown author / Reddit
• My sister was given a research project with a presentation and a poster that requires use of the internet and rather specific supplies. She’s 5. © SliferTheExecProducr / Reddit
• My daughter was given an assignment to make a bird feeder and then hang it in the park and take pictures. I did my best — I made a covered bird feeder out of plywood. We went to the neighboring park to hang it.
  On the way, we saw several feeders made “hastily” — from cardboard, juice cartons, or shoe boxes. We hang ours, pour in the feed, take photos and go home. Bottom line — everyone got an “A.” © A spoonful of tar / Dzen

• My mom is a professor but has worked with kids as well, so she was very good at breaking down difficult math and science problems (subjects I needed help with) into ways I could understand. She would create goofy/entertaining stories to illustrate the concept I was trying to learn. Her level of patience is impressive. © ****-usernames / Reddit
• As a child when these project type assignments were assigned I never understood it. But looking back on it now as a 24-year-old adult, these assignments are some of the best memories I have with my parents helping me and even more, so my late grandfather who was always excited to have a project to help me with. Since he passed when I was only 12 a lot of my memories of him come just from homework projects that we would spend hours on. So I am very thankful for that. © Sthager0 / Reddit

And here are more school stories that prove some people aren’t meant to be teachers.