Book Review: I Used to Know That: Stuff You Forgot From School

A short pause between school assignments, and a short book review to go with it.  I promise this one will take significantly less time than Catcher in the Rye did.  That book was heavy. 

I also promise to avoid any sexist parting comments, if I can.  As I remarked in my response to the first comment along those lines, I probably am over-compensating due to the virtual hedgerow of female perspectives I'm being exposed to in my Women's Studies class.  Only the most off-the-reservation stuff is getting over it, just now.

You should see the rant she gave me over my last response paper assignment.  I can't wait to see what she has to say about my response to her film clips that bagged on Hollywood movies for being too biased against women.  I said I agreed, but that there were a few films on her list that I thought she was being too one-sided on herself.  We'll see what comes of that.

Ok, enough on my Women's Lib - er, I mean Studies class.  On to the review.

Source: Amazon.com

I Used to Know That: Stuff You Forgot From School, by Caroline Taggart

From the book’s cover:

If you've forgotten the capital city of Chile; the basics of osmosis; how to solve a quadratic equation; the names of the Bennet sisters in "Pride and Prejudice"; who wrote the famous poem about daffodils; the use of a conjunction or the number of continents in the world, "I Used to Know That" will provide all the answers. A light-hearted and informative reminder of all the things that we learnt in school but have since become relegated to the backs of our minds, "I Used to Know That" features hundreds of important snippets of wisdom, facts, theories, equations, phrases, rules and sayings.It is a practical guide to turn to when an answer is eluding you, when helping a child with homework or preparing them for the new school year, or maybe just to brush up on trivia for the pub quiz. "I Used to Know That" covers English Language and Literature, Mathematics, Biology, Chemistry, Physics, History, Geography and General Studies, so never again will you find yourself stumped!


Synopsis:

Ah! Now this one I can actually do pretty quick. It was a fairly short book, and thus should prove no problem to report on.

I Used to Know That is a reference book for those of us who have forgotten most of what we learned in grammar/elementary/what-ever you call it school, and Middle/Junior High and also High School. Subjects included are English; both the mechanics and the literature, Mathematics (called Maths by the author - she's British), Sciences of Physical, Biological, Earth, Optical, Chemistry and a couple other varieties.

What else? There's also History - slanted toward British and the United States (more on that in a second), Geography, a review of Art, Music, Greek/Roman mythology, and probably a few others that have already slipped my mind as I write this. See how easy it is to forget? I just read the book and I'm already doing it.

The author, Caroline Taggart / Source: Twitter.com

What I liked about it:

This is a great little primer for refreshing your memory on the stuff that many of us learned as kids in school, but forget about the time we took off cap and gown - unless you go directly to college, that is. For myself, I resisted a lot of what they were trying to teach me in school especially when I became a teenager. So some of the stuff reviewed in I Used to Know That was only familiar to me because I have found a lust for learning (let's not call it love, I'm knowledge's whore lately, and I know it). Otherwise, I wouldn't have recalled much of it even vaguely, I'd imagine.

The book covers a lot of subjects in brief detail. The scope is broad, though not as broad as I'd prefer personally. The overview is not too deep. You get info on subjects, such as the periodic table for example, but the author doesn't bother to try to explain the history and significance of every atomic element. This is just a "memory jogger," as it were.

What I didn’t like about it:

The book is slanted toward British history and subjects. This is not surprising, seeing as the author is British. But there was an excess of material on Britain's history that I found to be a bit too Anglocentric. It's not like she doesn't mention other nation's and their contributions, but there is a lot on the UK's past and accomplishments.

Also, the math section is definitely not good for an audiobook. I read I Used to Know That as an audiobook (of course), and the math section was not helpful to me. This could be a tough thing to judge if I speak of how it might affect other people when they read the book. After all, Math tends to overwhelm me fairly quickly.

The trouble was that if I wasn't paying perfect attention, the math material quickly became an almost unintelligible background noise. So if you want to use this book as a true reference, I'd recommend the paper book and not the audio version. The audio book's narrator does a good job (she's a Brit too), but for Math... Other people might have the same problem with other subjects in I Used to Know That; things they don't excel in might seem like jibber-jabber if they listen to the audiobook instead of the paper book version. Just something to keep in mind.

Yeah, I'm forgetting it just as fast as you put it into my head. / Source: TallahasseeGrapevine.com

What I learned, if anything:

I'd say this is an obvious one. I learned that there are some things I'd almost completely forgotten from my compulsory, state-provided education. I won't bother to try and pick out specifics. Each individual person will find things they have mis-laid in their memory, or never learned much about in the first place.

That brings up another quick point. There seems to me to be more stuff in this little book than what I originally learned in school, 'back in the day,' as it is said. I think the curriculum in the UK must be broader than it is here in the states. That, or school was just more of a dull roar to me than I thought it was back then.

For instance, there are some subjects that I remember my Elementary, Junior High and High School classes covering in more detail than her book does, but there were also some things that I don't recall ever touching (such as Chemistry, I didn't pick up any of that of which I am aware of until I was a Freshman in college). Then again, they say the American education system is ranked poorly in the world's school system structures. Maybe this is just more evidence of that.

Recommendation:

I'd highly recommend I Used to Know That, but not as anything other than a fun little read, or a reference book to catch you up on things you've forgotten. The book's content suits its title quite admirably. It proved conclusively that there were indeed a lot of things I'd forgot from my primary/secondary education. Even a few things that I hadn't learned until I achieved "Higher" education. Thank heavens for America's world-class universities, eh?

One the flip side, don't expect a real diverse coverage of world topics in I Used to Know That; you are going to get a slant toward British and American materials in places. That's just how this one goes. Hail Britannia, and all that.

Learn more about I Used to Know That: Stuff You Forgot From School on Amazon.com 


The parting comment:

Source: StumbleThroughParenthood.com

The "Maths" section of I Used to Know That reminded me of both my days in Junior High School, as several teachers tried - unsuccessfully, but with varying levels of effort - to cram Algebra into my skull.  I still haven't mastered most of it, as of this writing.