Tim Clancy

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 show more 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. show less

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 show more a welcome release. I loved it! show less

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 show more 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:
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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.
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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. show less

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 show more 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. show less