Blame It On The Aliens

Blame it on “Men in Black.”

 

Blame it on Mr. Spock’s pointy ears.

Blame it on Yoda.

According to a recent survey, one in three British students, from the ages of 5 to 16, believe at least one of their teachers is an alien — and I'm not talking about the sneaking-across-the-border-kind of alien either.

No siree, Missy. We're talking about the sneaking-down-out-of-the-sky-kind of alien as in extra-terrestrial.

Since I've been teaching for a million light years, I've been called many things in my classroom, but even for me, “alien” is a new one.

Still, a third of the students surveyed think aliens have taken over at least one of their teachers' bodies. Sadly, the survey apparently never addressed why these children believed aliens body-snatched their teachers. 

It does, however, explain quite a few things—things like where all that extra weight I gained came from and why it won’t leave, or why my students stare at me as if I were from Mars. Those kind of things.

So the next time someone starts complaining about teachers, public education, tanking test scores or student achievement, let’s just lay the blame squarely where it belongs—those darn tootin’ fatso aliens.

[A version of this post first appeared on Technorati.]