Lies They Taught You In School

You only use 10% of your brain. Never start a sentence with a conjunction. Albert Einstein

failed math in high school. There are a surprising number of urban myths and co-called "common

knowledge" that turns out to be misinformation. Here are some lies they taught you in school.

This feel-good story was practically shoved down U.S. students' throats during elementary

school. The pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock, the land was inhospitable to the newcomers,

and many of them starved. Luckily for the colonists, the indigenous people felt bad

for them and taught them how to grow crops on unfamiliar soil. That way they could share

in a happy celebration.

Though much of this story is technically true, it's often used as a sort of trick. The idea

is to make children believe those early colonists shared a peaceful relationship with America's

indigenous populations. And that's anything but the truth.

There isn't much historical information about that first Thanksgiving in 1621, other than

that it happened, and some Native allies were present. Otherwise, the mythologized events

of the festival are generally accepted as truth by most Americans.

But many indigenous Americans view the first Thanksgiving quite differently. It's common

for people of Native heritage to hold a mourning fast over Thanksgiving. To them, the day marks

a dark history filled with conflict, death, and other hardships they would not have encountered

if Europeans hadn’t started to colonize the Americas.

Experts will likely agree that the English language is a mash-up of several wildly different

European languages clumped together. And the way the "rules" are taught to us in school

doesn't make it any easier. That’s mostly because these "rules" aren't actual rules

at all.

Take this piece of widely believed grammar advice: "You can't start a sentence with a

conjunction."

Most of us were conditioned to nix these short connecting words from a very early age. We

were taught it, we believed it, and... it's absolutely false.

There's no single authority on the English language. As long as it does its job, namely

conveying ideas from the writer to the reader, then whatever you decide to do with the words

is acceptable. If you need an authority to tell you it's okay to start a sentence with

"and," "but," or "or," you can check out Merriam-Webster. They say we've been breaking this "rule" since

at least the ninth century.

Similar to beginning a sentence with a conjunction, most of us were warned that ending a sentence

with a preposition is an improper use of the English language. It's probably best to forget

most of what you learned in high school English class, though.

Language changes based on how it's used in everyday speech, and as we've seen with internet

lingo, it can even change overnight. There was certainly a time when ending a sentence

with "to," "for," "of," or "with" would've made you sound like uneducated street rabble.

But that time has long since passed.

These days, it's perfectly fine to end sentences with prepositions. It's simply an informal