Article Spoiler Talking pineapple question on state exam stumps ... everyone! Students, teachers, principals - no one has any idea what the deal is Students across the state are still scratching their heads over an absurd state test question about a talking pineapple. The puzzler on the eighth-grade reading exam stumped even educators and has critics saying the tests, which are becoming more high stakes, are flawed. “I think it’s weird that they put such a silly question on a state test. What were they thinking?” said Bruce Turley, 14, an eighth-grader at Lower Manhattan Community Middle School. “I thought it was a little strange, but I just answered it as best as I could,” said his classmate Tyree Furman, 14. “You just have to give it your best answer. These are important tests.” In the story, a take-off on Aesop’s fable about the tortoise and the hare, a talking pineapple challenges a hare to a race. The other animals wager on the immobile pineapple winning — and ponder whether it’s tricking them. When the pineapple fails to move and the rabbit wins, the animals dine on the pineapple. Students were asked two perplexing questions: why did the animals eat the talking fruit, and which animal was wisest? Teachers, principals and parents contacted by The News said they weren’t sure what the answers were. “My reaction is horror that a question that’s so obviously confusing should be used on a test that is going to be used to determine our kid’s future and the future of our children’s schools,” said parent Leonie Haimson, of Class Size Matters, who first posted the question on her blog. In response to revelations that the state exams had become predictable and easier to pass, the state last year awarded a new $32 million contract to testing company Pearson to overhaul the tests. The new exams have higher stakes for principals and teachers statewide, whose evaluations will be based in part on student scores beginning as soon as this year. Scarsdale Middle School Principal Michael McDermott said the question has been used before and “confused students in six or seven different states.” And he had a quick answer to the question of who is the wisest: “Pearson for getting paid $32 million for recycling this crap.” The city confirmed the questions were on the exam, but declined to discuss any specifics, and Chancellor Dennis Walcott directed questions to the state. State officials wouldn’t divulge the answer and said they couldn’t speculate on whether the questions will be scored or scratched because of the controversy. They also noted that under new state rules, the questions and answers won’t be released. But the question prompted Ken Jennings — all-time leading money winner on “Jeopardy!” — to ask the question, “Is this a joke?” “The story makes no sense whatsoever. The narrative has no internal logic, the ‘moral’ in unclear, and the plot details seem so oddly chosen that the story seems to have been written during a peyote trip,” said Jennings, whose 74 consecutive wins on “Jeopardy!” earned him more than $3.1 million. E.D. Hirsch, chairman of the Core Knowledge Foundation and professor emeritus of education and humanities at the University of Virginia, said the question is “post-modern unanswerable.” “The joke is on the pineapple, because the New York Daily News is going to eat it up,” Hirsh said. Pearson spokesman Jason Smith said the state Education Department prohibited the company from speaking to the press on “matters like this.” tl;dr The following weird story and questions were on the NY State Exam for 8th graders. Happy 4/20!
I saw this article this morning. It's just r****ded. There is nothing in there that indicates why they ate the pineapple. I cant believe my tax money went to this piece of crap.
Oh, on the contrary. There are plenty of things you can do when you're annoyed. In this case they could have burned the pineapple, squashed the pineapple, ignored the pineapple, etc. Eating it is an option, of course, but not a necessity. The same goes for amused. Frankly, the first thing I associate with amusement is laughter, not eating. Because they were hungry is trickier. There are plenty of times when I'm hungry, but don't eat. Maybe there's no food. Maybe I don't want to eat a talking pineapple, even though I'm hungry. Moreover, they might have still eaten the pineapple even if they weren't hungry. But, without question, they wanted to eat the pineapple. Nobody was forcing them to, but there it was, and they had to think to themselves, "what to do now... ? Well, I kind of want to eat that pineapple"... so they did. The answer is clearly, D: Because they wanted to. On the second question, the answer is abundantly clear. The moose is obviously the smartest. Pineapples indeed do not have sleeves. C'mon people, this is not that difficult. In fact, it’s so simple. All I have to do is divine from what I know of you: are you the sort of man who would put the poison into his own goblet or his enemy’s? Now, a clever man would put the poison into his own goblet, because he would know that only a great fool would reach for what he was given. I am not a great fool, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of you. But you must have known I was not a great fool, you would have counted on it, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of me. BUT... it's not that simple. See, iocane comes from Australia as everyone knows, and Australia is entirely peopled with criminals, and criminals are used to having people not trust them, as you are not trusted by me, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of you. And you must have suspected I would have known the powder’s origin, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of me!!
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Disagree with the second part of Jay's answer. At first I thought the hare was the wisest. He agreed to a challenge he could win, won it, and then gained some toothpaste AND A NINJA. A Ninja! How cool is that??? But then, since pineapple was eaten, he has no way to collect. Moose just made an obvious observation. And a smart ass comment to a figure of speech. He probably has no friends and gets beat up a lot. So, it's clearly the owl. Owls are always wise. Plus he avoided the story all together. And that's probably the wisest thing of all.
1) D has to be the answer. You can make a case for any of the other ones, but if they did NOT want to eat the pineapple, they would not do so. 2) B is definitely the right answer as well. The Hare won the race, but did not get anything in return since the Pineapple was eaten. The crow was clearly wrong. The owl was not mentioned. The Moose made the only correct statement, hence the wisest.
I'll agree that the answer to question 1 should be "because they wanted to", even though it's a very lazy answer that could be applied to anything. "Why did the pineapple challenge the hare to a race?" Because it wanted to. "Why did the hare accept the challenge?" Because it wanted to. My first reaction was "they were annoyed", and I still feel that's the answer the test was looking for, but "they wanted to" makes more sense. For question 2, I don't feel there can be a correct answer without context. Did the moose say, "Pineapples don't have sleeves" in Confucius' voice or Jerry Lewis'? It could have been a cryptically wise statement or it could have been the idiot rambling of a moose who doesn't understand a figure of speech. The crow was my first choice, since he was the only one who thought ahead enough to imagine a trick, but that's all laid to waste by the fact that he was stupid enough to suspect a pineapple of trickery. The wisest has to be the hare, who accepted a challenge he couldn't lose, and then ate the pineapple for not following through on his unrealistic promise of a ninja and a lifetime supply of toothpaste. Shoutout to the owl, who wisely avoided this whole mess (bnb wisely pointed that out), and shame on the stupid ass pineapple, who wanted an "honest race" even though it couldn't walk. Also, big shame on whoever thought this r****ded question was fit to be presented to our nation's children.
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