University Challenge - Leaf ID shock.

[Dunelm]

I don't how many of you wantched last night's University Challenge on BBC2 but one of the picture questions asked the team to ID 3 common trees by their leaves - hawthorn, ash and hazel. It's a sad indictiment of our education system that 4 medical students from Imperial College said "Beech" for all 3.

Ho hum.

Back to work...

 

[gregorach]

Hehe - yeah, I saw that. Made me feel really good about myself getting all three...

The starter for 10 was to identify an oak leaf - my immediate thought was "I don't know which oak that is", but of course they just wanted "oak".

I got the impression they didn't know any other trees. Or what a beech leaf looks like.

Mind you, I once watched a student at my old Uni spend a good five or ten minutes trying to figure out how to work a vending machine, before giving up and walking away...

 

[leon-1]

Yes, but I think that Paxmans comment said it all "you're a right lot of townies aren't you".

Having said that the other lot from Oxford coldn't have been all that good, the starter question was "what is this leaf?" and they had to think about it

To quote Paxman again "Yes it's the common English Oak"

Now that is a sad state of affairs. They could tell you the exact distance of a picometre expressed as a decimal, but not identify an Oak leaf , so much for university education.

 

[Dunelm]

Yes, I was feeling very smug with myself until the medical students answered 3 questions about insane numbers expressed 10-to-the-power-of-18!

 

[mark a.]

It's got nothing to do with the education system - since when have schools or universities needed to teach about tree leaves? Only in a very few areas are they relevant, and perhaps in the dim and distant past at primary school do you draw around fallen leaves etc. Medical students especially really don't need to know about leaves, unless you're talking about exotic plants with proven medicinal purposes.

 

[macthemaths]

Education system?

Parents says I.

They would have (probably) looked at leaves a couple of times during their school life but it is walks in the woods with your family and friends that helps it stick in your mind.

Perhaps list members might like to offer guided walks to their local primary schools?

Regards,
Chris