Plumbing the Death Star - Is the Magic School Bus an Effective Teaching Method? (Feat. Handsome Tom)
Episode Date: July 30, 2017In which our heroes enroll in school, sign up for a field trip, and find themselves on a hellride through the human body as we ask is the magic schoolbus an effective teaching method?Want to help fund...raise in aid of PSC Support? Just head over to sanspantsradio.podkeep.com and give what you can for a brand new D&D adventure! And if you’re wanting to know more about PSC Support, you can head here; http://www.pscsupport.org.uk.Check out our upcoming lives shows and purchase your tickets for our UK tour right here; http://www.sanspantsradio.com/live/ Want to help support the show?Sanspants+: sanspantsplus.comPatreon: patreon.com/sanspantsradioPodkeep: sanspantsradio.podkeep.comUSB Tapes: audiobooksontape.comMerch: redbubble.com/people/sanspantsradio or teepublic.com/stores/sanspantsradioWant to get in contact with us?Email: sanspantsradio@gmail.com Twitter: twitter.com/sanspantsradio Website: sanspantsradio.comFacebook: facebook.com/SansPantsRadioReddit: reddit.com/r/sanspantsradioOr individually at;Handsome Tom: twitter.com/AwkwardTreedJackson: twitter.com/AlldogsaredeadZammit: twitter.com/GoddammitZammit Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Sands Pants Radio, random non-sequitur.
Hey everybody, and welcome to this week's episode of Plumbing the Death Star,
where we ask the important questions like,
is the Magic School Bus an effective teaching method?
Seatbelts everyone!
Please let this be a normal field trip with a friend?
No way!
Okay, so for those, say, uninitiated,
who maybe were a little bit too old to watch said Magic School Bus.
You're never too old to watch the Magic School Bus.
I might have missed it in my growing up.
Well, it's a fairly basic concept.
So there's a lady named Miss Frizzle who has a class of,
I want to say, grade four-eths.
Yeah, they're not old.
No, they're like ten.
Ten, like eight to ten, I'd say.
They're perpetually 10
Is there something fucked up there?
Maybe it's one school year
I feel like it goes a lot longer though
How many seasons?
I reckon that redhead kid had like 3 birthdays
Yeah, that's a bit much
Anyway, and this teacher
Miss Frizzle, accompanied by
From memory, an iguana
Who is alive but can't talk
Called Liz They Called Liz, that's right. They
have educational field trips, but the way they have these field trips is that they hop into
the aforementioned magic school bus, which I guess means that Miss Frizzle is also
the bus driver. That's pretty funny. And the bus
then transforms into whatever is necessary, and then they will go on the
field trip. So say they're going to learn about space,
well, it'll become a spaceship, they'll go into space.
They're going to learn about the ocean,
it'll become like a submarine, and they'll...
Oh, it's magic.
It's a trans-dimensional...
It's a magic school bus.
It's in the title, I guess.
It's not the average school bus that sometimes is a rocket.
They're transforming school buses.
The school bus that is just...
It's some spectacular technology, G-Wiz.
It's like a TARDIS bus. Yeah, I suppose.
But it can kind of like, I guess it is.
But it has a face.
It's alive as well, I think. It's an anthropomorphic
bus that people climb inside of.
So like, you're in the bus's
guts.
But the bus doesn't talk, so maybe it just has a face.
Oh, the bus smiles. I know, but it responds though.
Because it's like, when people are talking about it, it's like
oh, I'm a bus. That's even the point of its mouth.
And then they climb inside its chest.
Anyway, my feeling is that if I was a 10-year-old child
and I needed to learn about space,
sending me to space,
like, aside from the bus being alive
and my teacher having us perpetually be 11 or whatever,
going to space doesn't teach a child about space.
It just puts a child in danger
Well, but I'm of the belief that the immersion into the activity gives you a better
So space is dumb, the dumb example
Dinosaurs, right?
Okay
So there's a dinosaur one where they go back in time to meet the dinosaurs
So there's all conjecture about the dinosaurs
Hot-blooded, cold-blooded
Did they have feathers? Did they not have feathers? Solved We've gone back in time Here meet the dinosaurs? So there's all conjecture about the dinosaurs. Hot-blooded, cold-blooded. Did they have feathers?
Did they not have feathers?
Solved.
We've gone back in time.
Here are the literal dinosaurs.
I have the answers.
Well, that's fantastic if Miss Frizzle's taking back our school bus full of scientists.
Future scientists, man.
One of these kids is going to cure dinosaur cancer.
You got me.
You got me.
Throw it back to future scientists.
But, like, young minds.
Moulding young minds.
Because, like, it's a kind of, you know, there's different methods of learning
and, like, it's the kinesthesia ones where you learn by touching
and doing and that kind of stuff.
So, like, for those students who are like, oh, this is fantastic,
I can go and I can pat a good herbivore dinosaur that won't mold me maybe,
and that's great.
There's that one kid with ADD, though, that goes and tries to hug a Tyrannosaurus.
Well, herein lies the fucking rub.
So, yes.
Is that, say I'm Miss Frizzle
and I've taken children back in Dinosaur Z
without their parents' permission.
Oh, yes.
Of course it's fine.
Oh, yeah, no.
There's no parent permission.
There's the danger.
Yeah, nah.
And I'm like, oh, we're having fun.
And then Carlos or whatever runs off,
gets eaten by a T-Rex.
Yeah, she gets sued.
That's my responsibility as a teacher to make sure my kid doesn't get eaten. Go on, try and sue a woman with a bus that can travel through time.
She can also shrink the bus down and go inside people's bodies.
That was my least favorite episode because the kid they go inside did not consent.
Is it the redhead kid?
Yeah.
He feels sick the whole
day and he doesn't know why. And that's
a nightmare. That's a nightmare. Miss Frizzle went
she's like knocking her. Ralphie.
Inside Ralphie is the
I just got a list of all the
episodes. Inside Ralphie
is a really
fucking dark title. You're learning
about germs. The class
need Ralphie to give them a store idea
For a broadcast day
Because apparently that's a thing
But Ralphie is sick so his mother, a doctor
Refuses to allow him to go to school
The mum there seems smart
If a kid can't go to school
The school will go into the kid
Miss Frizzle says that there is an amazing battle
Going on inside him
The class decide broadcast day should be about whatever is making Ralphie sick.
Okay, that's a bit of a weird leap, but it's a multimedia kind of exercise.
I think this is just like Miss Frizzle's the night before,
like, what are we going to do with the bus today?
But then...
That's what I imagined.
She hasn't thought...
No.
No.
So I'm starting to think that Miss Frizzle is literally not a teacher
but a bus driver, and because of shortages with education funding,
it's set in America, their education is flawed,
they've had to employ this bus driver as a teacher.
And she's like, I don't know how to teach kids.
She's the equivalent of the substitute teacher
who lets you watch Space Jam for five days straight.
She takes you on a crazy field trip on the bus.
Yeah, they're like, who's this person?
She's like a sub teacher, but she's got a magic bus.
That's a twofer right there.
That's real good.
Get her teaching the kids.
Then this is like, after shrinking and going into Ralphie's veins through a cut,
which I'm not pleasant.
No.
That makes me very unpleasant there.
The class traveled to Ralphie's sore throat to see what is making him sick.
Then his white blood cells see the bus as a threat and
attempt to devour it. Wow.
So first
of all, going, I mean like
there's no ledger sludge of... Who made the clutch of the boy?
That's my first point of problem.
I think we know.
Carlos.
I like to think Miss Frizzle
was just like Kids look away
A little cut on Carlos
But Ralphie from memory he's not allowed to come to school
No he's not
So they go to him
What if there had not been a cut
That's my point
Yeah but how would they have gotten in
Would have made a cut
I don't know and I don't like it
I feel like the bus
In my head I imagine the bus shoots a laser out Cuts a little hole and i don't like i feel like i feel like the bus also in my head i imagine the bus like shoots a laser out yeah cuts a little hole and ralphie's like ah oh he's got it's a sore
throat it's just gone straight to the mouth but like that's just all kinds of fucked up and then
it's like look it's weird that you're learning about it's like observing a war so for example
all right oi there's a turf war happening three streets over let's go and watch it as an observer
and you're like that sounds great uh let's go and watch it as an observer. And you're like, that sounds great.
Let's go there.
And then you're there and you get shot by a stray bullet.
This is bad.
Like, journalists don't do this.
If Miss Rizzo was like, I got to teach the kids about World War II
and took them back to World War II, you'd be like, that's not.
Could you imagine, like, if Miss Rizzo was a secondary school teacher
and was like, tell them going to learn about the Holocaust.
But this is including magic involved in time travel.
I'm saying if you take and use a literal world example,
this is so bad.
It's like, all right, what we're going to do is...
It's magic, so it's okay.
None of the kids are magic.
They're not protected.
We don't know that, though. They've always got whatever they need, though, in that bus okay. None of the kids are magic. They're not protected. Yeah, we don't know that, though.
We don't know that.
They've always got whatever they need, though, in that bus, right?
Yeah, but in the bus.
When it turns into the spaceship and they go into outer space,
the kids all of a sudden have spacesuits in the bus.
It's fitted out for space travel completely, I feel like.
But to become an astronaut is like a process.
Children aren't allowed to be astronauts for good reason.
You're too high thinking.
It's just, all right, I've learned that dog fighting is a thing
and it's horrible.
And then Miss Frizzle is like, correct,
let's go down to the local dog underground dog fight
and go have a look.
Don't worry, I've got us some good seats in the arena.
In the actual fight.
In the actual pit.
Guess what, Ralphie?
You're fighting a dog today
Not even that
It's just like you're observing and watching
But then the dogs just turn on the kids
But see, that's
That's what's happening here
No, because you're missing the fundamental point of the magic school bus
It's magic
That doesn't change the fact that it's a horrible duty of care
It changes it completely
Because you're saying in a scenario where it's a horrible duty of care. It changes it completely.
You're saying in a scenario where it's like come on guys, let's go watch a street fight.
You don't need a magic school bus to do that.
Exactly. So she's not going to do that.
No, but she'll take you inside a body
and you'll get eaten by a white blood cell.
Imagine this world where
Miss Frizzle doesn't somehow bat a hundred
every time and she goes into
Ralphie's body and the white blood cell just consumes the bus.
And everyone's like, what happened to those kids?
What happened to that bus?
We'd never know.
And that's very possible.
Yes.
Oh, this could get dark.
So what if the white blood cell consumes the bus?
And it's like, how do we get out of this?
We just make the bus big again.
Better Ralphie disappears than the bus and the school bus.
What happened to Ralphie?
I just imagine Miss Frizzle
with this like wild
maniac grin
being like,
it's him or you, kids.
It's him or you,
make the decision.
And that's an easy
decision to make.
I'm sorry, Ralphie,
but bye-bye.
Yeah, oh, absolutely.
And then it's just like,
you're being,
is that murder?
Yes, yes.
Or is that manslaughter?
In a court of law, I don't think you can do anything about magic school bus. Yes? Or is that manslaughter? In a court of law,
I don't think you can do anything
involving a magic school bus.
Well, there's no precedent for a magic school bus.
I like the magic school bus coming in in cuffs.
That's good.
Look, like...
Brr, brr, brr.
It's the first three episodes.
You've got...
Gets lost in space.
So Arnold's cousin, Janna,
visits Miss Frizzle's class
to go on a field trip to the planetarium
to watch a show about the solar system.
Now, this is great.
That's a really good idea for excursion.
Boring.
I want to go to space, Zamet.
Well, the planetarium is closed,
so Arnold suggests that they go into out of space.
Hang on.
That's Arnold's fault.
What even?
All right.
The class explores Mercury, Venus, and Mars
while Janet collects proof of their voyage.
In the asteroid belt
While Janet is trying to collect an asteroid as further proof
They lose Miss Frizzle and find themselves
Lost in space
She can just fuck off apparently at any given moment
Miss Frizzle clearly has no like
Like as a teacher you have a certain level of responsibility
Yeah
Now the next episode for lunch
Arnold really wants to
Break a school record
and to his surprise,
finally gets his wish by staying at school with Liz
while Miss Frizzle takes the class
on another weird field trip
without realising he is the field trip.
Not quite sure what the break a school record is,
but I'm assuming he's just traumatised
from his recent trip to being lost in space
that he's like,
I don't want to go on any field trip.
I'm staying in the class.
Wait, wait, wait.
Arnold's the field trip?
Do they go inside a body twice?
Yes.
They go inside his digestion tract.
So, like, I'm guessing here.
It's a second time.
Is his record like an eating record?
Like he's going to eat the most hamburgers in the cafeteria or something, I feel.
I don't know.
Or it's like Arnold really wants to break his school record,
as in, like, to maybe stay in school without going on one of Miss Frizzle's weird trips. He's like, I refuse. I don't know. Or it's like, Arnold really wants to break a school record, as in, like, to maybe stay in school
without going on one of Miss Frizzle's weird
trips. He's like, I refuse. I don't want to.
I'm afraid of going into space
again. What if?
Right? What if the magic
school bus and Miss Frizzle
and the whole, you know,
the kids are the same age the whole way through. What if
Miss Frizzle
is the devil?
I'm listening. The kids are the same age the whole way through. What if Miss Frizzle is the devil? Uh-huh.
I'm listening.
This is a form of hell for naughty children.
But they're having too much fun, though.
Are they?
Well, look.
Are they?
They seem like they're enjoying it.
I just don't think if I was in that class,
I would ever feel, like, I wouldn't feel safe.
And not just because I might go to space at any
time. I know that I've been inside
two children's
guts. Phoebe is worried about all the poor animals
living in the desert. How will they ever
survive? She decides to go to the desert in order
to do something about it. Like, what the fuck?
And it's like, yep, alright, we got this.
There's an episode. That's weird learning.
That's not how you learn. That's also dumb learning.
How do animals survive in the desert?
They just do
They don't need help
Just get them a textbook, Miss Frizzle
Also apparently the bus can break down
Well that's not good
It's not that magic then
Is Miss Frizzle a time lord?
Or some kind of
Magical entity?
Is she a demigod?
Well Miss Frizzle herself
Has no magic
How do we know though
Well the school bus does everything
What does Miss Frizzle achieve
She was wearing cool outfits
Yeah but if you had a magic bus you would too
Her outfits often reflect what they're doing
Before they do it too
So she makes the plan
Presumably the night before
To be like today we're going to space or the moon or whatever.
What have you learned?
Well, it's Miss Frizzle's birthday.
They want to make her a cake, but the bus starts playing up
and shrinks them all.
So now they have a problem of how to make a cake
while they're a millimeter tall.
No, the problem is that you're a millimeter tall.
How do I get bigger?
Have you guys seen Monster House?
Yes, recently.
Yeah, familiar with the concept?
What if Miss Frizzle and the magic school bus are a monster house?
Her husband was a bus driver and is now a magic school bus?
It punishes children.
I just don't like how the bus can act up.
I don't like how the bus can act up I don't like how the bus
It's sentient
You live inside it
We discussed this
It's clearly sentient
And has emotions and feelings
And you're at it's whim
Because you're inside it
Also it acted up
Not as in like
The mechanics of it broke down
It acted up as in
The school bus was like
I don't know
I'm gonna make everyone tiny
I don't know
I remember one episode
Where they all get turned into lizards
Yeah I remember that
Yeah
They get turned into lizards
To learn about lizards. What are the powers
of this magic bus? It can shrink
people, it can shrink itself. I think it's reality
changing. It's a demigod.
A bus is a demigod.
It can just do whatever it likes to kids.
It's like, I'm gonna
eat your lizards now. But it's at the whim of Miss Frizzle
because Miss Frizzle plans. Unless the bus is like,
Miss Frizzle, tomorrow we're going to space. And she's
like, I don't think that's good for the kids.
And the boss is like,
you better fucking do it.
Put on your space jumpsuit.
We're going to space.
What if there's like a deal going on?
What if the boss is the devil?
Yeah,
the boss is the devil.
Frizzle's like,
be as a bub.
The devil's the hench person?
I don't know.
See,
but your argument is though
that it's not a,
it's not a,
taking away all of the absurd, like, dangerous things you go through,
empirically, is there a better way to learn
than, like, actually getting the evidence?
Well, I think it would be fine if the magic school bus itself was safe.
Because then, fuck it, send kids to space.
But it happens.
It's just a bus.
That acts up.
Yeah.
Like, if the argument was we're kind of, like, watching a bus That acts up If the argument was
We're kind of watching a reenactment of something
Because that's again another good way of learning
But what
Miss Frizzle is doing is
She's doing all of that
We're learning by doing
Which is, it's fine
That is a technique that you can do
But when it's always that, that's bad
Well I think it's kind of weird because
I don't think if I was put inside a human body I would learn about the human body a technique that you can do, but when it's always that, that's bad. Well, I think it's kind of weird because, like,
I don't think if I was put inside a human body
I would learn about the human body.
And not just because I'd be terrified the whole time.
You've got context.
Yeah, I'm just like, it's all pink mush.
She's like, that's the liver. I'm gonna be like,
okay. Because it's not
we gotta remember, like,
a university level education or even a high school level
education. It's like a primary school education.
Yeah, true.
So it's not like, oh, we're inside the heart,
so we can look at the different ventrises and where shit's coming and going
and all the intricate bullshit.
It's just like, the heart.
That said, like, I do love edutainment.
It is a fun little thing of mine that I actually enjoy.
So she's making her classes interesting.
Like, you are going to remember these classes.
Well, maybe not, though.
Maybe they're just like a blank.
Yeah, I'd repress them.
I'd repress them.
A trauma.
So, Ralphie, what's wrong?
He's like a 30-year-old guy, can't sleep.
Every time he sees a dinosaur or the stars,
he just goes out in cold sweats and he can't remember why.
And he's like, was I a boy who was a lizard
or am I just a lizard who was a man?
Every now and again, he just does this.
I like to think every time he gets sick,
he goes to the doctor and he's like, check me for buses.
What?
Nothing.
Is there a bus? Well, I want to the doctor and he's like, check me for buses. What? Nothing. Is there a bus out?
I want to know about the digestive system one with Arnold.
Does that mean he shit the bus out?
I mean, like, that's the digestive system.
I'm assuming then that
Arnold's classmates have now
been in and out of Arnold's butthole.
And here's, you know,
Miss Frizzle now a pedophile.
Unbeknownst to Arnold as well,
he didn't, without realising that he is the field,
he didn't know.
He didn't consent to this.
At no point was Arnold like, yeah, that's fine.
You can go in my...
Why not, Miss Frizzle?
Go to a fucking medical school.
Be like, hey, I'm teaching kids about digestion.
I've got a magic school bus.
You got anybody that would willingly let a bus inside them
and they're just
going to be
excuse me
what are you
what is this
what are you
and you both
just answered the
question as to
why she doesn't
ask for permission
if you can do that
how about this
instead
why don't you
teach
first off
let's just
ask ourselves
as not students
but people who
are expertise
in this field
if you can do what you say
you do, this will just improve
our field of knowledge for quite
a dramatic event. So let's just do this
ourselves. This is amazing. And you say
you can do this too. Can we employ
you to teaching like
university level?
Not do it at a university level.
She's just starting out.
Also, we've established she's a substitute teacher's just starting out She hates Also we've established
She's a substitute teacher
Slash bus driver
Yeah she hates the education
Yeah she hates the education system
Yeah
She didn't go to school
She didn't go to school
Because she has a magic school bus
She did all of her learning
She's like one of those
Free range children
That like
Didn't go to school
Or like was like a
Steiner school kind of thing
Oh my god
Oh
Wow
What's Is it worse Or better If Miss Frizzle uses herself Steiner school kind of thing. Oh my god. Wow.
Is it worse or better if Miss Frizzle uses
herself? So if
Miss Frizzle is like, everybody
get in the bus, we're going in me.
No, but like... Oh, then who's
driving the bus? The bus can drive
itself. But then like...
The bus can drive itself. But what happens when
something goes wrong? You're basically sending
again, using real world, trying to get this to real examples.
It's like, let's go to a field excursion.
I have a zoo in my backyard.
Just go nuts.
I'm not going to watch you.
All right, kids.
I bought a beer.
Everybody come out the back.
Let's have a look at it.
Yeah.
And like you go have a look at it while I go make our sandwiches.
Yeah.
And like you go have a look at it while I go make us sandwiches Yeah
Do you reckon like the other teachers
The other faculty at whatever school
Like hate Miss Frizzled?
Yeah
There's that bitch
Going inside kids
Also it's taking a whole school day as well
Yeah
That's true
Parents, could you imagine like
It's like School of Rock scenario
The parents all come in and just like
Yell at the principal
I'm trying to work out Because I'm thinking of like You know more high school They have different periods It's like the School of Rock scenario. The parents all come in and just yell at the principal.
I'm trying to work out because I'm thinking of more high school.
They have different periods.
In grade four, you just have your own class.
Where has it changed?
I haven't been to primary school for a while now. Yeah, no, frankly neither.
Unless they're learning...
When are they learning math?
They're not learning math.
They'll learn math on a day where they go into a math...
It's like, what are we going to do today? We're going to find the last digit of pi. Let's go, kids. Well, they're not learning math. They'll learn math on a day where they go into a math.
It's like, oh, what are we going to do today?
We're going to go, we're going to find the last digit of pi.
Let's go, kids.
Or it's like, we're going to learn about Pythagoras' theorem.
Let's go meet that dickhead.
Yeah, they can go to Greece.
Oi, Pythagoras.
Tell us about your theorem.
I like to think it'd get even more like, just out there than that.
She's like, today we're going to, everything is just math, children. We're going to's like today we're going to everything is just math children we're going to shrink
that we're going to become math
they just do that Ant-Man thing where they become
like through molecules
until they're just the concept of
things like the
concept of a bus full of children
grade four what's that in terms
of like that's like 10 yeah
at 10
what do you what are your educational needs because I'm kind of approaching this maybe a little bit too more
sophisticated because it's like pythagoras theorem that's you're not teaching that to
10 year olds what are you teaching tables i think time tables sort of spelling and grammar
basic basic math yeah fractions you really want to use basic stuff here yeah and like taking
someone to the human body that that's advanced biology shit.
Yeah, it's confusing in there.
Because this is hemoglobin.
What?
This is...
You've got to try to explain that.
You give them fun names.
Like the hemoglobin.
Yeah, this is a hemoglobin.
Ah, my body's full of goblins!
She just traumatises them again.
Oh my god, because if they go to Ralphie
and they see his throat
and everyone's having a fight
between white blood cells and infection,
they're like, that's inside me right now.
Get it out of me.
Because you have that idea
that apparently there's thousands of mites
living on your eyelashes right now
that we just don't know or care about
because they're so fucking tiny.
Hang on.
What?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Living in your eyeballs is like thousands of little microbes
that aren't part of you.
Yeah.
I'm not happy.
Do you know your body's mostly things that aren't part of you?
That's just how the human body works.
I want to cut my eyes out now.
We have things that live inside us that aren't part of us
but that just have evolved to live inside us.
That's the beauty of nature.
Let me just have a quick Google of an eyelash eyelash No, no, I don't want to know
I'm happy and not knowing
Oh my god, this is what the kids in Mrs. Fris's classroom must think
This little bugger like here
This little eyelash
This little face hugger
I'm pulling out all of my eyelashes
Oh my eyes are so itchy now
So this is your hair follicle
And that's where they live.
They don't live there.
I want to pluck my eyes and scratch them.
Just pluck your eyeballs completely out.
Do I need to see?
No.
When that's the downside of seeing, I'm good.
Because that's a weird concept,
and you're a mid-20-year-old man learning this,
and you're uncomfortable.
Imagine learning this at 10.
So my health theory holds up.
She's the devil.
This is a good way to punish kids.
But you're right, the kids have too much fun.
Carlos is making puns.
He's having a good time.
Carlos does do puns.
He's pun crazy, and he loves it.
And everyone's like, Carlos, you fucking dickhead.
Shut up.
In terms of an educational tool, it's overcomplicated.
It's too much for what I would consider 10-year-olds.
Yeah.
Like, if you're learning, like, if you're teaching, like, a unit, say,
on dinosaurs for 10-year-olds,
generally you kind of want to eke that out over a couple of weeks.
You're like, there were dinosaurs.
Here are some of the dinosaurs.
Because you're not going to have like a, it's a dinosaur day
today, because that's kind of what's happening
here. She's like, a whole day dedicated to dinosaurs.
We're going to go back in time and see these big dumb lizards.
Sick. So what I want to know
is though, are the kids now like 10 years from
now just fucking geniuses though?
What are the positive effects? Yeah, but okay, so imagine if
one point in your life you'd gone back
in time, seen dinosaurs, Miss Frizzle
would have been like, that's the this dinosaur. Because that's what I'm assuming the education you get, seen dinosaurs miss frizzle had been like that's
the this dinosaur like because that's what i'm assuming the education you get is miss frizzle
just being like that's a triceratops that's a t-rex they ate this grass they like it's still
because and and and this is a little matter but it's just the case the magic school bus the tv
show was designed to educate kids of the same age as the kids on the magic school bus which means
that the information those kids learned was information
appropriate.
Although that's good.
No,
but it's not because it means those kids got the same level of education
they would had they just had an already good teacher.
So it's unnecessary.
That's what I mean.
You're like,
well,
those kids be geniuses.
No,
they just would have at one point seen dinosaurs.
But they could be geniuses now because, uh, no, maybe not. No. They just would have at one point seen dinosaurs. But they could be geniuses now because...
No, you're actually hitting the nail on the head here.
It's like you could have been, say, gone and watched the dinosaur people
or you could have watched a documentary about the guys who went...
You've learnt the same information.
And because Miss Frizzle is kind of teaching to these kids who are...
Yeah, it's the same information.
But see, the kids couldn't learn.
The kids who watched the documentary about the people in the magic school bus couldn't learn the requisite information that they're learning from watching the documentary if the magic school bus doesn't go back in time to the dinosaurs.
No, but I mean if they just watched any documentary on dinosaurs.
All right.
They're geniuses because they can literally do a fully immersive topic every day.
Well, that's assuming that-
So by the time they finish grade four,
they've actually learnt everything.
Well, again, this comes down to what the kids
and which kid learns what better.
Because there might be one kid that actually learns better
by watching a dinosaur documentary than a kid who is like,
I'm going to go and experience dinosaurs.
I don't want to stay at home eating hamburgers.
Yeah, exactly.
Or I'm going to read a textbook or I'm going to write a report.
How many days of the year do you like?
At school?
Yeah, at school.
In grade four, how many days of the year are you there?
I feel like there's about three something, something, something.
So take 60 days out for the three months of summer.
Yep.
So we're at 300.
And then you probably, you then lose weekends.
So that's 50.
Yeah.
100 days because there's two every week.
That's about 100 days.
So we're now at 200.
Yeah.
And then you're losing like two weeks of the year for school holidays.
Chuck in an extra week of public holidays.
We're now looking at seven times four.
Let's call it 50.
Rightio.
50, 60.
So we're now at 140 days.
It's got 140 days of school.
It's 140 days of school.
And every single one of those days, good math, by the way, and every single one of those
days.
Yeah, I know.
I'm really, I'm actually really impressed with myself.
Yeah, that was real good.
It was great to watch.
Oh, thanks guys.
I don't need no magic school bus.
See, you didn't need magic school bus, you know math.
Well done.
Every one of those days is taken up by a different topic. Yeah. But that's not how you teach
people. No, and this is the thing, if this was part of like a larger topic
so again, you're like, alright, the whole thing is about dinosaurs, so this is what dinosaurs
are, and now we're going to go to the dinosaur place
and actually go back to where the dinosaurs were and look at them and be like, sick
alright, now I want you to write a report about a particular dinosaur.
Yeah.
You know, that's how you sort of teach.
That's education.
It's like you do multiple kind of facets about that one particular topic.
Yeah.
And because you're doing this to 10-year-olds, it needs to be general.
And this is just...
It's not.
It's not.
Although, you know what?
Having said that, they went inside Ralphie's body and who was the other guy?
Arnold.
Arnold.
So that's two sessions on the human body.
So do they literally go into different people's bodies to learn about different parts of the body?
Are they going into someone's brain?
A white blood cell and illness.
Another one you're learning about a digestive tract.
So technically, she is breaking them down into units,
which to say that the dinosaur excursions are three,
and they go to the Triassic period, the Jurassic period,
and the Cretaceous period.
I like to think they go to the extinction event.
Yeah, this is an extinction event, kids.
Hold on to your butts.
Let's go.
Because if that's how she's operating it, then that's kind of,
I mean, still not good.
Still not good.
And also again
We are looking at this
As in this is happening every day
We might just be getting a sliver of
Fuck going to that school
If it's not happening every day
Well we might just be getting this
As a slice of life
Actually you know what
Having said that
The kids are always pretty shocked
Aren't they
No they're not shocked
But they're excited
Like it's not
I imagine there are days
When Miss Frizzle
Doesn't take them on adventures.
There has to be.
That's ridiculous.
There's only 52 episodes.
So they're at school 140 days.
They're not going on an adventure.
So here you go.
When they go back in time to meet the dinosaurs, that's the last part.
You'd hope.
Or maybe it's the first part, and then they use that learning in class.
So...
Yeah, actually...
It's a good education system.
If they're only going 50 times to this stuff, they go, they come back,
they then spend like two, three weeks on the curriculum,
but they get a cool excursion, which, you know, I went to the museum,
you went back in time.
Okay, fair.
So look, I'm coming around to it.
Yeah, me too.
I think I'm winning.
52 excursions in a year is a bit much.
Yeah, but if you've got the-
It's one a week.
Yeah, that's what I'm saying.
It's one a week.
It's a bit much.
Actually, it's more than one a week because there's weeks where you're not at school.
So it's a little bit too much.
I think Miss Frizzle calmed down.
Unless this is taking place over the course of maybe two or three years,
then that's a bit better.
Who knows how many...
Well, you are missing out on something important
because it's just science really, isn't it?
They're not going back in time to learn like how to spell.
They could do, but they could.
They could go back to like Victorian era London
and meet Shakespeare and learn about how he created words.
But they go back to Shakespeare.
They'll be like Shakespeare.
Teach these four great forces of spell.
Recycling, water erosion.
Yeah, but those aren't
still science.
That's science.
That's what we call science.
Salmon migration.
That's what we call
What was that?
Color.
That's still science.
Archaeology.
That's what we call
That's history and geography
I reckon.
And science.
No.
Archaeology is science.
Honeybees is science.
That's science.
That's what we call science.
Oh, but okay.
So what if she branched out into space rocks? Man, she's doing more space. Energy. That's justes are science. They're science. That's what we call them. Oh, but okay. So what if she branched out into space rocks?
Man, she's doing more space energy.
That's just straight up science.
What if she's a science teacher?
Uh-huh.
So she comes in.
So at primary school, we had a science teacher.
Yeah.
So we didn't necessarily do science in the classroom.
You would actually go to a specific classroom with a science teacher,
and she would teach about something scientific. So what if Frizzler with a science teacher and she would teach about something scientific.
So what if Frizzler is a science teacher and, like, twice a week you go
and you learn specifically about science and there's another teacher
who teaches you history and English and math?
That's good.
That kind of makes sense.
Like, you're like, okay, because in a school day, yeah,
I had the same thing, not with science, but with, like, art and music
and a couple of other ones.
Yeah, like an extra teacher who wasn't, like like your homeroom teacher or whatever you call it.
So maybe these kids are like, well, I've done my English suite.
We're going to Miss Frizzle to learn about where are we going to go today?
No, no, no.
Because they've got a space for like the whole day.
No, no, no, no, no.
Maybe they don't, though.
It's a magic school bus.
Surely it's like Narnia, right?
You go in the wardrobe, You're there for like 25 years
You come back
You've been gone for 5 minutes
It would have to be your first period
I don't think that's how it works in the show
Because when they go inside
Like the lad
I'm guessing it's a whole day
You know what I mean
I haven't seen the episode
But I would argue when they go inside
So that's what I mean
They have a day of science
It's a science elementary school
Like it's a science based school
It's a K to 12 So it's kindergarten to science? It's a science elementary school. It's a science-based school. It's a K-12, so it's kindergarten to 12,
and it's a science-specific school.
These things happen.
You have sports-based schools, art schools.
It's like a reverse Steiner school.
It's an Einsteiner school.
I hope you'll be sitting on that for the last 10 minutes.
No.
I'm really happy with myself.
Off-the-cuff hero.
So as a learning tool, look, it's not a bad one
because it is basically an excursion.
It is a very fucked excursion.
It's irresponsible as fuck, but it's still a good science.
You didn't say, is the magic school bus irresponsible?
That's true.
Because if the answer is yes.
Yes, absolutely.
Is it a good educational tool?
Possibly.
Essentially, because again, you're hitting those different areas of how you learn.
Yeah.
And so long as they're doing follow-ups and kind of discussion.
They're actually exploring the subject instead of just going and that's good.
Well done.
Now you learn about dinosaurs.
You're like, wait, what?
I feel that's good.
Here's what I.
We're going to take you back in time and we're going to show you a T-Rex.
Fuck, I got a T-Rex. That's sick.
All right, let's quickly go back where it eats us.
Sick, we're back.
All right, now we're going to learn about T-Rexes.
I think if you're going to do it properly, you do two excursions per subject.
So you do the first one, you go back to see the dinosaurs.
You come back, you're like, right, for the next two weeks,
we're going to be learning everything we can about dinosaurs.
And then at the end of those two weeks, we're going to go back
and you can use what you've learned, like that's like your exam
to interact with a T-Rex
to uh, yeah
I don't know how you use it
you know what I mean, you come back and you're like
what is this? and now you've got the
knowledge whereas at first it's like
the first one is there
to kind of show, introduce, you put your toe in the water
then you come back in the real world
you learn books, all that kind of stuff.
Then at the end, instead of like a pop quiz,
you almost do like an interactive pop quiz.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Nice.
So it's like, what's this?
That's a T-Rex.
Correct.
What's it trying to do?
Eat us.
Correct.
You did it wrong.
Here's what bums me out for those kids,
what I think is kind of sad for them.
You live this amazing year with Miss Frizzle, you know,
two excursions to see the dinosaurs.
Ah, then you go to space.
Oh my God.
Every couple of weeks is like the most exciting adventure of your life.
And eventually I'm sure you figure out that like none of you are going to really die because
none of you really have, you know, you'd start to feel really safe.
Then you reach the end of the school year, you have your end of year celebration and
then you go to like Mr. Johnson and he's like, right.
And you're like, what excursions are we doing he's like no no excursion we go to the museum halfway through
the year and then we go to the zoo at the end and you're like well did you have the same art and
music teacher all the way through primary school i did so there you go i suppose all right all right
then you finish grade six yeah and they're like we'll enjoy uh puberty in high school and you're
like you're fucking 15 you're in the middle of your teenage angst and they're like, well, enjoy puberty in high school. And you're like, you're fucking 15,
you're in the middle of your teenage angst, and you're like,
I remember when I went to space.
I'm never going to get to go back. No, no, no, no, no.
Here's the thing. You go, I'm never going to get
to go back. Unless
I become an astronaut.
And so you apply all of the space
stuff that you learn, and you become a, like,
you learn, you learn, you become
really good, and then you graduate, and you become a pilot you learn you become really good and then you graduate
and you become a pilot and then you become an astronaut and you get to go back
to space. No because
the way my mind would
work would be like
I really want to go back
to space. Miss Frizzle
went back to space. I'm going to
go speak to Miss Frizzle. Miss Frizzle
how did you do that? Can I have
that magic bus
like i'd be trying to follow that path no but i see what you mean it might inspire you maybe
i'll become like an educator and try to become try to get that magic school bus maybe still that
bus imagine this you're like oh go to space you you take your path to me like i'm i'm gonna become
an astronaut you know you gotta you train you train Eventually you get to go in the ISS And you get to space and it looks completely different
To when you went with Miss Frizzle
But that's just growing up
What do you mean that's just growing up?
What if it's like you're like
This is not at all
Where did she take us?
Or you become a doctor and you look in the human body
And you're like this is all wrong
Where did you go?
What do you mean it's all wrong?
So she was taking you somewhere else I don't know but i could that's the kind of feat because
real space is different from the kind of space that miss frizzle took you to adam was saying
before as we spoke that at the end of uh every episode they would have somebody who would be like
hero the the things that we yeah exactly, exactly. How terrifying!
I guess I'm positing that she's not taking you to real space.
She's taking you to some kind of nightmare Miss Frizzle space.
I was under the assumption that we're going, you know,
she's actually taking us to space and doing all this. And that those faction accuracies exist in the TV show.
However, he's a cartoon version of the creator.
So he exists within the reality of the show.
Yeah, but, like, we're putting Miss Frizzle in the real world.
Yeah.
Yeah, fair.
Although that's a terrifying thought.
So she's kind of like, all right, everyone close your eyes
and just plugged everyone into a matrix.
Everyone just got matrix and was like, I've been in space.
And Miss Frizzle's there, like, flipping through a magazine.
Yes, you were. Yep, that's space. Totally in space and Miss Frizzle was there like flipping through a magazine yes you were
totally in space
enjoy
wow
dickheads
they just start
no what happens is
there though
is that she does that
and then they roll it out
across the board
to every school
in the world
because it's low maintenance
you just plug children in
and you don't have to do anything
exactly
you know where did
you know Miss Frizzle
apparently vanished at one point
no it just glitched out a bit
you know what I mean
it's one of those problems.
She had to pay.
It's just one of those things.
Yeah.
So, like, as an educational tool,
going to events and seeing them firsthand is an interesting one.
It's basically like a very in-depth excursion.
Yeah.
Yep.
There's arguments for and against if that would actually make a good
uh educational tool because against depends what they're learning depends like you know going
inside a human body and seeing like an actual war happening and then you're getting attacked
it's not good you're just not going to be paying enough attention to get educated it just seems
that every time something goes wrong, sometimes you're a lizard,
sometimes you're lost in space,
sometimes you're getting attacked by white blood cells,
sometimes you're getting shot out by a classmate.
Something is very weird.
I forgot we're getting shot out.
Fuck, you're learning about decomposition.
Dad, what are you learning here?
Yeah, I think at the end of the day,
like, it's good,
but there are other methods that are working.
Like, it's good, but it's not necessary.
It's good, it's not necessary.
And I feel 10-year-olds, this is a technology
that should not be given to someone who is looking after 10-year-olds.
Yeah, right.
She's a rogue agent.
Is Miss Frizzle of the same ilk as Rick Sanchez from Rick and Morty?
They're not actually going back in time.
They're going to alternate dimensions.
See, that's, I would watch that show.
Get in the bus.
Get in the bus.
Get in the bus.
Get in the bus.
Oh, bus, bus, bus.
I was enjoying imagining Miss Frizzle as a terrible drunk,
like earlier while we were talking, just being like,
why don't we get a little day?
Oh, go to the human body. Ralphphie's sick all right everybody in the bus
that's fine
gotta see what's going on ralphie gotta cure ralphie we're gonna let's go
miss frizzle standing there with that classic r Sanchez Bit of drool Looking at like the white blood cells Being like oh my god
Just curse
Ralphie goes inside him
You cut him real deep
How else do you think
We're gonna get inside his body
You idiots
You gotta go in the vein
You kids
Now we're gonna learn
What happens when a body bleeds out
While we're inside it
We've got a time limit now
Somebody out there
Should really do
Like a parody TV show
For your adult swim or something
Rick Frizzle
That's kind of vain, that'd be amazing
Don't tell your parents where we went today kids
Just collapses
Oh that's sad
As a teaching method
Maybe the kids are learning something
It's not the best teaching method, it's fine of care bad terrible and this does it like she's incompetent the duty of
care and the the recklessness probably means it's not great but as an educational tool they're
probably worse ones if it was this kind of like i don't know what they are but they're probably
dead fish but every day look on the scale of like no dead fish every day would be the best
all right everyone lie down frizzle's got a headache oh boy we don't have to go on a crazy
oh my god thank god i feel like i'd get like terrible anxiety like i would be chatting to my
where does frizzle sit on like the the you know like dangerous substitute
teacher scale like you know like you're you're you're dewey finn from uh do we finn from school
of rock like oh yeah where does she sit on that scale miss frizzle has good intentions it seems
like yeah she's clearly intelligent yeah intelligence she's got good intentions she's
also actually a teacher as far as we know yeah we, that's true. Well, that's an assumption. That's a leap
that we're making. But, like, it assumes that.
At least she's got a bus. That's something that
definitely knows that we know. She knows when they're in the place,
wherever it is, she knows what the things are.
In my head, she's more responsible than every teacher at Hogwarts.
Yeah. Oh, yeah, absolutely.
In terms of an educator, she's doing pretty good.
And there is a variety
of things you are learning. Yes, they're all very much science
based, but there's still a variety of stuff we're learning,
whereas with the School of Rock, we're just learning rock.
Oh, yeah, as an educator.
We're learning how to believe in ourselves, guys.
Yeah, that's still, like, education's important.
Learning is integral to learning.
I need to know about history and English.
I need math, otherwise.
Yeah, but Miss Frizzle, she's actually teaching
because she knows what she's talking about.
Clearly she did a dip
at some point or something.
Like, if I was looking at this,
scanning the sort of topics, I'm like,
this is very nice, but like, you're right, this is
all very science-based. Where are the stuff on like
art, literature, that kind of thing? But as we
suggested, she could just be the science teacher.
She could just be the science teacher, correct.
That means the school's complicit in it then, yeah?
Yeah.
Well then, yeah. And then if the school
is complicit in it, that means that
the duty of care is
taken care of. So it's semi-taken care
of because then the
parents would know about it as well.
Do they sign like a waiver at the start of the year?
Like if my kid gets eaten by a bear,
that's cool. It's like your general excursion waiver.
They don't need to know where you go.
It's just like any damages sustained to your child.
Because I'm sure that's on excursion things.
If he bumps his knee or whatever,
it's not like you can't sue us.
I'm sure that's on excursion waivers.
It's just that instead of a bumped knee,
it's like eaten by a centipede.
That's the difference here.
But it's just phrased generally enough that the parents are like, yeah, it's like eaten by a centipede. That's the difference here. Yes.
But it's just phrased generally enough that the parents are like,
yeah, that's fine, I get it.
It covers everything.
That school has a really good lawyer.
Unless this is like this is the only school of its kind,
which is like this is our selling point.
So like the teachers and students and parents are all aware about this.
Sort of like how some people, I don't know if it happens at like a 10-year-old,
but they're like, well, we've got an excursion or like a school exchange program
where we can send these kids to like, I don't know,
like an exotic foreign location for their education.
Does that happen at like a primary school level where they might be like,
well, send your kid to on a field trip to like Antarctica or whatever. No, not in like a primary school level Where they might be like We'll send your kid on a field trip to like
Antarctica or whatever
No not in like a primary school
I feel like it's high school
Unless you're in rich school
Like it's a private school
No these kids don't look rich
In
It is middle class America
I know in primary school
Like when I was like
It was generally
You'd have to get also parents helping
So parents would come on excursions as well
You don't need it because you've got a bus
That is sentient.
You need a certain number of adults and guardians
for a certain level, like number of...
I think it's one to five.
I think the rest of the school is just too afraid of Miss Frizzle.
Well, how many kids are in Frizzle's class?
Like 12 maybe?
So that's not a lot.
The bus is sentient.
The bus is a person.
And the lizard is basically a person. So there's three to 12. That's so odd. That's four a lot. The bus is sentient. The bus is a person. And the lizard is basically a person.
So there's three to 12.
That's not too bad.
That's four kids each.
Yeah, that's fine.
That's pretty reasonable.
And I feel like Ralphie is probably also a tattletale-y kind of teacher's pet.
He can look after the kids.
Or is it like when the kid's going and talking to their parents,
like, we did this?
It's like, yes, yes.
I'm sure you did.
Of course you went and saw real dinosaurs
and were like, you know, almost ate by a millipede
or like turned into a lizard.
That was, I guess, I guess what.
Got shit out of kids' butts.
I'm sure you just were like, you know.
Overactive imagination.
Take your Ritalin, son.
Yeah, so like maybe they're watching a very basic documentary class.
Wait, you were suggesting when I was like,
once you leave that class, you leave it forever,
you were like, well, it's a science teacher.
Does that mean she's taking like prep kids on excursions?
Oh, boy.
Like six-year-olds?
Yeah, but I reckon they'd be different.
They'd be different excursions?
They'd be like the zoo.
Just normal.
Because like what's...
Or she uses the school bus to bring things to them maybe.
Ah, see, that's clever.
She's like, I've brought her before dinosaur hit.
Well, maybe not that because it'd die in our atmosphere,
but I brought something good that you kids can just...
Maybe that's what she does and for, like,
it's not until you get to grade four,
so like the senior end of primary school, so four, five, six. Yeah, that's when she does and for like it's not until you get to grade 4 so like the senior end of
primary school so 4, 5, 6
then you start to
yeah because you wouldn't want to do that in prep because
in prep you're like I'm learning to colour in
and how to be just
maybe you don't do the excursions until
you get to like an advanced level
I think that's probably a reasonable way to do it because kids don't need
if you're 2 you do not need to go to space
you're not two in prep.
In grade two.
Well, you could be advanced for your age.
I think at the end of the day
if I found out that my children
were having these trips, I would take them out of that
school. I think if I found out that
my children were having those trips, I would go to school.
I'll supervise
this excursion.
Are we going to space again, I would go to school. I'll supervise this excursion. Fuck you.
Where are we going, Mr. Fris?
We're going to space again.
I got my astronaut helmet.
Well, we don't need it because you can't produce air or some shit.
See?
See?
Let's go.
Frizzle.
Look, I cut myself.
Let's go inside me.
Hop in.
Come on.
Hop in.
No, wait.
I want to be a pirate.
I'll cut you.
I think this is going to lead.
Can you cut your own child?
Maybe.
In my mind, he was cutting Miss Frizzle.
No, no, no.
No, it's darker than that.
In my mind, I was cutting Miss Frizzle, but all right.
Ralphie's sick.
Ralphie's sick.
We have to go inside Ralphie.
It turns into Munchhausen syndrome.
Ralphie's sick.
Ralphie's so sick.
Ralphie, drink this bleach, Ralphie. What's wrong with Ralphie, everyone turns into Munchhausen syndrome. Ralphie, look how sick Ralphie is. Ralphie, drink this bleach, Ralphie.
What's wrong with Ralphie, everyone?
Get inside.
Let's see who's got to get the bleach out of Ralphie.
Ah, Jesus.
So in that case, Miss Frizzle's a hero
because she identifies that one of her students' parents
has Munchhausen's by proxy.
Or just massive FOMO about her class.
So it's a good educational tool. It's a potentially good educational her class. So it's a good educational tool.
It's a potentially good educational tool.
It's a good educational tool.
It's just not a healthy educational tool.
It's wrought with problems.
I have further questions that may be for another episode
of the implications of this when you grow up.
But I think that's for another day.
And on that note, I've been Jackson Bailey.
I've been Joel Zamet.
I've been Handsome Tom.
Now that magic...
Uh-oh.
That's just on the
school motto.
Magic...
Uh-oh.
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