"Are you smarter than a 5th grader"

America recently has undergone a game show craze revival. There are many game show that runs over many years, such as "Wheel of Fortune" and "Price is right." It does not take a lot of knowledge to play these games. It takes luck and some guessing to win at these games. There is also a long running game show "Jeopardy" that target toward the intellectuals. And at 3:30pm, who is going to watch?? Only people with substanial knowledge can score on that game. On average I may be able to give the correct question to 1 or 2 answers. Then recently there are new, big money, starts-off-easy quiz shows such as "Who wants to be a millionaire?" Almost anyone can answer the first few questions, and that attracts you to watch them. Then there are a number of copycat shows not so worthwhile mentioning. I like "The Weakest Link". It is fast pace and fun. But you do not have to embarrass the contestants, ok?

Recently while channel surfing, I found a great new game show on Fox, Thursday night at 8 'clock. "Are you smarter than a fifth grader?". See this link: http://www.fox.com/areyousmarter/ for details.

You play along with a bunch of fifth graders for big money, and you only answer grade school level questions. If you lose, you must face the camera and admit that "I am not smarter than a fifth grader."

Here is a 3rd grade astronomy question, "Which is hotter? regular yellow star, red dwarf, or a blue giant". Gosh I am not sure. So red has longer wavelength, imply hotter or colder? The answer is blue giant.

Here is a 3rd grade math question that stumbled the contestant: "how many sides does a rhombus have?" Only students with interest in math remember a rhombus is a parllelogram with 4 sides congruent to each other.

Here is a 4th grade history question, "Which year did Lincoln first elected as president?" Now only people with interest in civil war history may remember this one when grown up.

These are all great educational questions that we should know when we were fifth grade. Much of these are learned and forgotten. The 5th graders on the show may probably forget when they grow up.

But this show is a great informational and fun show for families to watch. Great family activity that I would play with 9-year-olds.

American schools have a LOT of improvement to do. Kids must realize that learning is for their own good. Shut off that video game and wacky music and learn something!!