We had that, boys and girls, in 7th grade, 8th grade and 9th grade. We learned how to comparison shop, make a grocery list, apply for jobs, have a cheese tasting, basic nutrition, meal planning, simple sewing and simple cooking.

Miss Fallon was our home ec teacher, and she was a really great lady!

I didn't need the sewing class they forced us to take in junior high, I'd been sewing for 3-4 years by then and had even won a prize (a pair of pinking shears) for a dress I made. So, while everyone else had to make a skirt (learning how to sew zippers was the endgame), I got to make...wait for it...a pair of palazzo pants. 1969 people, not a good year for fashion.

have a cheese tasting

Love.

The cheese tasting was my favorite. I remember it really well even though it was 25 years ago. We ate pieces of apple between different cheeses to cleanse our palate.

have a cheese tasting

An absolutely essential skill!

I took home ec in jr. high, and turned in a couple of really disastrous shirts. I taught myself embroidery in college, though, and I was cooking basic stuff from a young age, so cooking in home ec was no big. I'm a good cook, and know how to clean just about anything, but it was never about finding a man.

My dad also taught me to clean tack and feed livestock, to find morels, ride well enough that I was leading trail rides on the river bluffs at 8, throw a punch, change a tire, check all fluids in my car, etc. etc. They wanted me to be competent and to be able to take care of myself.

I took a typing class in high school, and we learned on Selectrics with the damned hide-your-hands thing. I can touch type for the most part, but I do look sometimes.

And I never use the right shift key, ever! I just realized!

I got $100 and a power typewriter that had a tiny screen you could flip up and would show three lines of type that you could write and edit before it would print out. THREE. LINES. And a copy of Benet's Reader's Encyclopedia, which I still have and will never give away, because my parents bought it and inscribed it for me.

We had guys in our home ec class, it was amusing. They huddled together, then they discovered that cooking was were the wonderful snacks came from. The competitive cookie making annoyed the teacher.

Annoyed? That seems silly. I'd be all "Cookie Thunderdome! Two men enter, one man leaves! Loser cleans all!"

"With ALL THE COOKIES!"

(This is possibly why my students will never forget me. I faked a huge fight where I got "fired" by my principle to illustrate some literary principle, and it was great fun for both of us, and I SNOWED those kids. They mention it to me to this day.)