<p>I used to know Kubla Khan, too. I got into an hellacious fight with my 11th grade English teacher over whether it was “erotic”. (I thought – and think – it was.)</p>
<p>I obviously had a deprived childhood. The things I remember were far more practical and less literary. One I still use: “Neither financier seized either species of weird leisure.” These are, of course, the exceptions to the rule “I before e except after c when the word has a long e sound.” </p>
<p>Or every good boy does fine. </p>
<p>I also remember whole stretches of the Baltimore Catechism. “Who made you?”
“God made me.” “Why did God make you?” “To know, love and serve God in this world and be happy with Him in the next.”</p>
<p>Funny, I was taught: “i before e except after c, unless pronounced a as in neighbor or weigh… or is weird science.”</p>
<p>I was once told “i before e, except in Budweiser” ;)</p>
<p>Lists I memorized when preparing for Jeopardy that I still remember:</p>
<p>US presidents (in order)
Their party affiliations
Their birth places
US state capitals
State nicknames - some states have two or three
Nearly all world capitals - there were a few tiny African and Polynesian countries that I never bother with.
All the Oscar winners in the years I competed
All the cabinet secretaries in office when I competed</p>
<p>Plus a lot of shorter lists:
The nine muses
The seven dwarfs
The Great Lakes
The four state capitals named for US presidents
The two us cities named after US vice presidents who never went on to be president.</p>
<p>And so on and so on…</p>
<p>First 18 lines of Canterbury Tales. I can still sort of mumble through it.</p>
<p>23 helping verbs, which my 8th grade English teacher had us compete as to who could say them the fastest—complete with stopwatch!
is, am, are, was, were, has, have, had, do, does, did, shall, will, should, would, may, might, must, can, could, be, being, been.</p>
<p>This was the same teacher who made anyone writing the (non)word “alot” write it correctly as two words 500 times. I still cringe when I see other people write it!!!</p>
<p>I had to memorize some lines for my Chaucer class a few years back. I can still recite most of it (in correct middle English pronunciation), but usually forget a line or two:
(from the Nun’s Priest’s Tale)
This sely wydwe and eek hir doghtres two
Herden thise hennes crie and maken wo,
And out at dores stirten they anon,
And syen the fox toward the grove gon,
And bar upon his bak the cok away,
And cryden, “Out! Harrow and weylaway!
Ha, ha! The fox!” and after hym they ran,
And eek with staves many another man.
Ran Colle oure dogge, and Talbot and Gerland,
And Malkyn, with a dystaf in hir hand;
Ran cow and calf, and eek the verray hogges,
So fered for the berkyng of the dogges
And shoutyng of the men and wommen eeke
They ronne so hem thoughte hir herte breeke.
They yolleden as feendes doon in helle;
The dokes cryden as men wolde hem quelle;
The gees for feere flowen over the trees;
Out of the hyve cam the swarm of bees.
So hydous was the noyse – a, benedicitee! –
Certes, he Jakke Straw and his meynee
Ne made nevere shoutes half so shrille
Whan that they wolden any Flemyng kille,
As thilke day was maad upon the fox.</p>
<p>to hear my professor read it, go to her website:
<a href=“http://english.boisestate.edu/lzaerr/foxchase.htm[/url]”>http://english.boisestate.edu/lzaerr/foxchase.htm</a></p>
<p>OK, here’s one from my childhood:
Two all beef patties special sauce lettuce cheese pickles onions on a sesame seed bun.
Was this for Burger King? If you went into the store and said it fast enough, they’d give you free food.</p>
<p>That’s the “recipe” for a McDonalds Big Mac.</p>
<p>How about us Catholic elementary school grads/attendees?</p>
<p>Recitation from the Catechism was SOP.</p>
<p>I don’t remember much required memorization in school. I did have to learn the inscription on the Statue of Liberty:</p>
<p>Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door.</p>
<p>My son had social studies teacher in junior high who required them to be able to identify the country of origin for EVERY national flag of the WORLD. Also, to be able to draw, freehand, from MEMORY, each continent, designate national boundaries within, place capitols, draw and identify rivers, lakes, mountains, bays, seas, etc. From memory- the entire world.</p>
<p>Je vais travailler a la piscene cete ete.</p>
<p>3 years of high school French and that is all I can remember from the many “conversations.”</p>
<p>Lots and lots of children’s songs from Wee Sing, Wee Sing Silly Songs, Raffi, Sharon Lois & Bram, 50 Songs for Eyal, 50 Songs for Limor, etc. etc. etc. You can remember anything if you put it to music and listen to it over and over in the car… 
</p>
<p>My daughter, who always has had a good memory, at age 2 would sing songs from Wee Sing, including the spoken spiel about “just turn the tape over and we’ll meet you on the other side!” (or whatever the wording was), then continue with the next song. Pretty funny at the time.</p>
<p>I also know random lines of poetry that occur to me when the context is right, “It is a beauteous evening, calm and free. The holy time is quiet as a nun.” as well as Christmas carols in German from high school.</p>
<p>Amazing how I still recall facts that were drilled into us when we were small and teachers could require that sort of thing. Why 1619 was a Red Letter Year in Virginia history, for instance. Nowadays I understand you only need to know Where to Look It Up.</p>
<p>And German dative prepositions:</p>
<p>aus, ausser, bei, mit, nach, seit, von, zu</p>
<p>There must be other things I learned, if I could only remember them. ;)</p>
<p>Mommusic, I teach AP US history and, although I don’t require a lot of memorization, I do push what I call “anchor dates” and 1619 is one of them. </p>
<p>I didn’t used to make much reference at all to dates until I had the experience of scoring constructed response items in a system-wide end-of-course exam and saw that most students in this regular (non-AP) history course finished it with almost no chronological sense whatsoever. There was a question about causes of the Great Depression and according to fully 20% of the responses, it was because the banks hadn’t backed up their computer systems, so when they crashed, they lost all of their data, and well, you can probably imagine the scenarios from that point on. I guess the students had latched on to the word “crash” in their teachers/textbook explanations of 1920s economic conditions and put it into a context they knew to construct their own versions of history (which apparently made perfect sense to them!).</p>
<p>When I read the title to this thread, I thought it meant things like righty tighty, lefty loosey! </p>
<p>Of my three kids only my youngest really had “pieces” to memorize. In fifth grade he had to memorize Lincoln’s Gettysburg address and Martin Luther King’s, “I had a Dream” speech. Same teacher also had them memorize a silly song that covered most of American History.</p>
<p>One of my favorite kid books they I unintentionally memorized was Goodnight Moon. Perfect toddler bedtime story.</p>
<p>“Trees” by Joyce Kilmer. Don’t know what grade we memorized it in,but its stuck in my head.
The names of the 50 states sung to some tune. D learned it in elementary school and sang it nonstop for what seems like a whole year,so I know it too.</p>
<p>kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus species</p>
<p>“Let’s give it to Mikey. He hates everything.”</p>
<p>ReneeV - Maybe the students who wrote that computer crashes caused the Great Depression don’t know that computers were not invented until after the 1920’s! :)</p>
<p>I can sing the words to inscription from the Statue of Liberty!</p>
<p>And then there is this gem…
Under the spreading chestnut tree the village smithy stands
The smith a mighty man is he
with large and sinewy hands
the muscles on his brawny arms
as strong as iron bands</p>
<p>and this is stuck in my head and I can’t remember what the heck it means but it was important enough to remember I suppose…</p>
<p>Gaudeamus igitur
Juvenes dum sumus
Post jucundum juventutem
Post molestam senectutem
Nos habebit humus. </p>
<p>oh yeah and things go better with agricola…</p>