Reply #3: They still teach a lot of it

[Warpy]

but they don't use the scary big words to describe what they're teaching.

My grandfather had been a teacher of many things over his life, right through the college level. I had access to all sorts of school books from about the 1890s on up at his house.

I've been both grateful and a little wistful that I wasn't required to come up to those standards.

A high school diploma then was the equivalent, or even more so, of a four year college degree now. Our high school students barely come up to what eighth grade graduates did then, and only when they've worked their tails off in advanced classes.