Margie wrote about it that night in her diary, "Today Tommy found a real book!"
It was a very old book. Margie's grandfather once said that when he was a little boy his grandfather told him that there was a time when all stories were printed on paper. They turned the pages,which were yellow and crinkly (皱巴巴的), and it was awfully funny to read words that stood still instead of moving the way they were supposed to-on a screen.
"What's it about?"
"School."
Margie was scornful. "School? What's there to write about school?" Margie was always fed up with school. The mechanical teacher had been giving her test after test in geography. So she said to Tommy, "Why would anyone write about school?"
Tommy looked at her with very superior eyes, "Because it's not our kind of school, stupid. This is the old kind of school that they had centuries ago."
She read the book over his shoulder for a while, then said, " Anyway, they had a teacher."
"Sure they had a teacher, but it wasn't a regular teacher. It was a man."
"A man isn't smart enough." She added, "I wouldn't want a strange man in my house to teach me."
Tommy screamed with laughter. "You don't know much, Margie. They had a special building and all the kids of the same age went there, learning the same thing from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. On Weekdays.
They weren't even half-finished when Margie's mother called, "Margie! School!" Margie looked up. "Not yet, Mamma." "Now!" said Mrs. Jones.
Actually the mechanical teacher was on and waiting for her. It was always on at the same time every day except Saturday and Sunday, because her mother said little girls learned better if they learned at regular time.
The large screen was lit up."Today's math lesson is on the addition of proper fractions (分数). Please insert yesterday's homework in the proper slot (插槽), " Margie did so with a sigh. She was thinking about how the kids must have loved it in the old days. All the kids from the whole neighborhood came, siting together in the schoolroom, going home together at the end of the day. And the teachers were people. She was thinking about the fun they had.