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Many of my remaining memories of elementary school include receiving and browsing through the thin recycled newspaper feeling scholastic book fair order forms. For those of you who do not know what I'm referring to, it was a diabolical scheme to get kids excited to read and buy books to make the scholastic company piles of cash money.
![[image loading]](http://imgur.com/lmhaQ.jpg)
This is a newer example of what the order forms look like.
As the Scholastic corporation grew smarter and tried to break into different mediums that could be potentially educational (and therefore profiting), they began to include PC games on the last page of the order forms. I remember seeing mostly boring looking games that were clearly designed for education purposes. The first game I ever wanted to order was Lemings Paintball. The picture on the box just looked too badass to be educational.
![[image loading]](http://imgur.com/yea17.jpg)
What elementary school boy wouldn't think this looks interesting?
For reasons I cannot remember, my dream of finding out what the hell Lemings Paintball was actually about never came to fruition. But a different mystery was soon to be solved.
I clearly remember one Friday afternoon at the end of the school day we had the Scholastic order forms passed out. I was always excited to see what computer games they offered but never directly turned to the last page. Instead I sped my way through the entire form making sure that all of the books were a waste of time (they were). Then on the last page I noticed there was a weird looking box for a game that was rated T for teen. I thought, "Holy shit, what the hell could this be?" Those were probably not my exact words, but either way, it looked far more interesting than even Lemings Paintball.
![[image loading]](http://imgur.com/aWAPz.jpg)
This picture probably made many kids wonder what the game could possibly be about.
I concluded that Starcraft must be similar to Warcraft (to which I had the first two and the second one's expansion) based on the fact that craft was the last part of the title. I know, I was a brilliant child. But more importantly than sounding like Warcraft, it looked strange and was rated teen. I decided it must be ordered. I figured I could fool the education system by ordering a game that I was pretty sure could not make me smarter and had a rating that was meant to keep kids my age from playing it.
I got my mom to order it for me that weekend. She was probably thinking it was a good idea to get it for me because it was out of the Scholastic order form. Well it turns out it was a fantastic idea to get it, but unfortunately I'm pretty sure the game actually did make me smarter. Damn you Scholastic.
 
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Ahh scholastic, I remember this stuff. Except I was fresh off the boat and had no clue in anything that was written. I would waste countless afternoons just day dreaming at the pictures of the books and games it was effective way to kill time  . But when the orders would arrive I would lay low, So when the end of the day came. Everyone would get their orders while I sneak out with nothing but a dream.
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This blog was strangely addicting to read and slightly cynical and stuff throughout! Very good writing style that kept me entertained.
Scholastic always tricked my family into reading. My mom would go to the book fair and she would be obsessed buying books with medals on them and then forcing me to read them. She wasn't very good at reading english so she would have my older sister read them and then force me to read them and then have my sister quiz me. It was fun days...
Half the time my sister said the book was garbage and told me not to read it and just not tell my mom lol. My twin sister read every single one though...she loved all books...
edit looked back at your blogs and they were mostly all pretty awesome blogs! you awesome yo. rated 5!:
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For some reason I thought of found as foundation a.k.a. invent rather than discover. Obviously I came here with much more expectation than I should have rofl
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those scholastic order forms were so great! i remember getting civilization 2, among others. good times!
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WTF the scholastic order things at my school never had games..only books..and super awesome "spy kits". My childhood would have been 10x better if I got games from those things .
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On December 19 2010 17:30 AirbladeOrange wrote:
Well it turns out it was a fantastic idea to get it, but unfortunately I'm pretty sure the game actually did make me smarter. Damn you Scholastic.
![[image loading]](http://ngrthugmansion.com/images/smilies/16x16_smiley-very-happy.gif) that made the thread. I just imagine it being uttered with such spite.
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the book fairs used to be amazing in elementary school!
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lol the scholastic forms. I remember I used to ninja loose change from my mom purse to get book/stuff that I really wanted... The teacher would be like wtf, why is this kid is paying for a $15 in all quarter/change?
I think the first time I played/found out about starcraft was at a friend's house in 4th/5th grade and that dude had SOOO many games. I remember he had 2 PS1s, a nintendo 64, sega saturn, gameboy, really nice PC and a ton of snes games. During Christmas in 5th grade there was a holiday raffle and he won (despite only purchasing one ticket) another fucking N64. He ended up giving it back to the school because "he didn't need it". The cool part was that his father was a high school teacher and played a shitload of romance of the 3 kingdoms on snes.
Anyhow, one day he was playing the SC campaign and I started watching him go through a couple of missions. I swear I thought the SCVs were the coolest friggin units ever. SCVs was probably the primary reason that I ended up playing SC 
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Good story, I remember seeing it in the scholastic pamphlet and being very confused on what it was doing in there.
Ending was pretty fantastic and got a laugh out of me.
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rofl i can just imagine blizzard north employees trying to insist to scholastic that starcraft is educational
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Haha I remember those things! Though I think back then for me they didn't use to have games as well. I do remember always being super excited when the book-fair would come though. That was because it meant I got to add a new Calvin and Hobbes book/anthology to my collection. ^^ Which was, I think, along with Garfield and The Far Side, the only things I ever bought from them.
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Ahhhh, I remember the schoolastic order forms. *enters state of nostalgia*
I remember cool widgets, spy kits, and lots and lots of books, but I don't quite remember the computer games (though my memory of those forms is quite bad now, heh). The only books I remember were the "how to draw Dragonball Z character" books that I'd always force my parents to buy. In fact, one of those came with a cool SSJ4 Goku keychain that I still have on my house keys. =)
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Ah, nostalgia has just taken over from me. We used to have these forms 2 times a year in IB schools.
My parents didn't really get me anything T_T
And yes, I loved reading. I only once bought a book and that was about a mice and a robot friend. Something like that. I always wanted Captain Underpants though.
I am still in IB school but they don't have these book forms in Croatia lulz.
Its kinda weird how you find such stuff in these book forms.
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Hong Kong20321 Posts
OH SHIT SCHOLASTIC!!! OMG i LOVED ORDERING STUFF! >_<
brings back memories!
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Croatia9529 Posts
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OMG SCHOLASTIC BOOK FAIRS HAD THE BEST SHIT EVER
there were so many cool pens & pencils ^_^
i never saw starcraft in there o.O
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Ah, I remember those. Except I was usually given free $10-$25 per order on those because I read maybe 100 books in 5th grade and they gave out money for reading.
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Between 3rd-5th grade, I amassed a large quantity of garfield books through those orders hahahah
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On December 19 2010 23:03 ShivaN wrote:
Haha I remember those things! Though I think back then for me they didn't use to have games as well. I do remember always being super excited when the book-fair would come though. That was because it meant I got to add a new Calvin and Hobbes book/anthology to my collection. ^^ Which was, I think, along with Garfield and The Far Side, the only things I ever bought from them.
My experience with actual book buying is pretty much this. I always looked for a Calvin and Hobbes book I did not have or the occasional Garfield book.
Thanks for all the nostalgic feelings and positive feedback.
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Ahh the days of magic school bus, thank you for this.
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EPT
