History YMMV / WaysideSchool

* TransAudienceInterpretation: Some readers developed one of Mac and Nancy, who become less shy and more self-assured after trading away the names their parents gave them, for names that the kids feel better suit their respective genders.

** ''Wayside School is Falling Down''
*** Paul nearly falling out of the window of the thirtieth story. He's dangling for dear life from a brick and asks Leslie to not leave him as she tries to offer her hand, with no time to get help. Leslie is too little to reach him despite her best efforts, and his fingers are slipping. She saves his life by telling him to grab her pigtails while she leans back. This works, while putting her in a lot of pain. As they're catching their breath, Paul says sincerely that one day he will return the favor. Leslie says ThinkNothingOfIt, just don't pull her hair again.
*** The Mushroom Surprise when it's revealed to be [[spoiler:a LovePotion]]. Louis eating it is one thing because he's an adult; Ron ordering it is quite another. [[spoiler:Ron kisses Rondi while under its influence, and is implied to have kissed Mrs. Jewls. For that reason, Mrs. Jewls makes Miss Mush throw away the rest of the Mushroom Surpirise and promise to never make it again]].
*** One entire chapter is dedicated to Mrs. Jewls's students saying that Mrs. Gorf has been appearing randomly around the school. Deedee screams in terror when seeing her on the monkey bars. Louis doesn't believe it, telling the kids the fear is all in their heads. He completely understands, going OhCrap when thinking ''his'' SadistTeacher had returned. Then when Louis convinces Deedee the monkey bars aren't haunted, he fails to see the second set of larger footprints next to hers.
*** Allison accidentally ends up in [[EldritchLocation Miss Zarves' class on the 19th floor]]. It is common knowledge among the students of Wayside that the building doesn't have a 19th floor, and that Miss Zarves doesn't exist. Among the students are a thirty-two-year-old woman named Virginia, a boy Allison's own age named Mark Miller, and a small boy named Ray (implied to have been created by Bebe claiming she had a little brother with the same name). All the students do all day is "alphabetize" numbers and memorize the dictionary, and they're never allowed to leave or rest (save for a two-minute break every eleven hours), with Miss Zarves cheerfully giving everyone an "A" no matter what they do. It's outright stated that being in Miss Zarves's class reduces the students' minds to mush: they lose all memories of their previous lives and become mindlessly happy drones. Allison eventually realizes that ''this is the point''--Miss Zarves's curriculum is designed to distract people with mindless busywork so they can't focus on anything important or escape, and the good grades are incentive to not complain. To hammer the point home, we have this conversation between Mark and Allison, severely implying that Miss Zarves's class is Hell itself:
---->'''Mark''': Maybe we died. Maybe we died and went to--
---->'''Allison''': This isn't Heaven!
---->'''Mark''': [[ThisIsntHeaven ...that wasn't what I was going to say.]]
*** Heck, the fact that Mark Miller is there and mistaken for a kid named Benjamin Nushmutt. He got trapped there because the real Benjamin in Mrs. Jewls's class is too nervous to tell everyone he's not the Mark Miller they have heard about through the grapevine. [[spoiler:Mark is only freed when Benjamin tells the truth, and Miss Zarves asked him to deliver a missing ear. It's the ear from Mac's story]].
*** "Another Story About Potatoes" has Joe trying Miss Mush's potato salad because he forgot his lunch. In an attempt to make it more interesting, he mixes mustard and ketchup into it and starts shaping the potatoes into a face. John, who brought his lunch, joins him, and they work at it. Both go OhCrap, however, on realizing they made Mrs. Gorf by accident. Mrs. Gorf then ''comes to life'' and starts wiggling her ears. They wolf her down fast, and later say it was a close call.
*** Mac's last story is horrifying. He talks about how he heard about a barber accidentally cutting off a hippie's ear because the man had long hair. The man then asked the barber to repeat what he said because due to his ear getting cut off, he wasn't able to hear the barber telling him that. The hospital then ''lost'' the ear as they were about to sew it back on and were scrambling to find it.

* ValuesDissonance:
** Mrs. Jewls comes off as a less sympathetic teacher in the 21st century, though the books were written in the 1970s and 80s. She thinks that taping everyone's mouths is a great way to keep them quiet after seeing how well it works on Jason-- masking tape which is easily removable, but still NightmareFuel in the day and age where restraints used on special needs kids have led to suffocation and death -- and considers it a fair punishment to send kids home early on the kindergarten bus. Besides the obvious of GettingSuspendedIsAwesome, it essentially means she's not doing her job as a teacher. Not to mention that when the mean Mrs. Jewls takes over, she commits several offenses that would be firing-worthy if the kids decided to rat her out. She nearly hits Todd with a yardstick so hard that it breaks, and comes close to dousing Leslie's head in pickle brine just because Leslie was confused about the lesson. All Mrs. Jewls does is punish herself by sending herself home on the kindergarten bus.
** Louis has to deal with Terrence in the latter's spotlight chapter when he kicks every ball in the playground over the fence. He had already fielded complaints from the other kids, who said that Terrence ruined their games. Terrence then whines that there's nothing else to kick, and the kids and Louis tell him there is. The kid then demands it. Louis then kicks Terrence over the fence as punishment for his bad attitude and because he asked for something to kick. Now imagine a teacher in the 21st century kicking a student over the fence as punishment, especially if the school is next to a busy road.

** Everything about "Sammy", who is revealed to be [[spoiler:a dead rat in disguise. No, don't think about it too hard]]. Mrs. Jewls keeps telling him politely to take off his coat. He refuses and calls her a "windbag". She writes his name on the DISCIPLINE board, not only checking and circling it but also adding a triangle after taking off his multiple coats, which diminish his height. Sammy starts smelling horrible and giving an EvilLaugh. The kids can't figure out if the smell or the laugh is worse.

** Chapter 14 from ''Sideways Stories'' is about Sammy, a new kid in Mrs. Jewls' class. Sammy comes in wearing lots of raincoats which stink up the classroom as each get taken off. And once the final raincoat is removed, it turns out that Sammy is actually [[spoiler: a dead rat in disguise]].

* BizarroEpisode: Even by the standards of the books themselves, the Miss Zarves chapters are usually quite out there, particularly the 19th "chapters" in ''Falling Down'', where Allison finds herself trapped in her classroom.

* HilariousInHindsight: Paul and Leslie are implied to have some form of a [[ShipTease relationship potential]] down the line. Then an episode of ''Series/KitchenNightmares'' features a couple named Paul and Leslie running a restaurant with each other.

* BrokenBase: The Adam [=McCauley=] illustrations: some don't like them, some don't mind them, and some actually prefer them.

* TastesLikeDiabetes: The "Love and a Dead Rat" chapter in the second book. Even the ''dead rat'' can't stomach it.

** Louis has to deal with Terrence in the latter's spotlight chapter when he kicks every ball in the playground over the fence. He had already fielded complaints from the other kids, who said that Terrence ruined their games. Terrence then whines that there's nothing else to kick, and the kids and Louis tell him there is. The kid then demands it. Louis then kicks Terrence over the fence as punishment for his bad attitude and because he asked for something to kick. Now imagine a 2010s teacher kicking a student over the fence as punishment, especially if the school is next to a busy road.

** Mrs. Jewls comes off as a less sympathetic teacher in the 2010s, though the books were written in the 1970s and 80s. She thinks that taping everyone's mouths is a great way to keep them quiet after seeing how well it works on Jason-- masking tape which is easily removable, but still NightmareFuel in the day and age where restraints used on special needs kids have led to suffocation and death -- and considers it a fair punishment to send kids home early on the kindergarten bus. Besides the obvious of GettingSuspendedIsAwesome, it essentially means she's not doing her job as a teacher. Not to mention that when the mean Mrs. Jewls takes over, she commits several offenses that would be firing-worthy if the kids decided to rat her out. She nearly hits Todd with a yardstick so hard that it breaks, and comes close to dousing Leslie's head in pickle brine just because Leslie was confused about the lesson. All Mrs. Jewls does is punish herself by sending herself home on the kindergarten bus.

*** Allison accidentally ends up in [[EldritchLocation Miss Zarves' class on the 19th floor]]. It is common knowledge among the students of Wayside that the building doesn't have a 19th floor, and that Miss Zarves doesn't exist. Among the students are a thirty-two-year-old woman named Virginia, a boy Allison's own age named Mark Miller, and a small boy named Ray (implied to have been created by Bebe claiming she had a little brother with the same name). All the students do all day is "alphabetize" numbers and memorize the dictionary, and they're never allowed to leave or rest (save for a two-minute break every eleven hours), with Miss Zarves cheerfully giving everyone an "A" no matter what they do. It's outright stated that being in Miss Zarves's class reduces the students' minds to mush--they lose all memories of their previous lives and become mindlessly happy drones. Allison eventually realizes that ''this is the point''--Miss Zarves's curriculum is designed to distract people with mindless busywork so they can't focus on anything important or escape, and the good grades are incentive to not complain. To hammer the point home, we have this conversation between Mark and Allison, severely implying that Miss Zarves's class is Hell itself:

*** Allison accidentally ends up in [[EldritchLocation Miss Zarves' class on the 19th floor]]. It is common knowledge among the students of Wayside that the building doesn't have a 19th floor, and that Miss Zarves doesn't exist. None of the students in the class have ever left the classroom, and they spend their time doing meaningless assignments, like memorizing the dictionary and getting meaningless A's. Another student, Mark Miller, seriously wonders if they're in Hell.

* BizarroEpisode: Even by the standards of the books themselves, which are already bizarre, the Miss Zarves chapters are usually quite out there, particularly the "ones" from ''Falling Down'', were Allison finds herself trapped in her classroom.

* GeniusBonus: ''Wayside School is Falling Down'' states that Albert Einstein didn't wear socks with the implication that socks make you less smart. It seems like an example of the books' nonsensical humor but Einstein did prefer not to wear socks.

* FirstInstallmentWins: While the later two books get some love, the first is considered the most memorable.