> The Soviets were ahead in math and science because they drilled their kids harder. Any kid who didn't want to drill was a traitor to the working class.
That was not how the Soviet schools worked. There was no corporal punishment, and struggling students were given help.
Instead, it was quite competitive. There was a system of academic competitions ("Olympiads") that went all the way up from schools to the international level. Students were encouraged to compete.
At the same time, school sports competitions were pretty much absent.
One thing that struck me as very different in classroom scenes is that we* were always to avoid giving each other help, but I get the impression soviets were supposed to aid each other.
Punchline 1: (little Johnny sent to the principal after making a comment about physical attributes of the teacher instead of Pushkin's next line, says to the visiting teacher evaluators) "Next time, sirs, when you don't know, don't prompt!"
Punchline 2: (a former maths prof turned shipbuilder, trying to coast, read literature, and earn some extra cash in "maths for the proletariat" evening school, is stuck at the brownboard having calculated a negative circumference of a circle = -2πr; his classmate helps) "Psst, colleague, swap order of integration!"
* I distinctly remember being taught the "right" way to raise hands in 4th grade, and in particular placing one's elbow on the desk and putting a forearm perpendicular to it was "wrong". Imagine my surprise upon discovering, many decades later, that they for sure didn't want us somehow (despite the iron curtain — as if we'd had had a clue anyway) copying soviet classroom protocol.
That was not how the Soviet schools worked. There was no corporal punishment, and struggling students were given help.
Instead, it was quite competitive. There was a system of academic competitions ("Olympiads") that went all the way up from schools to the international level. Students were encouraged to compete.
At the same time, school sports competitions were pretty much absent.