Best I can do is relate a tale from my youth: We had read a story in, I dunno, fourth or fifth grade (nine or ten years old) that took place in Australia. One of the new words we got in the story was kookaburra. The glossary for the story defined it as 'laughing jackass'. Somehow I was the only one in the class (including the teacher) who managed to figure out that a kookaburra was a bird. I was marked wrong on the test for not parroting back 'laughing jackass' when asked what a kookaburra was.