Do you guys remember sitting in class and learning? I have no actual memory of that. I have no memory of taking tests. I have a lot, a lot, a lot of memories of my teachers. To say my teachers had an impact on the person I became is the understatement of the century. I don't think it's too far-fetched to believe that in the near future, we will feel there is no value at all to teachers and that we can replace them with computers. Then the kids can take their multiple choice tests from their automated teacher and every student will get the EXACT SAME experience.
But where would that leave us? Teachers change our lives. Here are just some of the ways teachers changed my life.
Miss Brown was my bat shit crazy third grade teacher. She was absolutely the meanest person I'd ever met and she was borderline sadistic. She used to take the low-functioning kids and line them up against the wall and they were called the Peanut Gallery.
And poor Lonnie Powers. I'll never forget when Miss Brown discovered Lonnie Powers was picking his nose and leaving all the boogers under his desk. That kid used to dig in his nose like he was heading to China. She went insane and called him out in front of the whole class and made him clean his desk. Then he had to carry a handkerchief in his back pocket and if she even saw him going for his nose, she'd start screeching like a banshee. I bet you to this day, Lonnie Powers doesn't pick his nose. He was the grossest kid ever, so maybe he even got married and went on to live a productive life.
One day she found out that I was still reading picture books from the library. She was furious. She made me stay in from recess that day and she gave me, Little House On The Prairie.
"Read this! And I don't ever want to see you with a picture book again!", she screamed at me.
I went home that night and I started reading, and it was like the whole world had been opened up to me. My world was really small and when I read my first chapter book, it was like I was transported to another world. Miss Brown, that bat shit crazy woman, changed my whole life. With books...real books... I could know everything.
I don't have a picture of Mrs. Frank, my fourth grade teacher, but Mrs. Frank was a world traveler. I never went on a plane until I was twenty years old. I never saw snow until I was twelve and my church group rented a bus and drove us from Phoenix to Flagstaff, Arizona. Mrs. Frank had gone to Australia the summer before we started in her class. Australia. WOW! That was the craziest thing I'd ever heard. She told us everything about Australia. We made passports that year and we had to write to the tourist office and make travel plans to go to Australia. Then we had to get maps and plan our entire trip. It was the most exciting thing ever for me, the child of 18 year old parents, whose entire life consisted of home, my grandparents, or church.
Mrs. Frank changed my whole life, because I knew I wanted to travel. I wanted to see things. I knew someday, I would do it.
My fifth grade teacher, Mrs. Goekler, was a total bitch. She used to wear this God-awful red wig every day and she could do the splits. I can't tell you how many times she did the splits in class because if we challenged her and she proved us wrong, she'd do the splits like HA!
Did anyone else speak I.V.? You added I.V in each syllable to make a secret language so nobody would know what you were saying. Same concept as Pig Latin. My bestfriend and I spoke I.V. fluently. To this day, my sister and I still speak I.V.
So one day, in I.V., I said in class, "Miv-ivrs. G-ivoek-liver iv-is iv-a b-iv-itch."
Translation: Mrs. Goekler is a bitch.
And she looked me right in the face and said, "iv-I ivun-diver-stivand yivou."
Translation: I understand you.
Then she did the splits.
Fifth grade was the year we were supposed to learn about evolution and my grandmother was pissed. I was not going to learn about evolution. How dare the school teach us such blasphemy. And I was all, hell yeah, I get out of class. So I marched right into Mrs. Goekler with my signed note from my grandmother. I was getting out of class, SO THERE, Mrs. Goekler. Take that, you bitch.
She looked at me and she looked at my grandmother's note and she told me to sit down. Then she rolled down the atlas of the world and she took the pointer and she slapped it on China.
"There's almost one billion people in China, Michele.", she told me. "None of them believe what you believe and your God says they are all going to hell. If you aren't interested in knowing other people's ideas or beliefs, you are excused from evolution."
I ripped up the note from my grandmother and I stayed in the class.
In sixth grade, I had the best teacher I ever had, Mrs. Bordeleau. That was the year my parents got divorced and all I had was school. School was my safe place. School was where I was really good at something and the world made sense and Mrs. Bordeleau was my hero. She always made sure I was okay.
I can remember her pulling me aside and saying, "I know your parents are getting divorced. If there is ever ANYTHING you need, I am here for you."
Mrs. Bordeleau had a disabled son, who was deaf, and she talked about him a lot in class. A boy named William Ashby was in our class that year. Poor William Ashby had the misfortune of being born partially deaf. He had these giant hearing aids that always had wax on them and he couldn't speak normally due to his disability. The kids in class made fun of him and psychologically tortured him. Danny Bates would put crayons in his ears and scream, "Ashby! Ashby!" and kids would call Ashby retarded.
I know people think bullying has gotten worse, but that's a lie. Bullying has been around since the beginning of time. I will never, as long as I live, forget Mrs. Bordeleau standing in front of the class and crying over William Ashby. She begged the kids to treat William Ashby as if he was her own son. As if he was our brother. They didn't, but I'll never forget her compassion.
In seventh grade, I had my first male teacher and he was African-American. His name was W.T. Grant. He was the first black person I ever met. I grew up in white bread Phoenix. There wasn't a single black kid in our entire school. You should have seen the look on our faces when he walked into school on the first day. We were stunned. We had all pow-wowed before class because none of us could believe we had a man and then, OHMYGOD, he was black? Were we on another planet?
He stood at the front of the class and said, "I'm W.T. Grant. You will not call me Mr. Grant. When people call me Mr. Grant, I look for my father. You will call me W.T."
And we were like WOW. Holy crap. He was like the coolest guy EVER. He was the first adult that ever treated me like an equal and not a subordinate. It was mind-altering.
So that's just some of my stories. I have so many in my brain. I'm sure you all tons of your own stories, good and bad, about how a teacher changed your life.
My hope for my kids is that all this bullshit at school will not take away from what teachers REALLY bring to the table. They bring to the table their life experiences. If you are a teacher and you are reading this, your very existence impacts the children you see every day. All that other stuff? I can guarantee you that the children will never remember it. They'll remember the PERSON who was their teacher. Teachers make all the difference for children. They mold and shape them in ways that can never be measured by a multiple choice test or a statistic on a report. With all the craziness in our current education system, we can't lose the value of that along the way.
Michele S.
