On teaching: A 3-letter word

Former students of mine go to the head of the class - Cool!

I recognized her right away. We were in the middle of Wal-Mart. A sweet, modest former student of mine. She smiled and said “Hi!”

“What are you doing now?” I asked. She blushed. “I’m uh, teaching!”

When I spotted Marisol Herrera’s post the other day, I thought, there’s somebody who OUGHT to be teaching. I was delighted and told her so. She’s teaching Junior High students at Betton Hills, starting her second year. Good for her!

The start of another school year reminds me of the excitement of those early days, wondering what sort of characters Central Casting is going to send you for this run of classes. In my case, because I taught Advanced Placement classes and Journalism, there were always a few familiar faces. Kids who knew the drill. Some were glad to be back in Nogo’s class, some weren’t.

But it was the new kids, the ones you’d never taught before, that were always intriguing. Since I’d taught at the school for a dozen years, I had a rep. “Mr. Nogo: No way to get an “A.” (Which wasn’t true, actually, but that’s what a poll said one year. It also said out of all the teachers at the school, I was the one “Most Likely To Call Home.” Which WAS true.)

That’s me in 5th grade, hands folded to the left, long before I ever imagined I’d be a teacher.

So in those first few weeks, you can see the kids who want to learn — they aren’t hard to spot — and those you’re really going to have to watch and those you know you are going to have to have a “Come To Jesus” meeting with, sooner rather than later.

There were a couple of young ladies in a second period class (You can bet you will ALWAYS have one PROBLEM class, every year) who, I could see, I’d have to deal with. Always talking, farting around, not paying attention, provoking others, etc. They had all the skills. No wonder one of them actually made our Spanish teacher cry. (She now works AT a school. Go figure)

So I brought her and her playmate in the hall and we had a brief, decisive chat.

“Here’s the story,” I told them. “You are either on MY side and help me or you can be on YOUR side and keep doing what you’re doing. But remember: I give the grades.”

From then on, they were relatively model citizens. And they passed.

You also find out early which classes you can push; one year I had 27 kids (too many) but for 10th graders, they were really sharp. I knew I’d have to up my game and I think I did. Twenty-six of the 27 passed the end-of-the-year English exam that year, a record I suspect will stand forever at Gadsden County High School. Usually, it’s barely 50%. Great kids, great class.

Just heard from one of them who just got her degree in Theater at FAMU and is going for a Master’s Degree in Creative Writing. She was virtually silent in my class. Who knew?

I’m not sure how other teachers feel about hearing from their former students but it matters to me. At the start of every school year, I’d tell every one of my classes, even the knuckleheads, that when they walked out of the classroom in June, they’d be ready for anything any future English teacher would throw at them. I meant that, figuring that the exotic assignments I’d throw their way, from U2 to Eight Men Out to The Marx Brothers to James Joyce to Hamlet, would prepare them for everything.

Just catching up with a former student, a future English teacher now at FSU about ready to start after her Master’s, I think that was the case. “I already knew a lot of the stuff they gave us,” she said. “You had us covering a lot of it. We were ready.”

Another former student of mine from my days as an adjunct at Florida State, is going gangbusters at her school, the kind of teacher that I’d want to be in her class. She started a school newspaper “The Seacoast Post” at her school just because she thought she should and periodically, updates me on her progress and how things are moving along. And they are moving in her class, believe me.

Of course, she was a fabulous student of mine at FSU and my arcane ways of teaching seemed to fire her up. I could see she had big things ahead.

After I saw her newspaper and heard of a few other assignments she gave her kids, I sent her this, which, I would hope all teachers would apply to their kids. Like Marisol did.

“What that tells me is that they have a teacher that is enthusiastic, that has led them to think creatively, to go somewhere new, to try stuff...and I can't think of a higher compliment than I can pass on. Wonderful.

“What I found was that once I made it theirs -- that they could write about whatever we thought would work - I had one kid write about what it's like dating a girl who was smarter than him - they're all invested and in a good way, competing with one another.

“In short, I tried to do something that is generally not recommended in any book on teaching, suggested in faculty meetings or noted by Administration. I made it fun.”

Go get ‘em, teach…