PRIME TIME

This Week November 28,1990. Page M7

: A teacher that made all the difference:

emories of

childhood come

without bidding.

I remember
being about 10 and thinking
school in November was a
fun place tobe. .

Up until then, I hadn’t liked it
at all. We had come through a
regime of dictatorship. A time of
stern, unsmiling
authoritarianism, a “learn or
else” environment not in the
least conducive to increasing our
knowledge. We were given to un-
derstand we were little more
than lumps of clay, to be molded,
sometimes manually, into what

wee teacher perceived to be

“proper” students. She was a
mighty fast woman with a
pointer:

Then, without warning, every-
thing changed. One morning she
was gone, and a new teacher sat
in front of us. It took us less than
a week to realize that we were
more to her than lumps of clay;
that we were living, breathing,
and sometimes even thinking
little creatures, individual in our
own rights.

It made all the difference in
the world. As soon as we realized
we weren't ninnies, we began to
learn, and to our surprise, we
found we actually enjoyed it.

__ But come November, we still
Booked forward to putting our

books away every afternoon,
and practising for the
Christmas concert.

Ours was 2 one-room school. It

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had only four rows of desks, two
single and two double. It was a
milestone when we graduated to
having a desk of our own. There
was not electricity. Heat was
provided by a big stove at the

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back of the room. It was a chore
for the big boys to keep it sup-
plied with wood.

Outside the land was snow
covered, and the temperature
well below freezing, but inside,
we were snug, and full of an-

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ticipation. For unlike all the pre-
vious concerts, this year we were
not to have endless boring drills,
or long, equally boring recita-
tions. This year we were going to
put on plays, and we got to make
backdrops and learn all about
cues and waiting in the wings.

And we got to use our imagina-
tion, because we would only
have a proper stage for the very
last day, the dress rehearsal on
the afternoon of the concert.
Until then, we moved the desks
back and ran through our parts
guided by chalk marks on the
floor that indicated the
whereabouts of furniture and
walls. One of us invariably

walked over a chesterfield or
made an exit through a wall.

But it was all great fun. Never
before had we been allowed any
degree of self expression and it
went to our heads. And we all
wanted to do our best, for we
adored our teacher.

She was very different from
her predecessor. Her treatment
of Tommy was a case in point.

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Tommy was a slow learner and
had a slight stutter. He was also
clumsy. He was big for his age,
and he was repeating Grade 4.
Never before had he been al-
lowed anywhere near the stage.

Heaven forbid he should trip
and ruin an intricate drill for-
mation, and of course, everyone
knew he couldn’t recite.
Everyone, that is, except our
new teacher. She gave Tommy a
part in one of the plays. A good
part. A speaking part.

At first we felt sorry for him.
He would be embarrassed to
tears making mistakes in front
of an audience. Then, after
weeks of struggling, something
happened. All of a sudden we
saw him as he saw himself. . .
we realized he was a kid just like

_ us, no better and no worse. We

finally saw him without
prejudice, just as our teacher
saw each of us.

For Tommy it was the begin-
ning. He never had to repeat
another grade.

I guess that's what being a
teacher is all about.

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