STICKS AND CLUBS

Teenagers can be very clever and quick witted.  I was walking through the cafeteria at Seneca after school one day and the field hockey team was meeting.  Being known a a big tease, I had to make a comment.  I asked them why no one had ever come up with a better name for the piece of equipment called a stick.  A girl looked up with a slight grin, knowing I was the golf coach, and asked, "And what is it they call that thing you hit golf balls with?"  The answer, as you know, is a club.  Great comback, I laughed out loud.

I had picked quite a few pounds over the years and a bit of a pot belly and jokingly said in class one day, I know there's a six pack under there somewhere.  A student retorted with, "Why do you need a six pack, you a have a perfectly good keg."

A fellow teacher was writing names of study hall student who would like to use the library and not wanting to admit that he could not remember a girls last names asked her to spell it.  With a straight face she, said "J-O-N-E-S.  the jig was up.

What a fun job.

Bubbleheads

There was a time in my career, before I transferred from Seneca to Manual, that I affectionately and, to a degree teasingly derisively, called my Advanced Program student bubbleheads.  If I remember correctly, there was no protest.  So I decided to do the same thing the next day with the same result.  As it turned out, they liked the tag and wore it like a badge of honor. That habit continued until 1987 when I transfered and died there. 

I asked a girl why no one reacted to the term and she said it was because it was me.  No one ever thought that it was said with anything but endearment.  Hmmm.  I probable teased the AP kids more than others.  They seemed to be more secure than others and were not threatened very much by my banter, which is exactly how I liked it.  

I will say one thing for bubbleheads, however.  They cheated more than any other group of students I ever taught.  I'm not exactly sure why but it may have something to do with the high expectations of parents, teachers and administrators.  Even friends got caught up in it.  Many of these kids were fighting and scrapping for scholarship money to college, they took every step they could, took every test possible such as PSAT,  AP tests, signing up for Governor's scholar positions, etc. that have possible scholarship money attached.  

My son Jeff got two full scholarships to U of Louisville because he was a Governor's scholar and a PSAT semi-finalist.  Fortunately GPA didn't count for this. Jeff was always around 3.0 just enough to stay in the AP program.  One of the smartest kids I have known. Both of my sons went to college on scholarships.  Both were on their respective high schools quick recall teams along with other highly motivated, and fiercely competitive kids.  My son, Brian, was the captain of his team at Male and a member of a very good Murray State University team.

All this competitiveness brought with it the desire to succeed at all cost and I think it included cheating.  Being caught, however had some serious consequences.  In my class, cheaters received a zero on the test and an "F" in conduct for the grading period, their parents got a phone call.  The students worried very little about the conduct grade because it did not affect their GPA.  Some parents made it important, however, and thus there was some stigma attached.

Even a cheating incident brought me to respect a kid very much.  One of my present Fb friends eventually told me a story that I did not remember at all.  He missed a day and consequently missed a quiz, which he could make up.  I told him that I would give it to him the next day.  He got with his cheating group and they furnished him with the correct multiple choice answers, sans the questions.  The young man took the quiz the next day and got a ten percent.  He realized then that I had changed the quiz.  I confronted him and said that I knew he had cheated and offered to give him another make-up the next day.  He held to his guns that he had not cheated because he did not want to lose my respect for him.  So I said OK and he got the bad grade.  He told me that it totally change his feelings on cheating and he never cheated again and actually lost a couple of friends because he would not abet in cheating.  You just never know what effect you have on people.  I wonder, sometimes, how many children I affected negatively.  I hope, not many.

Many of you who are Fb friends with me know that I have very strong political opinions and don't mind telling what they are.  I tried very hard to not let them be known in the classroom.  I felt that it would adulterate the issues we studied and possibly discourage some student from being open and honest.

One of my Fb friends, a former student definitely disagreed with me on many things but we were civil in our talks.  He wrote that he never knew what my political leanings were while he was in my class and he said it was a tribute to me.  Occasionally I had an opinion on other things.

In the process of discussing technology, really not my strong point and computers, also not my strong point, and this was in the early days were Bill Gates required sellers to load only Microsoft program on the machines.  I had read, and my son, a Computer systems engineer, told me that there were better products out there and Gates was stifling progress.  This met with a lot of resistance by all the PC users (most of them were) and it became a little heated and I became frustrated and said very loudly, "DAMN."  This caused an immediate and awkward silence and surprised and disappointed looks.  I was presenting the History Student of the Year award that same day at the Senior Ring Ceremony and when I was introduced I got a big applause that went on for some time.  I remarked that after second period class this morning, I'm surprised that some of you didn't walk out when I was introduced.  That got even a bigger applause.  Such forgiving souls.

MARY AND THE BATTLE OF FREDERICKSBURG

Wow, it has been a while.  It is not my policy to use people's last name in a blog, especially one which might make one feel uncomfortable and certainly with people I really like.  I have a funny, but, alas, a bit embarrassing story of a student report in which the last name is important to the humor.  So I messaged this woman and asked her if she would mind if I publish this story and she graciously consented.  Mary Heitz is a super  fine, lady and she was a fantastic student with great intelligence and caring.  I adored her in the class room.

As you may know, I did not like to teach the acts of war but preferred to deal with causes and effects and historical importance, but a lot of student like studying the Civil War and to make that OK for both sides I assigned battle reports for student to present to the class and I tried to tie the whole thing together in some coherent form.

I had the student chose three battles that they would be interested in and I would assign the battles first come, first serve.  I shuffled the papers and gave the student the battle first listed unless that battle had already been taken.  I then assigned the next one on the list.  As it turned out, by sheer coincidence (something it took me awhile to have Mary believe) Mary got assigned the Battle of Fredericksburg in Virginia.  unfortunately, there was a hill above the city named Marye's Heights, which ,at first glance, looks to be pronounced the same as Mary's name.  It is actually pronounced Marie's heights, but no one knew that at the time, including me.

In the course of reporting, Mary said something to the effect, The Confederate Army was on top of Marye's Heights and the Union Army assaulted Marye's Heights a number of( maybe 10, I don't remember) times.  I immediately picked up on the similarities in the names but hoped that no one else would.  Of course, some one did very quickly and began to laugh.  After all, it was a funny coincidence.  Mary, trying to concentrate on her presentation, did not realize the situation and heard the laughter and repeated the name of the hill a few time to try to figure out what was so funny.

Unfortunately I found myself in a position that dictated that a teacher should not laugh but I couldn't help it. The more Mary repeated the name, the funnier it got to me and the students in the class.  I was once in the church choir and the guy next to me said something funny and I started laughing and couldn't stop in front of the entire congregation and eventually ended up crawling out of the choir.  This was the same for me.

I laughed so hard that my sides began to ache, I got tears in my eyes, all the while feeling much remorse for my action and incredible sympathy for Mary.  It is an incident I deeply regret and Mary was a trooper.

It actually get worse, here.  After Mary graduated and I was pretty sure that none of my student knew her I began telling the story to my student and other teachers and the day came when I really was sorry for that, also. A few years down the road I was sitting in the first faculty meeting of the year at Seneca High School. and the Principal said, "I would like to introduce the new teachers this year,  first, someone many of you will remember, Mary Heitz."

Oh, my, this is not good.  After the meeting I caught Mary in the hall and awkwardly explained that I had been telling the story.  that is all the farther I got and she said you told people about the Battle of Fredericksburg.  I tried to soothe her by saying I never expected her to return but, she was rightly upset and I was, rightly, humbled and rueful.

Again, Mary was the better person and accepted the situation like an adult and accepted my apology.  Mary became a very successful educator and administrator and I do truly thank her for her consideration about this blog.  And, Mary, I really didn't set you up, I was just ignorant.  The laughing, that is another thing.  I have no excuses.  Bless you.