227 Unique teaching styles

Unique Teaching Styles

In a discussion about grammar, I was proudly telling Frances Lowe, fellow Savvy Broad and former English teacher, about my favorite English teacher and her unique teaching methods. I think her name was Mrs. Knox. (I changed schools on the average of every two years and have trouble remembering my teachers' names.)

She taught ninth-grade English in a manner that I have appreciated over the years. Each student was required to bring a notebook dedicated to grammar to class.

Every day she filled the blackboard with grammar or punctuation rules--they were crammed in from side to side. We were required to write down everything from the board.

Her writing, unlike this example,
made sense.

Eventually, I had a notebook filled with all the rules. From what I know about education research, her methods were entirely wrong for many students.

But they certainly suited my learning style. I must write things down for them to stick! I think we were allowed to use our notebooks to solve grammar questions on quizzes--a great way to reinforce learning, I think!

Mrs. Knox also started my love for Shakespeare--we read parts of plays out loud in class. She also had us choose one or two, I am not sure which, more plays to read on our own. In another notebook, we were required to record our favorite quotations from those plays. I still remember some!

I also remember a creative writing exercise in which we wrote a story during class while listening to (and inspired by) a dramatic piece of classical music. I had just seen Spencer Tracy in The Old Man and the Sea. Of course, I wrote about being lost at sea in a small boat! It did fit the music though not too original!

Jumping ahead in time, I took a graduate grammar course. I know I enjoyed the course, but honestly, I remember very little of its content. That professor used a technique that I adopted when I was teaching graduate courses in library science. After an essay exam, he would type up the best answers to the essay questions and distribute them, without naming the author, to the class.

One thing that I remember him saying, "It is simple. When you pause, add a comma." That was a slap-your-head moment for me. We also discussed the Oxford comma. Think about it--don't you pause before the and in your series?

So when I write, I remember my ninth-grade grammar rules and add commas when I pause.

And I still love Shakespeare!

Grammar-Savvy Trish          

226 Oct. 31--Still a Celebration!

OCTOBER 31 – Still A Celebration! 

Yes, I am probably rushing the holiday a bit, but I admit Hallowe’en is one of my favorite celebrations. Although many schools and churches no longer acknowledge Hallowe’en as an activity for children, pumpkins seem to work their way into teaching about fall and, thus, a few orange and black Crayons see extra duty in school, and spooky stories might get included. I do believe every child who ever set foot in a public elementary school brought home at least one orange pumpkin picture to be hung on the refrigerator.

From www.gardner’snet.com, a site that tells me when to prune the trees and shrubs that grow around our house, I found some interesting pumpkin facts. I think maybe I knew some of them, but here are a few: 

· Pumpkins originated in Central America 

· Pumpkins are really squash 

· Pumpkins are fruit – they have seeds 

· Pumpkins should not be called Jack-O-Lanterns until they are carved (eye roll here)

· Pumpkins are gluten-free

· Pumpkins are grown all over the world except in Antarctica

· Never handle a pumpkin by its stem

For those of you, dear friends and readers, I thought I would also refresh my memory and yours about Hallowe’en. Bless Google’s heart! The first site that appeared was www.holidayspot.com --a site that gives a nice variety of facts for almost all occasions. So, taking from their website, I have relearned that the custom of trick-or-treating originated in the Middle Ages. 

An age of superstition for sure, but the poor dressed in costumes and went door-to-door on what was called “Hallowmas” to beg for food or money. Some of the poor got only a prayer while luckier beggars got a coin or a Soul Cake. (Wikipedia defines a Soul Cake as a small round cake which, when eaten, means a soul would be released from purgatory. Also, popping up, were recipes for Soul Cake. Those I did not open--no need to turn on the oven--now is there?!)

Back to Medieval Europe. The black cat and the owl were and are popular images for Hallowe’en says the holidayspot.com website. Black cats were the familiars of the witches, and owls were thought to be witches themselves. The owl’s hoot on October 31 meant someone would die soon. 

From reading historical fiction and binge-watching the Celts on Amazon Prime, I do know that the last day of October is the last day of the Celtic calendar and it honors the dead. The Celtic tradition uses the term Samhain, meaning “end of summer.” I also learned that it is pronounced “sow-in.” (Not exactly English phonics, is it?)

Now, let’s jump forward to the 1930s and modern Hallowe’en when the National Communication Association (a somewhat scholarly association that has been around since the 1920s) said that over 90% of all American children celebrated Hallowe’en with parties, costumes, and/or trick-or-treating. But in the 1930s, with the Depression, urban gangs, and backwoods’ good-ole-boys, trick-or-treating turned a bit nasty with considerable theft and property damage. Local authorities then began setting limits on what was legal and what was not. Hours for trick-or-treating were established community by community.

I remember my first Hallowe’en. It was a party at the Episcopal parish hall. I was four-years-old and a “beautiful ballet dancer” with a tutu and a wand. I won first place for the prettiest costume. (Don’t think I have won anything since! and I don’t remember the prize so it must not have been anything particularly noteworthy.) 

Then there were the years of herding my two younger sisters from house-to-house with the caveat that I got part of their candy. In high school, the custom was for groups to go out as a covey? flock? gathering? of ghosts. I used the same sheet for three years. In my junior year, we got stopped by the local sheriff who told us to “go on home and let the little ones get the candy.” Nope, didn’t stop us until we had a sufficient supply of sugar in our brown paper bags. We were so cool, weren’t we? One of our ghostly gang members’ grandparents lived at and were the caretakers of the local cemetery. It was a grand place to play flashlight tag and hide’n’seek in our ghostly sheets.

Now Dear Husband and I, since we get no “trick-or-treaters” in the country, buy a bag of our favorite candy and munch away on the 31st with no thought of sugar or calories!!

Here’s a tip or two for candy-buying. According to www.sunny98.1sd.radio.com, the most popular candies are: Twix, Kit Kat, M&Ms, Nerds, Butterfingers, Sour Patch Kids, and Hershey Bar miniatures. (I was a little surprised--where are the Reese’s Cups and the Snickers?) 

The least favorite treats are: candy corn, Mary Jane taffy, Necco Wafers, Tootsie Rolls, Good&Plenty, and licorice. 

Also, predicted for most popular costumes this year: Pennywise (the awful, scary clown from IT), other clown costumes, Spiderman, dinosaurs, and pretty little princesses.

I have my coupon for CVS buy-one-get-one-free Hallowe’en candy. I can’t go too far ahead of time, though, as my will power is not great. So, here’s to Happy Hallowe’en, or Samhain and to lots of good chocolate!

Savvy Glenne

p.s. this just struck my warped sense of humor as really funny: 

225 Do it now!

Do it now!

How many times have we heard or have we said--let’s get together, give me a call, let’s have lunch soon!

Probably too many to count. Most people let loose with these comments without ever planning on making good on them or following up.

Well, it is time, people, to do just that. Make that call, set that visit, reconnect with an old friend, or any similar activity.

It seems lately that many dear friends have left the planet. While contact has been made in many of these cases, not so in some of the others.

A friend of mine for more than 50 years recently passed away and the accolades were numerous--a great person, wonderful teacher, and many other exclamations of love and friendship. If only she had been there to hear them-she would have been thrilled.

Why do we wait to honor those we care about! Death is not the time. Reach out to someone you have been meaning to contact. It really isn’t that hard. Social media makes it very convenient. In most cases, it is also free. On Facebook, a person can send a message, like a comment, love a post, or say something about what is posted. It only takes a few seconds. Likewise, Instagram, Twitter, and other similar platforms provided the opportunity to keep up and even make an initial contact.

Several years ago, my high school classmates started a Facebook page, and since then, my husband and I have communicated with dear friends whom we had not seen in decades. It has been a blessing to reconnect especially since we moved away many years ago. Also, there have been a few trips that brought back so many memories. 

Now sometimes these reunions will not always be successful. You may realize the person is not who you remember and may disagree completely with you on many topics. I actually had a classmate unfriend a few of us after some decided differences in philosophy. But don’t let this discourage--it didn’t me.

In addition, through social media we now keep up with cousins we grew up with but lost touch due to moving miles away and letting life events get in the way. It has been equally rewarding to communicate with them and visit in some cases. 

None of this would have happened without modern methods of communication. So there is no excuse! Reach out and find out what is going on in their lives and share yours before it is too late. If you are not technologically savvy, ask a younger person for help or even a grandchild--they definitely know how to communicate.

In a recent novel by John Grisham, The Rooster Bar, one of the characters laments that he hates funerals. “What purpose did they serve? There were far better ways to console the loved ones than gathering in a packed church to talk about the deceased and have a good cry.” Many people will disagree with this, but it does encourage us to communicate before it is too late. Funerals are for the ones left behind not the one who is gone.

We shouldn’t wait until it is too late to make the contact and let others know how we feel. If only my friend could have heard the wonderful things her former students and colleagues were saying about her. It would have made her day.

Go ahead – do it. Make someone’s day.

Frances               

224 The Ultimate Whistleblower

The Ultimate Whistleblower: A Guest Blog 

I blew the whistle long and hard, and in seconds, 200 pairs of eyes looked my way. A scrum of hot, sweaty, red-faced children began lining up, some fighting to be first in line, others slowly straggling in.

As usual, some of the older students stood defiant, doing their best to ignore me. After all, I’m the playground monitor, and in the pecking order of authority, I’m somewhere between the lunch lady and the janitor in the minds of most school children. Or so they thought.

I accepted the job 20 years ago because I thought it would be a fun way to see my children and experience a typical day at an elementary school in Dallas, TX. And for the first week or two, that’s exactly what it was.

But after a month of watching hundreds of children test the limits, my calm, steady personae took a hard right turn toward authoritarianism. Whistle ready and not afraid to use it, I quickly learned that I was the absolute arbiter of all social behavior on the playground and needed to draw a line in the sandbox of control. 

Children, in their free-thinking exuberance, look at objects entirely differently from the adults who created them. Kindergarteners will gleefully run up the slide, rather than down, or belly flop on a swing intended for their backside. Perfect whistle-worthy moments!

Later, several forceful blows from my trusty whistle and a fierce middle-age glare will convince several 5th graders to cease their game of kicking the soccer ball over the school fence. Recognizing the error of their ways, they give up the game…for today anyway.

As every parent knows: children are nonstop energy. And when they only have 30 minutes of unstructured time on the playground, their vitality goes into hyper speed.

Balls, jump ropes, chalk, and other toys are grabbed up and carted off with a frenzy usually reserved for Black Friday sales. Constant motion, thunderous shouting, and occasional bullying are all being monitored by just a few parents and teachers, who often exhibit a Zen-master ability to handle stress.

With my trusty whistle, I could stop a bully in his/her tracks, determine which group got the soccer ball, and prevent an errant child from climbing the downspout to the roof.

Often, middle-school soccer games were the most trying moments. A flying ball, swinging legs, groups of running boys and goalies on either end with no padding…what could possibly go wrong? I was responsible that no teeth were knocked out or body parts broken. It was often a daunting responsibility, and one that I never took for granted, being a mother myself.

Sometimes I think back on those days and wonder if we all wouldn’t be better off with a playground monitor in our heads. Thinking about running that red light? The squeal of a whistle will get you to stop. Pulling into a designated handicap parking spot without a proper tag? The piercing tone in your ear will get you to move on. Texting while driving? Get the bullhorn out for this one!

All of us should live as if our conscience holds a whistle, and even the thought of a misdeed will bring the shrill sound of shame bearing down on our behavior.

I look back on those days with fond memories. No broken bones, chipped teeth or lost children on my watch--just a sense of pride in a job well done. And of course, I still have my trusty whistle.

Teri S. Merrill