Teach and Be Taught

The impact of a teacher on a student - whether good or bad - is hard to overestimate. I'm frequently complemented on my handwriting and each time I think of Mrs. Fowler, her 3rd grade penmanship class, and the ever present ruler she carried behind her back.

We practiced on blue lined yellow pads with freshly sharpened number 2 pencils. Every capital letter had to go exactly from the bottom line to the top and every lower case letter had to go exactly half that distance. Mrs. Fowler was meticulous and unforgiving about these rules and every failure brought a sharp rap to the knuckles with her ruler.
She missed nothing and accepted nothing less than perfection. T's were crossed and i's were dotted just so - self expression was discouraged. Children, she would say sternly as she peered at us over her bifocals, The object of proper penmanship is to be legible, not creative. We do not improvise here. She spoke slowly, with emphasis and clarity. There were no misunderstandings in Mrs. Fowler's 3rd grade class. In this class, she would say, slapping the ruler against her palm, In this class, there will be no slackers.

After Mrs. Fowler, there was Mrs. Rankin's 5th grade class. They were almost interchangable though Mrs. Rankin did not carry a ruler. She was a fearsome teacher - short, stout, with tightly waved iron grey hair, gold rimmed spectacles, a suggestion of a mustache and an obsession with state capitols. She loved geography and drilled us
endlessly. You will be able to recite in your sleep she warned us at the beginning of the school year. States, state capitols, rivers, oceans, mountain ranges all were second nature to us by the time she was done.

Mrs. Hansen's 6th grade class, in comparison, had no resemblance to our prior grades. She was petite, pretty, and young and her ideas about teaching appalled her colleagues. She took us on field trips, taught us about fiction writers, encouraged independent thinking. She smiled a lot, didn't mind if class discussions turned loud and tolerated any and all questions. One day a week she took her whole class to the library where we took turns reading whatever struck our fancy and then dissected its meaning. We adored her and the freedom she allowed us. She opened doors for us and made us curious and excited about learning and she was always careful to remind us that Mrs. Fowler and Mrs. Rankin had laid the foundation - she was just putting on the finishing touches. Open minds and hearts will always learn faster and go farther she would say with a smile.

All my teachers cared deeply. All good teachers do.