I've been meaning to make this topic for a while, but never got to it.
Of all my teachers, both the very best and the very worst have been English teachers. I have had no middle of the road kinds of English teachers, no generic ones, none that are "ok but nothing special". They've all either been good, or horrible.
My first English teacher, was a guy named Mr. B, in 7th and 8th grade. Probably, he was the best teacher I ever had. I was a mental mess in middle school, unable to cope with anything. But I was smart, and he liked me for that. And unlike any other teacher I've ever had, he made a real effort to figure out what my problem (Aspergers) was.
My English teacher for 10th and 12 grade, Ms. C, was my second best teacher. I'm trying to think of what it is that made these teachers so good, and it's hard to put into words - the bad ones make the better stories. I guess it's selection and presentation of subject material. But Ms. C. was always quick to encourage my interests in whatever I tried to do, and never put limits on me. When I had her in 10th, I failed the first semester, and scraped a final grade of a C-. In 12th, I ended with a final grade of an A because I'd learned organization over the past few years. She was so pleased with my improvements that one time, when I forgot my vocabulary homework at home, she told me to bring it in Monday for full credit, even though it was class policy that vocab missed was a big fat 0 in the gradebooks.
11th grade... a really bad teacher that would have been really good with a few years experience, probably really good as I write this post. Her problem was she had to overcomplicate everything. For vocabulary... coudln't just memorize the words. You had to put each one on half a note card, outline the word with lines and put a symbol on the card that somehow related to the word. Or our research paper... I don't remember anything about it, but she broke it into so many sub-projects and small tasks that it was like trying to sort tornado debris while it's still in the tornado.
Then, the bad ones.
9th... this teacher was interested in being pals with the girl students and completely ignored the boys. She also used kiddie slang, like "like". She continually said like. It was like, so totally, like, annoying. Otherwise she was just dull. Not an incompetent teacher, but one that's very easy to ignore.
ENGL 102 (first try). Ugh. To put it bluntly - she was obsessed with sex. Everything was about sex to her. We read a lot of Kate Chopin. While I don't care for Chopin, I can see why she's an author that people should be introduced to. However, I don't think giggling about who slept with who in her stories makes for a good lecture. And don't get me started on "Winesburg, Ohio". While she was busy inserting sex into a scene that had nothing to do with sex, I questioned her view in class. She stared at me, turned white, then red, then after about 15 seconds screamed 'you're WRONG!" at me. She followed that up by refusing to accept my next 2 assignments, causing me to fail the class.
ENGL 102 (second try). I guess most of us have had a teacher who starts out good and then turns bad. That was this teacher. She knew the subject material, could make it interesting. She was disorganized and couldn't follow her syllabus. She'd make changes then forget to mark hers and ask for assignments before they were due, make changes in hers but forget to tell us... that kinda thing. Then there was the day I was having car trouble, and I called her to ask if I'd miss anything important - I figured if it was test day or something I could take a taxi to school. No, she assured me that I wouldn't miss anything. I went in the next class, and she told me I'd missed a 60 point quiz, and the handing-in of an essay, neither of which I'd be allowed to make up. Even though she'd told me I wouldn't miss anything... oh yeah and the essay was not on the syllabus to begin with.
ENGL 209 - I guess this teacher wasn't bad. But she was a 1st year teacher, and her syllabus said absences are only excused if they're given 48 hours ahead of time. So one day I woke up to go to class and had laryngitis. I called in sick, missed that class and the next one. My other teachers had no problems. This one, refused to give me credit for the assignments I'd missed. Seriously... it's not like I knew 48 hours ahead of time I was going to get laryngitis.
So yeah, I've had some widely varied experiences with English teachers in particular. And the other funny thing - me as an aspie, I'm interested in writing and for some time was contemplating an English major in school.
Is there something about English that attracts people with strong and/or unusual personalities?
20 Mar 2006, 1:46 am
