I was teaching English at Clarke Road Secondary School in London -  known to some as EOA (east of Adelaide) indicating it was a rather tough school.

So, I was writing an assignment on the board for my students  (a grade 12 general class), when one of them spoke out: “Hey Mrs. Fellows, are those shoes of yours what I think they are?”

Without stopping what I was doing or turning around, I replied, “Yes Robbie, they are what you think they are!”

The class all responded: “Cool!”

I had just bought a pair of red wine coloured Doc Martin’s.

They noticed everything.

Pam Fellows

Hi Jackie,

An unforgettable 2-week experience happened before I was a teacher. I was on a 2- week practicum in a grade 5 class in Windsor. One of the pupils whose name was Mark really made me shine! It was almost as if he worked on the lesson plan with me! I had the best results ever on that practicum. I decided then, that if I ever had a son his name would be Mark, and it is!

Happy to share this one!

Jane (Wilson) Russchen.

 

Jack; Here is one of many stories I could send.

I taught drawing, painting and art history at Andrews University for 43 years. I directed 15 alternating year summer sessions in Europe from 1971 to 2001. I did not realize that many college students have their own agendas for getting away from home and campus until something became an issue. At the beginning of my first trip in 1971 one student immediately took off from our group and didn’t show up until that evening. He had gone shopping and spent all of his money on clothes, a guitar, a man purse etc. Well, he begged for money from the other students until they asked me to intervene. I lent him some cash but told him I would hold his camera at the end of our tour until he paid me back. I discovered that he had borrowed the camera anyhow, so I was fortunate to get my money in the end.

Recently, I caught up to him and asked what he was doing for a living. He scalps tickets to football games full time

Greg Constantine

In the 90's, I was teaching a grade 11 Writing Strategies class with 8 great teenage boys.  My school had a no hat policy, however, it was left to each classroom teacher to enforce or ignore.   On the first day of class, i instructed my class to remove their hats!! Yikes, the fellow in the first row..got rid of his hat and there it was. A very weird blue  hairdo!  I immediately realized i could look at hats comfortably but not this hairdo.  Quickly i announced ...all hats back on!!

Marie (Valkonen) Clayden

 

Hi Jack:

I was sure not a school teacher, but did serve as a Sunday School teacher for a few years.  The SS pamphlet had a picture on the front, the story/lesson was inside on both pages, below which was a memory verse, and a picture on the back cover for them to colour.

 We talked about the picture – read the story, and then asked all to repeat the memory verse several times, as while they were coloring, I would always asked who remembered the memory verse.

 One student was always the first to exuberantly thrust his hand up in the air, but he could never ever give me the verse.  This one Sunday I talked with him ahead of class and knowing he really needed to be successful at this, I went over the memory verse with him before class started.  The verse was “Jesus said, Feed my lambs”.

I had him repeat it to me many many times, then talked with him about something else to distract him, then asked him again and he gave it to me correctly.

So now we are in class and going through the routine.  They are coloring and I asked again who remembered the verse.  He, as expected shot up his hand and I said “OK, Terry, what was the verse?”.  He hesitated and bit his lip, then his thumb, and I was getting ready to start helping him get started when he suddenly blurted out “Jesus said, Give my sheep something to eat”.

I had to applaud.  His effort was stellar……and close enough.

Never forgot that one.

Donna (Ruch) Dick

Jack...ie: This is a story about a teacher and myself. I was in grade 4, John McCrae public school. Teacher was Miss McKenzie. Grades 4 to 8 were in one class room. Miss McKenzie found a cigarette butt somewhere in the school. To find out who the smoker was, she asked all of the boys in the class room to stand and empty their pockets onto their respective desks. She then went up and down the aisles to see if there were any cigarettes on any of the desks. When she got to my desk she looked at what I had placed on to the table top. She then looked at me and said :"You have Tom Sawyer pockets", referring to large quantity of odds and ends I had taken out of my pocket. I do not remember what I emptied onto the desk but I know it was a good assortment of stuff a lad of my age would need. She never did find a cigarette, and she did not physically search any of the pockets to make sure we had completely emptied same. Veikko Autio