Getting a Fourth-Grade Education

What were you doing sixteen years ago?

It was 1992 and the Summer Olympics had just left Barcelona. The Bush/Quayle ticket was fighting a losing battle against Clinton and Gore. I was 22 years old and ready to educate the world. Or at least a handful of fourth-graders from Provo, Utah.

I don't know why parents are so often unhappy with first-time teachers. Those days I was bright-eyed and filled to the bursting with innovation and enthusiasm. In the classroom at 7:30 every morning and often the last one out the door. Each night I took home a teetering stack of lesson plans, teacher manuals and dialogue journals to mark with scratch-n-sniff stickers and my trademark purple pen.

I stayed remarkably healthy considering the size (closet) of my classroom and the hygiene (questionable) of my students. In fact, the only day I missed all year was the time my husband broke his face, using his cheekbone to stop a "grounder" at a church softball game. (They won.)

Maeser Elementary--my first teaching post

These days it's a senior citizen complex. Maybe I'll retire there someday.

I taught a class of fourteen children in an old storeroom of the almost-100-year-old building. There were no cubbies or lockers or whiteboards. My students used cardboard box "tote trays" and my carefully-chosen teaching wardrobe was quickly dandered in chalkdust. After recess, I would hike up my long denim skirt, climb on a chair, open the room's one tiny window and pray for a strong breeze.

The most embarassing moment of my teaching career occurred during an evaluation. I knew a senior administrator would be coming in to observe a writing lesson and I had planned carefully. It was October, so we were writing scary stories. The interest level was high and the children were excited to make their Halloween tales spooky and bloody.

After the direct instruction, I sent the students to their seats to begin their rough drafts. I circled the room, feeling like a seasoned professional as the administrator scribbled comments on his clipboard and the classroom hummed with gory excitement. Suddenly one of the boys piped up, "Hey, Mrs. L! How do you spell {insert amazingly-intricate-anatomically-correct-completely-terrifying-male-reproductive-term here}?"

Little Kevin didn't realize how truly scary his ghost story had become. I froze and felt my blood run cold. Fortunately, the administrator was even more frightened than I and finished his visit in record time.

Well, I've seen a lot of Olympians and a few presidents rise and fall in the past 16 years. And my scary/sweet little class of nine-year-olds has gone and grown up. Now I'm the mother of a fourth-grader, dreading the long-division homework without a teacher's manual.

This week I'll come out of retirement to teach again. Big kids this time. Seminary teachers don't make any money...but nobody goes into education for the paycheck. Since it's voluntary, I'm not worried about poor evaluations or getting fired. I'm a little less innovative and a lot less bright-eyed. But what I lack in energy, I've gained in experience. Heaps of life-lessons to share. (Lesson #1--for example: No scary stories...)

I can't wait.