Of Life and Times

Since I come from another century, I laugh when I think about how I was taught compared to how people are taught today. My days in high school seemed to be at the crossroads of the old school of “shut up, sit down, listen up” and today’s efforts to be creative, build autonomy in the learner, and inclusion of those with special needs and disabilities.

I don’t know if I can call her my favorite teacher, but Betty Zumo was probably the most powerful teacher I have ever had. She was an amazing mix of dispenser of knowledge, motivator, drill sergeant, scientist, and intimidation specialist. I don’t believe there was any student in my high school who was not deathly afraid of Mrs. Zumo. She was all of 4’ 11” standing tall. She had short cropped jet black hair, a sharp hawk-like nose that could have sliced bread, beady black eyes, and a pinched expression on her face that froze you in your tracks.

Mrs. Zumo taught biology. Her rules were the strictest in the school, and no one was exempt from her punishments, which were meted out with universal fairness. When she said that you had to be in your seat when the bell rang, you still got detention if you were in the act of lowering yourself onto your chair when the bell stopped ringing. She demanded exactness, and she got it. When she lectured she wrote on the board. We were expected to copy onto our paper everything she wrote. There were no handouts (took too much time to mimeograph). As short as she was she could fill two full chalkboards from top to bottom and from side to side before we could finish copying one of them. There was a constant barrage of needling from her about how in years past the students were so much faster, so much smarter and intelligent, etc. That was life in her classroom. She brooked no interruption and took no guff from anyone.

Then it started, we had a bomb threat in the school. Every day we had more of them. Someone even threw a Molotov cocktail onto our old wooden gymnasium floor. Fortunately it didn’t explode, but the upshot was that the whole high school building was condemned by the fire Marshall and we had to start attending school in shifts so that only half the school was in the building at any one time. This doubled the workload for all the teachers.

As I went past Mrs. Zumo’s room one day I saw her standing at the sink cleaning stacks of Petri dishes that each had to be three feet high. I felt really sorry for her having to clean them out all by herself, so I went in and volunteered to help her clean. During the course of the conversation that ensued I learned that she, like my mother, had attended this same high school 20+ years before, and that she even knew my mother. We talked about class and what was happening to the school, and many other things during the hour or so I was helping out. What stunned me was that she was a really nice person. She had an infectious laugh, and was even capable of getting a sparkle in her eye. I got brave and asked her why she felt she needed to be so strict in class. The answer was astonishing to a high school boy. She said that because of her size the bigger boys, especially those on the football team, felt like they could just walk all over her. The only way she could protect herself and keep any sanity in the classroom was to make them so afraid of her that just coming into class made them tremble. And it was true, they did. She explained many of her methods to me that day. I left the room feeling so blessed. I had made a friend of the meanest, most ornery teacher in the school, and I was no longer afraid of her.

For the rest of the school year we had an understanding. She wouldn’t be harder on me than anyone else, but only if I didn’t let on that I knew her secrets. I gladly agreed. From then on when she was brow beating a defensive tackle, I would occasionally spot this twinkle in her eye, and would get a half a wink as she turned and laid into the football player for not having done his homework. The textbook says that teachers “have the power to create a community of learners within their own classroom every day” (Diaz 38) As I have thought about this statement it occurred to me that Mrs. Zumo did, in fact, create a community of learners each day, though I don’t think it was done as our textbook authors intended. The class came each day, united in their fear of this little spitfire of a teacher. We all worked hard and tried our best, because we knew what would happen if we were lazy. Mrs. Zumo was never mean or hurtful in what she said, but she was very direct and let you know exactly what she expected out of you. She always pushed us to be better than we were at that moment, to rise to the challenge.

Our textbook says that “good teaching is about caring, nurturing and developing minds and talents. It is about devoting time, often invisible, to every student.” (Diaz 18) Betty Zumo was not your nurturing kindergarten teacher. She wasn’t one you thought of first to go to when you had a problem you needed to talk about. But Betty Zumo was devoted to her students. Even through the thankless hours of cleaning up from the experiments by herself, sometimes late into the night, she kept doing it year after year. She believed in our abilities and saw our capabilities even when we had no clue, and if she had to drag it out of us (sometimes with us kicking and screaming the whole way) then so be it. Surprisingly enough, I am probably more proud of what I learned in her class than in any other subject I ever took in high school, and I’m terrible in the sciences. But I still have a soft spot for biology.

Diaz, Carlos, Carol Pelletier, and Eugene Provenzo. Touch the Future... Teach!. Boston: Pearson      Education, 2006.

I honestly cannot remember a time that I did not like going to school. Okay, I lied. I hated the fourth grade. Cruddy teacher and everything seemed to go wrong that year. But besides that little glitch, I have always loved to learn, and school was like a smorgasbord of new information for me to play with.

My most difficult subject was math. I think I was almost 40 years old before I found an injured mechanic turned adjunct math teacher at SUU before I met anyone who could help me understand how to think about multiple variables in an algebraic equation. For some reason when he walked me through it I felt like the sun shown for the first time in my life, and I understood what it meant to be warmed by its rays. It was so very exciting. That was short lived, but I won’t ever forget how it made me feel. I felt hope and confidence. I felt like I could conquer the world.

When I was in high school I had a history teacher who was as effeminate as was allowed, short of being in imminent danger of being beaten up by the red necks in the neighborhood. He had gone to school with my mother 20 plus years before and was a quirky fellow. One day I asked him why those in South America just let the Europeans walk into their countries and just take it away. Why didn’t they fight back? He paused a moment, with his head cocked to one side, then bravely strode down the aisle and snatched my pencil from my hand and went back to the front of the room. Turning on me he said, “This is my pencil. You going to do anything about it?” I have to admit that I had to scramble to pick my jaw up off the floor. I saw with perfect clarity why the Europeans got away with what they did. They had the fire power to slaughter the local peoples if they gave them any trouble, so the locals couldn’t do anything about it. That was the most potent and graphic lesson I ever learned in school. It was instant comprehension and understanding. Everything fell into place in that moment. It was a wonderful experience. I was thrilled to be in his classroom.

I wanted to grow up to be a history teacher myself, but my father (and I won’t get into those issues) discouraged me because it wouldn’t pay me enough money and I would have to work too hard for what little salary I got. So I stuffed my dream into the back of my mind and looked elsewhere.

Over the years I have come to one grand realization. I love to teach. I love it so much that I cannot not teach. It just comes out. It is like the enthusiasm of a child on Christmas morning. Just try to get them to stand still and not make any noise. Won’t happen. As I watched television with my children I interjected and drew comparisons. As we watched sit-coms I challenged the moral undertones being represented so they would not think I approved of what they were being taught by Hollywood. When I went to work for BYUH as the Administrative Assistant for the Dean in the School of Business, it was my students who encouraged me to go into TESOL. They said that they learned more from me while at work than they did from most of their other teachers at the university. While I don’t know that I really believe that, it made me feel good, and I yearned to be able to teach full time. So I left my position and finally finished my Bachelors in TESOL. I fully expected to go back to work as an Admin. Asst., but three years have now gone by and I am still unemployed. I have been blessed with the opportunity to teach three EIL classes in the last couple of semesters. That has been a euphoric joy. I love the students, I love the topic. I love my language. I love to teach.

This is why I am enrolled in the certification program. Despite what my father told me those many decades ago, I still want to teach, and if I have anything to say about it, teach I shall.