<p>There is a bit of activity/negativity over in the “Are you smarter than a teacher?” thread. So, let’s have some positive feedback. Did a teacher ever change your life? Your kid’s life? If so, how?</p>
<p>When I was in high school, I was involved in a special program called the PEACE Academy. Personal success through Empowerment, Academic achievement, Conflict resolution and Ethics in action.</p>
<p>It started out as a few teachers sitting in an empty classroom over the summer with magic markers and butcher paper, planning out what a dream student would look like.</p>
<p>What resulted was the best four years of my life. These were teachers who believed in producing not just better students, but better people. They welcomed students into their classrooms during lunch and after school, to discuss anything under the sun–including personal problems, if need be. </p>
<p>There was one teacher in particular who (whom? Oh dear, she’ll be disappointed in me…she was my English teacher) I’ll never forget. We had her for 10th and 11th grade Honors English, and I loved her so much that I returned to TA for her senior year.</p>
<p>She was the teacher that taught me to write, and write well. Not only that, but she inspired passion in kids that I could never see being passionate about school. In 10th grade, the class was pretty normal until we got to The Crucible.</p>
<p>We walked in. The class was set up with the tables (we had tables that could seat 4 students around them instead of desks in some classrooms) set up like pews in a church. There was a huge Bible in the front. The lights were all off, with candles lit for the only light. She was dressed in a strange black robe.</p>
<p>Keep in mind, meanwhile, that this woman is only about 5’4", so the image was pretty hilarious to us at the time.</p>
<p>Her classroom, normally cheery and chatter-filled, was dead silent. A student (class clown type) walked in and made some comment. We all laughed, and she flipped. She was screaming at us, telling us we were possessed, etc. We realized it was supposed to be like a puritan church.</p>
<p>The next day, she chose a student from each class (it happened to be me, because everyone knew I was Christian) and explained to us with tear-filled eyes (she was quite the actress) that “someone” had complained (after pulling me out and bringing me back in) because the Puritan classroom was “inappropriate” and she was being fired. The whole class turned on me (she was extremely beloved), and it quickly turned into a witch trial sort of situation.</p>
<p>The next year, when we read Animal Farm, we became a “Communist Classroom”. We were not allowed to wear any jewelry, logos, name brands, etc. And at the end of the project, she averaged the class grade and that was the grade we all received.</p>
<p>My favorite by far was our final exam junior year. She sat at the front of the class and told us to write “something”. She wanted it to be about something we were passionate about, and she wanted it to be at least a page. She then looked at us and simply said, “Go.”</p>
<p>She said she got some of the best writing our class had done from that project.</p>
<p>Also Junior year, we studied Native American literature. We got to give ourselves a Native American name, do a name chant with it (which we could either write or, for extra credit, perform), and paint a small rock with symbols of it.</p>
<p>If you can’t tell by the length of the post, she had quite an impact on me.</p>
<p>Wonderful story, Grace!</p>
<p>Thanks! I could probably tell stories about her and her class for hours.</p>
<p>When I was in school, years and years ago, my biology teacher talked my parents into sending me on a summer course out of state. I was extremely shy and not very worldly to say the least. I had a blast. Six weeks with kids from all over the nation, none of whom knew me and had any preconceived ideas about me. I came home with tons more confidence and a much wider world perspective which I know has trickled down to my kids. Thank you, Sam Spagnola!</p>
<p>When I was in junior high, we had our first opportunity to take electives. I signed up for something (I forget what) but my music teacher made sure that the guidance office put me in his ensemble group instead. I told all of my friends that I was mad, but I was really flattered. Because he thought so much of me to think of me and have my schedule changed, I stayed in music. Today, I am a teacher of the performing arts.</p>
<p>My daughter went through a really tough period of her life at 16 when her much loved first love (a real sweetheart loved by us all) was killed in an accident just a month before she left for our prestigious but tough state math/science residential junior/senior high school. We didn’t want her to go because she was in such an emotional turmoil but she is as stubborn as a mule so off she went. A chemistry teacher there could see she was lost and overwhelmed and spent many hours talking to her, including about losses in his life and how he had felt - even talking to her about how people think of suicide (which is something we were worried about) at such times but that it was not a good option. He helped her through it at a time when we were quite lost as to how to help her (she completely shut us out for quite a long and painful period of her life) - he may have even saved her life. She thinks the world of him still - though she still hates chemistry with a passion.</p>
<p>Another teacher at the same school inspired her with a real love of biological sciences, which she is now majoring in. </p>
<p>Her least favorite subject in HS was English. Fast forward to freshman year of college and her honors college English class. This teacher helped my daughter discover a passion for writing. She had taken every clash the teacher offers and several other English classes. She is going to minor in English or maybe even double major. My daughter tells the story of how one of the students in the first English class told the teacher that she nearly didn’t take the her because on ratemyprofessor many students commented that ‘she changed my life’ and this student said he was perfectly happy with his life thatnk you and did not want it changed. But she is indeed a life changing teacher.</p>
<p>My husband’s basketball coach, who was also a teacher at our high school, talked to him about going to college. No one in his family had ever attended college and only about 20% of the students at our h.s. went on to college. He would say that this man was the ONLY reason he decided to go, and of course, I don’t have to tell any of you, it changed his whole life. His long-time girlfriend, expecting marriage immediately after h.s. graduation, broke up with him and we began dating, even though we initially headed off to differerent colleges.</p>
<p>I took AP US History the first year it was being taught by the history department chair, after years of being taught by the easy, cool teacher. The department chair made us write and write and write and got us a huge textbook that she made us read and we had essay tests and it was hard. And we all hated her mean old guts. Boo!</p>
<p>And then we took the AP test and everybody in the class got a 5. And we went off to college and all of us actually knew how to structure a good essay – that class did more for my writing skills than any English class I’ve ever taken. I’ve been back to thank the “mean” teacher several times, and I sent a profusely thankful card for her retirement.</p>
<p>My 12th grade English teacher. She was originally a short term replacement, but they luckily kept her all year. I was a shy, quiet kid who loved books, and she made me feel smart and cool, was interested in what I thought, what my aspirations were, who I was. I went off to college a million times more confident in my abilities because of her. A bigger than life, loving, incredibly memorable personality. She was a beacon for many a lost soul. My friends and I kept in touch with her after we graduated. Which worked out well for me–</p>
<p>I ended up marrying her son. :)</p>
<p>Garland, I love that! Do you enjoy having your former teacher as your MIL?</p>
<p>My favorite high school teacher completely changed the way I viewed reading. I’ve always been a reader, but up until freshman year, I’d only read for pleasure. I noticed when I liked a certain author’s writing style, which I then tried emulating in my own creative writing. However, beyond liking good prose, I never paid much attention to the power of words (to put it cornily). I vividly remember reading Gerard Manley Hopkins’ “Spring” in class one day. When my teacher explained the significance of the double meaning of the word “unleaving,” I was completely blown away. I had absolutely no idea that language could do that! After that class, I couldn’t read the same way again. I started noticing syntax, diction, and imagery. She basically taught me how to think critically and read actively, instead of passively. </p>
<p>I had her again for AP English two years later. While honors freshman English had been pretty easy, she was known as a tough teacher in AP English. We wrote essays every other day for several weeks. She’d critique the heck out of them; it was nearly impossible to get even an A- in that class. While I’d never had so much trouble doing well in a class, I’d also never been so challenged in my life. It was grueling, but I loved it. When I took my first college English class, I was absolutely terrified. I kept on telling myself that I was no longer in the Little League and needed to work harder because everyone around me had so much more experience. My instructor ended up being really impressed with my ideas and my writing, and I definitely owed all of my success in that class to my high school English experience! </p>
<p>In addition to all the academic help she gave me, she also helped me with some personal issues. I was incredibly stressed out fall of senior year, since all I wanted was to get into my top choice. When I went to see her about my college application essay, I ended up telling her a lot about myself that I never would’ve told anyone else. I’m embarrassed, now, to have done such a thing, but at the time it was really a relief to get everything off my shoulders. She never, ever judged me for what I said or thought less of me. </p>
<p>I still keep in touch with her. And is it any wonder that I’m double majoring in English now? 
My life would honestly not be the same without her.</p>
<p>Demeter–I loved having her for a MIL. She was a great grandma, too! Unfortunately, we lost her way too soon.</p>
<p>I could go on for pages about the ways in which teachers have changed my life, and those of my children, for the better. With only a minute to spare this AM, I’ll settle on Miss Satta, my junior year English teacher. She was a very large, not really attractive middle-aged lady who never seemed to get up from behind her desk. But she didn’t need to in order to keep her classes in line. She was fascinating, funny, interested in us, and absolutely dedicated to her job.</p>
<p>She taught us how to write. Every week, she assigned a 2-page essay (then called a “theme”) which was due on Wednesday. Every Thursday, she returned them to us, with numerous corrections, in red ink, of everything from structure and spelling to organization and style. Every Friday, we’d return the corrected version to her. No detail escaped her notice, and I’m certain that none of her former students would dream of using “it’s” when they mean “its” today. </p>
<p>Oh - and her classroom discussions were free-wheeling and entertaining, and she let us pull our desks around in a circle without seat assignments. We adored her. She changed all of her students into confident writers and questioning readers. What a blessing to all of us!</p>
<p>I could never, ever do what teachers do. My hat’s permanently off to them.</p>