<p>Land 'O Lakes, Florida – The stories in the news about inappropriate relationships between teachers and students have been overwhelming. There was even a substitute teacher in New Port Richey who got in trouble after investigators say she had a relationship with an underage student.</p>
<p>Well, another Pasco County substitute teacher’s job is on the line, but this time it’s because of a magic trick.</p>
<p>The charge from the school district — Wizardry!</p>
<p>Substitute teacher Jim Piculas does a 30-second magic trick where a toothpick disappears then reappears.</p>
<p>But after performing it in front of a classroom at Rushe Middle School in Land 'O Lakes, Piculas said his job did a disappearing act of its own.</p>
<p>“I get a call the middle of the day from head of supervisor of substitute teachers. He says, ‘Jim, we have a huge issue, you can’t take any more assignments you need to come in right away,’” he said.</p>
<p>When Piculas went in, he learned his little magic trick cast a spell and went much farther than he’d hoped.</p>
<p>“I said, ‘Well Pat, can you explain this to me?’ ‘You’ve been accused of wizardry,’ [he said]. Wizardry?” he asked.</p>
<p>Sheesh. My H does magic tricks in class. He also has students building Coke bottle rockets. He roller skates and rolls bowling balls to demonstrate physical laws. He has held a match to a filled water balloon over his head to demonstrate temperature stuff (balloon doesn’t break–usually). He brings in snakes, slugs, and other critters for bio. They don’t get away *too *often…</p>
<p>He’d be in trouble in this school, that’s for sure.</p>
<p>A mom of my D’s classmate (was it 3rd grade or 4th?) came to me asking to sign a petition to keep their teacher from promoting witchcraft in class. This is how I found out about the Harry Potter books…</p>
<p>There are parents who want to ban HP from the schools and libraries. I can’t believe the magic trick story though. I would hope that an explanation took care of that. Unless there is far more to the story than that.</p>
<p>I agree, there could be more to the story. In my D’s teacher case, I suspect some parents were uneasy that the teacher (gasp!) might have been a lesbian, and the HP book was just an excuse to land this great educator in hot water with the administration.</p>
<p>The suspension story reminded me of a local case when the front page article about a wonderful science teacher brought attention to his “unorthodox” teaching style, and in the end he was forced to resign:</p>
<p>yes, i read the article…good to know it “wasn’t just the wizardry.” Apparently there are other major charges that now have surfaced against the wizard. Figures. you just can’t trust a wizard.</p>
<p>I saw a TV news interview with a young magician, recent Cornell U graduate, last name Cohen, first name was maybe Steve.</p>
<p>The interviewer made a big deal that the performing artist had an Ivy degree. Cohen said he did all of his undergrad papers on topics relevant to magic, for example, psychology papers on how to redirect a person’s attention by tangential hand motions. </p>
<p>They showed him demonstrating tricks to some parents and teen students, including one where he psyched out the boy’s locker combination.</p>
<p>He said his goal is to do the tricks so well that his only answer to the inevitable question that he never answers (“How did you do that?”) is “It must be magic.”</p>
<p>I suspect this substitute teacher was fired for entertaining the kids with magic tricks <em>instead</em> of following the lesson plan and actually teaching something. </p>
<p>Or teaching them in a way that actually keeps their interest. Innovation is anathema in schools these days, often times.</p>
<p>My H always makes it clear that it’s not “really” magic, and then discusses the science behind what he does. He gets socalled low level students to grasp the concepts behind college level physics (little do they know, since they mostly don’t believe they can.)</p>
<p>The Christian “right” strikes again (don’t get your hackles up … I am a Christian myself). Ridiculous! </p>
<p>As for the after-the-fact assertion that he didn’t follow lesson plans … why did they continue to place him as a sub? He is an at will employee. He should have been gone if he didn’t do his job. If he was so bad, why was he even in that room the day he practiced his “wizardry?”</p>
<p>Thank goodness I don’t have any tricks up my sleeve to use when I try to connect with kids I don’t know!</p>