Confessions of a bad teacher

John Owens:

By the time we sang "The Star-Spangled Banner" in 9th grade English, it was too late to save me. So I didn't even try to keep the kids quiet, and joined the class as they burst into song.

Almon, an A-average boy whose parents had emigrated from the Dominican Republic by way of Milwaukee, was absolutely sure our national anthem includes the lyric "cheese bursting in air."

Daria, who came from Honduras just a few years ago and was struggling with English, was gamely singing, trying to guess what words would be appropriate for a song about her new country. "Nice!" "Nice! In air!"

Sarah, the daughter of Ghanese immigrants, got every word right and hit every note with church-choir perfection. And from Rikkie, the highly intelligent, perhaps brilliant, boy, whose father is serving six years in an upstate prison, to Cristofer, a skinny kid who fancies himself a Puerto Rican tough ("I didn't even cry when my father died"), to A'Don, whose mother doesn't speak English, to Michael, whose father doesn't speak English, to Macon, who only seems to care about basketball, we sang loud, we sang laughing, we sang whatever words we knew, and we sang for all we were worth.

Posted by Jim Zellmer at September 8, 2011 3:49 AM
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