Saturday, August 4, 2012

School Days, School Days, Good Old Fashioned School Days...

Well, summer break is over and school has 3 days under her belt. The first week has been good. I really do love getting back to school even if I do wish summer break could continue (unfinished projects, sleeping later, not having to be on schedule, etc.). I think the anticipation of the new school season is a holdover from my childhood days.

I lived right across the street from my grammar school so my sister and I were frequent visitors to the playground there and the Book Mobile that came in the summer. As the new school year approached and the week before school started, teachers would post the new class rosters outside their doors. The delight of being able to go up those concrete stairs and enter those empty halls (except for some teachers, a few other students like myself, and a member of the janitor staff) to see firsthand which teacher you would have that year was so exciting.

I still have that  joy of seeing the new class roster except this time I am the eductor and not the recipient. I so hope that my "children" have the same anticipation of the new year like I did. Times have changed so much. Children are not as well disciplined as my age group was. They have so many more distractions to keep them less focused. The social issues that they face in their little lives is so much more daunting than any I ever had to face at that age. But I hope that in some way I can provide a little haven in the long process of education and life that looms before them.

I think this is a good time to express thanks to those wonderful ladies of Pearl Stephens School (Macon GA) who served me for the seven years I was in grammar school. (It's called elementary school now. Saying "grammar school" REALLY dates you!) Mrs. Wimberly (1st grade), Miss Wesley (2nd), Mrs. Ricks (3rd), Mrs. Goss (4th), Mrs. Lewis (first few weeks of 5th) and Mrs. Meeks(5th), Mrs. White and Mrs. Wimberly (6th - we switched classes), and Mrs. Lewis, Miss Williams, and Mrs. Deaton (7th - teachers taught their expertise). I know most of you are no longer alive, but thank you for all you taught me. I am a better person for being under your devoted instruction.