On your marks… let’s start… the FAMILY FEUUUUD!
If I am ever a contestant on Family Feud (if, say, I’ve died and been condemned to hell), and I’m asked, “Which occupation will be chosen by the greatest number of people to complete the following sentence?”
I would be a great __________.
I’m confident that the correct answer, by a wide margin, would be teacher .
It is with no little pride that I recognize that (1) the conviction that I would be a great teacher is a fundamental, integral element of my own self-concept, and (2) the conviction that I would be a great teacher is, at least in my case, incredibly, tragically, catastrophically, irrevocably, and dangerously wrong. It turns out that, unless the student is chronologically and psychologically mature and, most importantly, motivated – at a level approximating desperation – to learn whatever I’m offering, I manage to edge just over the threshold for a technical classification of “crappy teacher,” the criteria for which follow:
- * Does not physically harm students without providing warning
* Does not knowingly supply erroneous information to students “just for giggles”
* Knows when to quit
I am suffused with gratitude and admiration for good teachers.
So, from time to time, the Heck Of A Guy blog will offer an appreciation of teachers. Today’s saga concerns a special moment of instructional inspiration experienced by one of my buddies who recently retired from teaching high school. Some of the identifying details have been changed, but the essence of the story is unaltered.
Setting
Third Period Chemistry I Class; Room 221 at a consolidated high school in the Ozarks
Characters
Billy: Billy is a brawny, 6’5″ Junior who is a contender for all-conference running back, who can tune his 1971 Dodge Charger using only pliers, a crescent wrench, and a roll of duct tape, and who spent the last week of his shop class building a black box that has brought the magic of free cable TV to his family’s estate at #36 Green Meadows Trailer Park, but who is, alas, struggling in Chemistry I
Mr. Science: Mr. Science is Billy’s mild mannered chemistry instructor of record, locally renowned golfing guru, expert birder, weekend jock, all around good guy, and, when the need arises (cue fanfare) – Master Teacher.
Plot
Mr. Science: To correctly write the formula for certain compounds containing a polyatomic ion such as sulfate, SO4, it is sometimes necessary to put parentheses around the (SO4) and then add a subscript outside the parentheses such as (SO4)2 in order to balance the charges in the compound. For example, Pb (SO4)2 (written on the overhead projector)
Billy: (raising his hand) So why don’t you just write it as SO8?
Mr. Science: (patiently) Well Billy, sulfate’s name is SO4. We want to show that we need two of them.
Billy: Right. So why not just write SO8? It’s easier.
Mr. Science: (less patiently) But if you do that, you don’t have sulfate. You see Billy, SO4 is sulfate’s name.
Billy: (frustrated) OK … but I still think SO8 would be faster.
Mr. Science: (jugulars bulging, but still in control, pauses momentarily, sighs, and stares at the ceiling, and then, … inspiration) Billy, let me ask you a question. If your daddy sends you down to the store for two Colt 45 tall boys, what do you look for?
Billy: My fake ID? (class laughter)
Mr. Science: No Billy, in the store, what do you look for?
Billy: Well, two Colt 45 tall boys, I guess.
Mr. Science: Right! But according to what you told me before, you should be looking for a Colt 90. Two Colt 45′s would be a Colt 90, right?
Billy: There’s no such thing as a Colt 90, Mr. Sci……. (he pauses dramatically in mid-sentence, a hush falls over the room, all eyes are on Billy as his face takes on the beatific aspect emblematic of profound enlightenment, which, in Billy’s case, is not dissimilar to the expression of one finding relief after six days of constipation) Ohhhhh … I think I see what you mean Mr. Science, two SO4 groups. I get it.
Mr. Science: (smiling) Riiiiigghht.
This reminds me of the fisherman who taught me how to bait a hook.