Paper # 2 Rough Draft...

Jennifer Daniels

English 101 – Begert

2/19/2013

Partington VS. Johnson Rough Draft:

            Mark Twain says, “I have never let my schooling interfere with my education.” This is a very meaningful quote, and it really applies to this assignment. Education leads to knowledge, and as everyone knows, knowledge is power. Education is a gateway to a better life, and a better understanding of oneself. The first teacher I have chosen to write about is from my own experience, my eleventh grade English teacher Mrs. Partington. The second teacher is Ms. LouAnne Johnson from the movie, “Dangerous Minds”. The reason I have chosen these two is because both women went above and beyond to ensure that their students learned everything they possibly could. They were both inspiring, encouraging, tough when they needed to be, and a shoulder to cry on when their students needed them most. The role that both Mrs. Partington and Ms. Johnson played in their students’ lives was to inspire them, to push them beyond their limits, and to show them that they are capable of doing anything they want to do.

            My eleventh grade English teacher, Mrs. Partington, reminds me a lot of all the teachers we have read about so far, in the way she inspired me as well as my fellow classmates. Mrs. Partington was a brand new teacher. She was young and very pretty, but not conceited in any way. She was the kind of woman all the girls aspired to be, and the kind of woman all the boys wanted to marry. Maybe it was her youth that allowed her to connect so easily to all of us, or maybe she just had a gift. One characteristic of hers that makes her a good teacher is her determination. She found a way to reach each and every student that she came into contact with. And not all of us were easy. A few students in my class purposefully tried to piss her off. They’d intentionally forget their books, start fights with other kids, or ask for a hall pass to use the restroom and then disappear for 30 minutes… you name it. When all of the assigned reading books were stolen from the classroom as a prank, she had the librarian bring her a copy of each book and read them aloud instead. If any students were caught cutting class, she had their parents come in and surprise the kid in the next class period. They would sit through the entire class for that day. When kids started to get rowdy, she took it in strides and managed to tame even the most rebellious students. Another characteristic of hers is her encouragement. One student, Andrew, was dyslexic. He used that as an excuse to not do any of the readings or the homework. She gave him a lot of attention, when he was used to being ignored and written off. She tutored him in class and after school, and after a while he was one of the fastest readers in the class. She was also big on positive reinforcement. If you did a great job on a paper or assignment, she let the whole world know. But she never criticized students in front of their peers. Another thing she did was to push all of her students to take the SATs and other pre-college tests, even if the kids said they weren't going to college. She informed us about financial aid, scholarships, etc. She even had a "College/Career Day" held in our classroom where she brought in counselors, administrators and athletic coaches from nearby college campuses to talk to us. One more great thing about her was that she was our advocate. She defended her classes. Our situation was a lot like that of Garfield High School, where the Principal said that our test scores had jumped up so dramatically that we HAD to have been cheating. She knew it wasn't the case, and she fought for us. In the end, they realized we had done it on our own. She fought for us as individuals as well. Christian was a guy on the football team who was getting a lot of trouble from his teammates when they found a book of poetry in his locker. They started making his life hell, saying that he was gay. Mrs. Partington took control and spoke to their coach, letting him know what was going on. Not only did the guys get punished with extra time in practice, but they all had to read the entire poetry book and give Christian a report on it. It was a bold move on her part, though very effective.

            Ms. Johnson was a great teacher too, though her backbone wasn’t so strong at first. I saw the movie “Dangerous Minds” when I was about ten years old. It stars Michelle Pfeiffer, and she plays the role of LouAnne Johnson, a young white teacher starting out in a run-down high school in California. Even though she is an ex-marine, she has serious struggles with her students, who are mostly of African-American and Hispanic descent. One of the things I admire most about her is her tenacity.  On the first day of teaching her new class, Ms. Johnson did not do well at all. When one of her students, Emilio, got in her face, she wrote his name on the board as a form of punishment. But even after being laughed out of the classroom, she still came back. She realized that she needed a way to connect to her students, and decided to use karate as a means to accomplish it. By having Raul and Durrell do a demonstration, she got her students' attention. She also endured discouragement from her other colleagues, like when the principal told her that she had to stick to the curriculum and the required reading for her class. And again when the assistant principal tried to kick her student Callie out of school for being pregnant. Another great characteristic of hers is how she went beyond normal means in order to help her students. When Durrell stopped showing up for school, Ms. Johnson went to his house to speak with his grandmother. His grandmother told her that he had more important things to do than go to school, and Ms. Johnson tried to convince her that he had a better future ahead of him. While it did not work, most teachers would not have even gone to the trouble. When Ms. Johnson and Raul went out to dinner as his prize for winning the poetry contest, he told her that he'd need to miss a few days of class in order to work to pay off a debt. Instead of allowing him to miss school, Ms. Johnson lent him the $200 he needed and told him he had to pay her back on the day that he graduates. Not only did she keep him in class, she also motivated him to graduate, knowing that he couldn't stand to have a debt left unpaid. And while Emilio was her most troublesome student, she tried to help him as well. When his girlfriend’s ex threatened Emilio’s life, Ms. Johnson promised to keep him safe and took Emilio to her home and let him spend the night. The main thing that shows how she plays the role of a great teacher however, is her ability to connect with her students’ lives. When she had the students read the lyrics to the song "Hey Mr. Tambourine Man", they didn't understand the meaning. But once she connected it to something they were familiar with, saying that Mr. Tambourine Man is a drug dealer, it made them understand it perfectly. It seems dark or wrong to do so, but it was effective. When she had the students do the Dillon VS. Dylan poetry competition, it not only taught them how to interpret poetry, but how to embrace the darkness in it, as well as to understand the meaning it had in their own lives. To the students, "Do not go gentle into that good night" was about choices and pride. It taught them to hold their heads high, to fight for what they believe in, and to go down swinging. When Callie said she was going to drop out of school because she was pregnant, Ms. Johnson went to her house and talked to her about it. Not only did she let Callie know that she had other options, she told Callie something very personal. She told her how her ex-husband had beaten her, which is what caused the divorce and also caused Ms. Johnson to get an abortion. While she was in no way trying to encourage Callie to do the same, she did make her realize that she can still have a future, and that reality is much different than her fairytale.

            As the gatekeepers of this great power, teachers play an extremely important role. The role of teachers is not only to teach their students about traditional education, but also about values, about life, and about themselves. Their job as educators is to help these children reach their full potential, and in some cases the kids don’t believe they can do it. While Mrs. Partington and Ms. Johnson are very similar in terms of inspiration, endurance and level of experience, they differ in disciplinary style, background, and the strategies they use in trying to reach their students. They are both perfect examples of what I believe to be a great teacher. They each played the most important role a teacher can play, by being an inspiration to their students. They both encountered very difficult situations with their students, and while Ms. Johnson's was a lot more extreme than Mrs. Partington's was, they both learned to deal with them, as well as prepared their students to deal with similar situations.