Schools up the down staircase

(The extracts given below are from Bel Kaufman's book "Up the Down Staircase". The book was screened and the film was a great success in America as it shows the American educational system from the inside. It is "a cry from the teacher's heart", as the writer puts it. Sylvia Barrett, a University graduate, M.A., goes to teach at Calvin Coolidge School, a New York high school. She writes letters to Ellen, her college friend, about her teaching experiences.)

Part one

1. Hi, Teach

Pupil: Hi, teach! You the teacher? You so young. Can I be in your class?

Teacher: Please don't block the doorway. Please come in.

P.: Good afternoon, Miss Barnet.

T.: Miss Barrett. My name's on the blackboard.

P.: Oh, no! A dame for homeroom?

P.: You want I should slug him, teach?

P.: Is this homeroom period?

T.: Yes, sit down, please.

P.: I don't belong here.

P.: We gonna have you all term? Are you a regular or a sub?

P.: There aren't enough chairs.

T. : Take any seat at all.

P.: Can we wit on the radiator? That's what we did last term.

P.: Don't you see the teacher's trying to say something?

T.: Please sit down. I'd like to...

P.: Hey, the bell just rung!

P.: When do we go home?

T.: The bell is your signal to come to order. Will you please...

P.: Can I have a pass to a drink of water?

T.: I'll have you for homeroom all term, and I hope to meet some of you in my English classes. Now, someone said that first impressions...

P.: English! No wonder! Who needs it? You give homework?

T.: I'd like you to come to order, please. I'm afraid we won't have time for the discussion first impressions I had planned. I'm passing out Delaney cards You are to fill them out while I take attendance from the Roll book.

P.: Who's got a pencil to loan me?

P.: Someone robbed my ball-point!

P.: I can't do it. I lost my glasses.

P.: First name last or last mane fust?

P.: I goat have a pass to the Men's Room. I know my rights; this is a democracy, ain't it?

T.: What's the trouble now? And who are you?

P.: I'm sorry I'm late. I was in Detention.

T.: The what?

P.: The Late Room.

T.: May I have your attention, please. Please, class. There's been a change in today's assembly schedule. Listen carefully! This morning there will be a long homeroom period extending into the first half of the second period. Since it is difficult to provide adequate seating space for all students under existing facilities, the overflow is to stand in the aisles. Dr Clarke will extend a warm welcome to all new students. His topic will be "Our cultural heritage", any student found talking or eating lunch in assembly is to be reported at once to Mr. McHabe. Now class, please finish your Delaney cards while I call the roll. Please come to order while I take attendance, and correct me if I mispronounce your name. I hope to get to know all of you soon.

P.: Hurray! Saved by the bell!

T.: Just a minute... the bell seems to be fifteen minutes early. It may be a mistake. We have so much to... Please remain in your seats.

P.: That's the belli You heard it!

P.: When the bell tings, we're supposed to go!

T.: Well. It looks as if you and I are the only ones left. Your name is...?

P.: Alice Blake, Miss Barrett. I just wanted you to know how much I enjoyed your lesson.

T.: Thank you, but it wasn't really a... Yes, young lady?

- I'm from the office. Please disregard the bells. Students are to remain in their homerooms until the warning bell rings.

T.: I'm afraid they've all gene, what's that, young man?

P.: Late pass.

T.: That's no way to hand it to me. Throwing it lake that on desk...

P.: My aim's bad.

T. : There's no need for insolence. Please take that toothpick of your mouth when you talk to me. What's your name?

P.: Joe Ferone. You gonna send a letter home? Lecture, me?

T.: I don't allow anyone to talk to me like that.

P.: So you're lucky - you're a teacher.

2. Let it Be a Challenge

Intraschool communication

From: Mrs Beatrice Schlachter, Room 508.

To: Miss Sylvia Barrett, Room 304.

Dear Syl

Welcome to the fold! I hope it goes well with you on this, your first day. If you need help, just holler, I'm in 508.

What's your program? Can we synchronize our lunch periods?

Fondly, Bea

From: 304

To: 508

Dear Bea -

Nothing in my courses on Anglo-Saxon literature, or in Pedagogy or in my Master's thesis on Chaucer had prepared me for this.

I had planned to establish rapport, a climate of warmth and mutual respect. I would begin, I thought, whit First Impressions: importance of appearance, manners, speech, on which I'd build an eloquent a for good diction, correct usage, fluent self-expression.

That's what I thought.

What happened was that I didn't get beyond the B's in taking attendance.

Syl

3. And Gladly Teach...

Dear Ellen,

It's a far cry from our dorm in Lyouns Hall (was it only four years ago?); and a far and desperate cry from Education 114 and Prof. Winters' lectures on "The Psychology of the Adolescent". I have met the Adolescent face to face, obviously Prof. Winters had not.

What I really had in mind was to do a little teaching. "And gladly wolde he leme, and gladly teche" – like Chaucer's Clerke of Qxenford, I had come eager to share all I know and feel; to imbue the young with a love for their language and literature; to instruct and to inspire. What happened in real life was something else again, and even if I could describe it, you would think I'm exaggerating.

But I'm not.

In homeroom (that's the official class, where the kids report in the morning and in the afternoon for attendance and vital statistics) they went after me with their ammunition: whistling, shouting, drumming on desks, playing catch with the board eraser and so on – all this with an air of innocence, while I stood there, pleading for attention, wary as a lion-tamer, my eyes on all 46 at once.

I am writing this during my free unassigned period, at the end of my first day of teaching. So far, I have taught nothing – but I have learned a great deal.

To wit:

We have to punch a time clock and abide by the Rules. We must make sure our students likewise abide, and that they sign the time sheet whenever they leave or reenter a room. We have keys but no locks (except in lavatories), blackboards but no chalk, students but no seats, teachers but no time to teach.

The library is closed to the students.

Yet I'm told that Calvin Coolidge is not unique; it's as average as a large metropolitan high school can be. There are many schools worse than this (the official phrase is "problem-area schools for the lower socio-economic groups") and a few better ones.

Kids with an aptitude in a trade can go to vocational high schools; kids with outstanding talents in math, science, drama, dance, music or art can attend special high schools which require entrance tests or auditions; kids with emotional problems or difficulties in learning are sent to the "600 schools". But the great majority, the ordinary kids, find themselves in Calvin Coolidge or its reasonable facsimile. And so do the teachers.

Do you remember Rhoda, who left Lyons Hall before graduation? She is now writing advertising copy for a cosmetics firm at three times my salary. I often think of her. And of Mattie, who was in graduate school with me, and who is teaching at Willowdale Acad­emy, holding seminars on James Joyce. And I think I must be crazy to stay on here.

And yet – there is a certain phrase we have, a land of in-joke: "Let it be a challenge".

There goes the bell. Or is it only the warning signal?

Love Syl

COMMENTARY

Calvin Coolidge: the US President from 1923 to 1928. The school Bel Kaufman describes is named after him.

high school. Secondary education in the US is given in high schools. Formerly state education consisted of 8 years of elementary school and 4 years of high school. Recently, in the greater part of the US, a new division was adopted. Elementary schools were reduced to six years, a three- year junior high school was introduced, and senior high schools were cut down to three years. The new plan is called the 6 + 3 + 3 plan ‒ six years of elementary school, three years of junior high school and three years of senior high school. In senior high schools jive curricula are usually offered, namely: the Academic, the General, the Commercial, the Vocational Home Economics and Vocational Agriculture.

He (slang): Hallo

teach (Am. vulg.): "училка"

dame: an old word meaning 'lady', not used now except in joking style

slug (Br. to slog): to hit hard

gonna (illit.): going to

Delaney cards: special cards for checking the general and psychi­cal development of a child

My aim is bad. "I am not very good at aiming".

Welcome to the fold! "Welcome to the school!" fold (fig.): a body of religious believers

holler (slang): to shout (for help)

It's a far cry from our dorm...: "It's a long way (very different) from our dormitory (hostel)..."

Lyons Hall: the name of the college Sylvia Barrett went to

Education 114: Lecture-hall number 114 in which lectures in Pedagogy were given by Prof. Winters

"And gladly wolde he lerne and gladly teche": a quotation from Chaucer (and gladly would he learn and gladly would he teach)

Oxenford: the old name of Oxford

to wit: namely, that is to say

to abide by the Rules: to obey the Rules

WORDS AND WORD COMBINATIONS

Homeroom, period , homeroom period (Am.), unassigned period, pass, late pass, take attendance, roll book, call the roll, assembly, facilities, detention, report smb., establish rapport, imbue, board eraser, graduate school.

EXERCISES