School Story #4

Miss McQueen.  1984.

I began my teaching career in 1980 at the ripe old age of 22.  I was a young, idealistic, fresh-faced kindergarten teacher.  With a few years of experience under my belt, I went to teach at a Metro Vancouver inner-city school in 1984.  That was one of the toughest assignments I've ever had.

Teachers in the district had voted it 'Worst School' amongst themselves.

Back in those days, all kindergarten teachers did home visits to ease the students' transition to school.  Home visits were forbidden.

You'll see why in a minute.

I taught 22 students in the morning and 22 in the afternoon.  Those kids knocked the stuffing outta me.  Halfway through the school year I felt I had made a huge mistake in choosing teaching as a career.  "I am not good at this," I often said to myself.  "Not good at all.  Maybe I should look for another job."

I had one student in particular I will never forget.  I look for his name on 'Crime Stoppers' every now and again.

For the sake of anonymity, I shall refer to him as 'Billy'.

The dirt on Billy's neck was ingrained.  I don't think you could have scrubbed it off if you tried.  His hair looked like it had been clipped with pruning shears, his clothes were often inside out and backwards, he smelled of stale urine.  It breaks my heart just typing these words.  The poor little poppet.

Five year old Billy was fond of telling me (in great detail) how he was going to chop my body into pieces, put them into black plastic bags and leave them at the side of the road for the garbage man to pick up.  He loved to recount this scenario every chance he got.

His other favourite past-time was to jump at me (what is it with kids leaping at me?) and put his hands around my neck with his thumbs pressed onto my windpipe.  As a bonus feature he would often lift his feet from the floor and become dead weight.  It was all I could do to pry his scrawny fingers from their vice-grip on my neck.

Not only did I have to deal with Billy on a daily basis, I also had to contend with his dad.  Billy's father was an extremely large man.  EXTREMELY LARGE.  And he dressed in camouflage.  Head-to-foot camo.  All day, every day.

I think his Dad had a bit of a crush on me.  We would call it stalking today.  He hung around the school for hours.  More times than I care to remember, I would look up and see his huge face filling the window of my classroom door.  How long he'd been standing there watching I'll never know.  What I do know is that HE GAVE ME THE CREEPS!!!!!!

The children in my class came from poor families, many headed by young single mothers.  I swear, the moms of my students were younger than me.  And I was only 26 at the time!

Since the parents had little money, we took no extra-curricular field trips.  Days on end were spent in the classroom.  There weren't even any neighbourhood parks for us to walk to.

'Ocean Life' was our theme in June.  I was shocked to discover that none of my students had ever been to the ocean!  And here we lived on the beautiful coast of British Columbia.

With idealism and naïveté as my trusty companions, I set out to rectify that wrong.  I organized a year end field trip to White Rock Beach.

Since there was no money to book a school bus, I decided we would take the city transit bus to the beach.  I figured everyone could afford a buck for the bus.  On a sunny day in June we left the school for the very first time and waited on the sidewalk for the bus.  All 60 of us.  60!!!  Me, 44 children and 15 mothers.

I can't remember much about the bus ride to the beach, but I do remember the noise and how excited the kids were.  Never mind the ocean, many of them had never been on a bus before!

White Rock Beach.  Photo courtesy of Google Earth.

White Rock Beach.  Photo courtesy of Dave Cowper.

White Rock Beach.  Photo from the 'Freckles Collection'.

It was one of those days when the tide was incredibly low.  The water seemed miles away.  I'm sure you could have walked to Bellingham via the sand.

We happily piled off the bus.  We safely crossed the train tracks and before I even said a word, all 44 of my kindergarten students started running straight for the ocean!  They spread out like marbles on a wooden floor.

I yelled, "Come back!"  I shouted, "Stop!"  I screamed, "Wait for me!"  All to no avail.

I turned to ask the moms for help in rounding up their children before someone drowned.  And there they all were.  Lined up like birds on a wire.  All 15 of them sitting side by side on a log.  SMOKING!  They would be no help.

No one drowned that day.  We played on the sand.  We splashed in warm tidal pools.  Everyone made it back to school in one piece.

I only taught at that school for one year.  As a going away gift, the staff presented me with a camouflage hat and T-shirt to remember them by.  Such funny colleagues!


Now that I am nearing the end of my career, I am proud I chose to be a teacher.  I make a difference in young lives, as do my many colleagues.  Teachers are some of the most dedicated, hard-working, and caring professionals in the world.

I'm so glad I didn't quit in 1984.