Because I was both intelligent (I started reading on my own when I was three) and overly active in the eyes of the nuns I became a focus of concern both in Catholic school and my previous elementary school. Much of school involved reading. I would quickly finish whatever I was reading and then, well, I would find something
to do. Often this involved disturbing the other students or creating interesting and distracting diversions for myself.
This caused such consternation among the powers that be that I was tested by the school psychologist in second grade. According to family legend, she quit halfway through my tests and told my mother there was nothing wrong with me. I was just bored. All the school had to do was keep my busy. By the time I was in the third grade, they had me tutoring kids as old as twelve in reading. At the same time I took bonehead or more politically correctly, "remedial" math.
They also had me and five other kids doing "projects" constantly. I suppose this was an early attempt at talented and gifted programs. Projects meant spending a lot of time in the the library reading. I loved reading. It brought me into a world much bigger than what school could provide. Alas, all of these efforts to fit me into the school box went awry. I continued getting in trouble. My intelligence and hyperactivity knew no bounds.
Compound this with the "open classroom concept." Nobody ever accurately explained the open classroom concept to me. Let's just say it was another education reform theory gone wild. From the perspective of a memory from third grade forty years later it was delightful chaos. Four classrooms were all semi-open to each other with four different teachers teaching four different lessons. I think part of the theory was that we would be absorbing part of each lesson.
"Open-space schools continue to be a very controversial idea for the obvious reason that a lack of architectural walls increases the noise and distraction making the teaching environment non-conducive to learning. It is generally accepted that this negative aspect disproportionately hurts students who have difficulty focusing because of ADHD or other attentional challenges. However, some studies have shown that the open-space school model has a tendency to increase curiosity and creativity of other children."
The transition from open classroom to the education system of the world’s most repressive and patriarchal religion was like parachuting only to discover too late that there was no parachute. I went from utter freedom and chaos to green sweaters, white shirts and corduroy pants just like everybody else. I recall distinctly my very first day in the fourth grade in Sister Mary No Fun’s class. I had endured several hours of forgettable instruction when finally recess arrived. I rushed back to the box of balls and toys at the back of the classroom. The coveted red rubber inflatable balls were gone! I had been too slow!
I said. “Shit, there aren’t any balls left.”
Sister Mary No Fun turned from erasing the chalkboard and screeched “Young man what did you just say?”
I thought she hadn’t heard me so I repeated myself. “Shit, there aren’t balls left."
My left ear to this day still bears the imprint of Sister Mary No Fun’s right thumb and forefinger. I believe it is also slightly longer than my right ear. She drug me to the office of the head nun where I received my first hack (more on nun hacks later). That was my first day at Catholic school and it never really got much better.
In the open classroom free love school “the child is encouraged to express himself.” We were not encouraged or technically allowed to swear but we were rarely punished for this. The freewheeling spirit of the 70’s dictated that dampening the child’s natural free expression could kill their spirit. The nuns had no such strictures about dampening a child’s spirit. In fact they excelled at it.
To be continued
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