Promise and Potential

Here we are at the Labour Day long weekend.  First day of school is just days away, and for the first time in more years than I can remember, I will be joining the kids on their new school year journey.

It feels just like it did when I was a kid - the excitement of a brand new beginning and brand new books.  Shopping for new pencils, erasers, and pens and hoping for a new school satchel (backpack these days).  And for those of you who went to school in South Africa - the buying of new school uniforms and shoes.   Best of all, the promise of new horizons in a higher 'standard' (read 'grade' as it is now called).  I always loved the quest to conquer the information for that year, always curious about 'what next? ....except when it came to math which I hated with a passion. 

Math negativity stemmed from my year in Miss Hall's Grade 2 class - she had grey hair rolled into an austere bun, long dark skirts, eyes that squinted and stabbed at you like daggers, a tongue that lashed out when you deviated just the least from her expectations and a voice that could cut a swathe and lay desks out in a swoon.  She marched down the aisles between us, drumming her ruler on the palm of her hand to a rhythmic metronome beat, whilst barking out multiplication tables and pointing to random sacrificial lambs who had to respond within 2 seconds.  She got me every time - I was so nervous I could never answer quickly enough and so had to endure the punishment of putting out my hand and having it smacked by her ruler - oh how I hated math!


2010, however, brings with it much more charm and pleasantaries.  I am armed with a new computer, new assessment forms and a whole new list of children to serve.   I have my pens, and pencils and notebooks at the ready.  I am armed for the next 10 months - let the battle begin!