It Happened in the Third Grade

The year I was blessed by the woman I now consider "My Favorite Teacher."

We didn't move much as kids; as a matter of fact, the apartment my family moved to when I was 9 (my brother was 3) is where my mother still lives today. From kindergarten through second grade, I attended William Ramsay Elementary.

Third grade marked my first year at Weyanoke (which translates to "Land of the Sassafras" in some particular native American language that I never managed to pinpoint) Elementary. My assigned teacher was Mrs. Anderson. While my actual memories from that year are embarrassingly blurred by time, I do remember looking at all the posted sheets taped to the school's front windows -- scanning for my name on all the class rosters.

Clearly, as a "new kid," I knew the reputations of none of the teachers, but for some unknown reason, simply learning her name brought reassurance. (Which was welcome, seeing as in the school district I had just departed, they taught cursive in the third grade. The school I was entering taught it in the second.)

Mrs. Anderson's classroom was traditional. One-piece, books-go-under-your-seat desks were lined in four vertical front to back of the room rows. Windows looking out onto the playground were along the left side of the room. And thankfully -- ever so thankfully - atop the front of the room chalkboard was an oversized border of the upper and lower-case cursive alphabet. (Ogling that capital "Q," I remember thinking that it was the prettiest "2" I'd ever seen!)

As far as the day-to-day academic rigors in Mrs. Anderson's class, my recollections are few. What I DO remember vividly -- and cherish to this day -- was that every single day after lunch, Mrs. Anderson would sit in a rocker (not behind her desk) at the front of the class and would read aloud for at least an hour. Every student -- the most raucous of boys, the most socially precocious of girls -- sat silently, paying rapt attention. She read from a book called Jack Tales...the stories of a wise-cracking boy we imagined to be of our own collective age, who was clever enough to save his own backside amidst all sorts of scrapes. And she read Laura Ingalls Wilder. Each and every one of the Little House on the Prairie series. Aloud. Every third grader was enthralled. A pig's bladder as a balloon. A stick of candy as a Christmas present. A fiddle-playing Pa. Family. Neighbors. The joy of finding happiness in the most perfunctory of activities.

In retrospect, Mrs. Anderson, with her grandmotherly calm and caring consistency, demonstrated daily how reading can help us find not only common ground as a group, but as individuals, to partake in some grounding moments of personal peace.

Mrs. Anderson's first name? Missouri -- the very same name as the "Show Me" state.
How grateful I am even today for the things she took the time to show me. Now let me go scour Amazon for the Jack Tales...

Take a moment as school heads back into session to think about those teachers that impacted your life for the better...and go share those appreciative thoughts on Laura's Catholic Teacher Musings. Here's hoping that Mrs. Anderson, surely by now residing in her place of great reward, has internet access...

PS - We had a flood here a few years ago. Wish I could share my third grade class picture with you, but sadly, all my photos and yearbooks were lost. Waaah.... What was saved was my paperback collection of the Little House on the Prairie series. My mom brought 'em down for my kids on a recent visit. All is far from lost!