Robert?

The new school year is exciting and stressful at the same time. It's always a fresh start for both teacher and students. The students in elementary school only have to learn a few teachers names - their P.E. teacher, homeroom/classroom teacher, and their music teacher/art teacher. If they travel to a specific course, they might have to learn a couple more names. The middle and high school students learn not only those above, but also having somewhere between 5- 7 classes with different teachers' names, or if on the block schedule, maybe 4 new names, they've got more to remember. Also, they have the additional elective course teachers to worry about. Either way, starting a new school year is interestingly chaotic for both student and teacher.

My first year teaching high school, I was overwhelmed with the names of all the students. This was 1978 and there was no block schedule. We taught 5 classes with 2 classes off for planning period...and those 2 periods might not be at the same time - or one big amount of time to run off tests, study guides, etc. This was before we used XEROX machines...we were still using that blue ink round stencil type contraption that smelled to high heaven and got that blue ink all over your fingers, up your arms, and sometimes on your clothes (obscenity!)

Remember when the Delta's of "Animal House" were caught cheating on an exam? The Omega's had swapped the real throw away blue stencil test questions and answers for a fake one so the Delta's would study the fake one and give the wrong answers? It was like that. And BTW, that was the movie I went to see the night before school started so I could laugh all the way into the night and not think about "first day" nerves. Ironic. Not much in the way of running off tests had changed much since the 1960's.

However, there is so much to do to get ready for the first day of school. In 1978, no matter how may 3x5 cards you pass out to get information about name/address/phone number/parents or guardians name/etc., or getting your roll/grade book in beautiful order in ink (then they'd drop a new student on you that first week whose last name began in the middle of the alphabet, so of course, your beautiful work and penmanship was screwed up by having to use WHITEOUT, the only mistake eraser there was in the 70's that I knew of.) OR the person's name was at the end of the roll and you had to go to a second page so that just turning the page for ONE PERSON was a pain. (About 3 decades later I learned to use pencil until the first 3 weeks of school, as some students didn't show up until after Labor Day.)

No matter how prepared one might be for the first day to run smoothly, there was nothing one could do about learning names UNTIL the students showed up. That first year learning all those 150 names (5 classes Xs 30 students) was a challenge. And wouldn't it be my luck, I got identical twins that first year - in two separate classes? I sure was seeing Marty (or was it Mark) Henninger a lot those first few days. It was about 2 weeks later, I realized that I wasn't seeing one so much...I was seeing TWO!

Which brings me to my point. By the 1990's nothing had improved on learning names. You just have to wait your first day and that was it. Oh, there might be an Open House the week before, but now you are trying to remember students who will be in your class AND their parents. Think of all those mind games - here comes a family - let's say it's Ann, Bill (parents), Courtney, and Dean. (A,B,C,D - rignt?) Well, that goes out the window after the first 5 minutes of Open House. With parents and children's names - oh, so many!

So, in the 1990's I was teaching at Memorial Middle School. I was teaching Gifted students. According to the Georgia Department of Education, the Gifted classes could have no more than 21 in a middle/high school classroom. Very helpful, but which makes this story even more sad. Our middle school program had a pull-out all day Gifted program. We were enrichment-content based. We taught the "extra" that the regular education teacher could not get to because of larger class sizes. We built a quick bond with our students because of the low numbers. It should have been easy to learn their names fast. We had them ALL day, but only one day a week, which met the state standards of having them in Gifted services for at least 4 1/2 hours a week. That was what was required, no matter what the format.

We serviced 6th, 7th, and 8th grades. The other teacher and I had 2 classes each of 6th graders, 2 classes each of 7th, and 1 class each of 8th graders. By the time 7th grade came to my first class, it was a smaller class than normal. I think there were no more than 12 students in one of the 2 classes that I had. So that first day, I have all their names on roll. I then call roll. Everyone answered to their names, except Robert. We even played a "getting to know you" game for us all to learn our classmates' names. I did not see them for a week, but since the class was so small, by the second week, I was just about on top learning all of them. Everyone answered roll. We had an oral test of some kind and I marked down a participation grade in my grade book that 2nd week. Everyone did well...just a quick little quiz to start posting some grades.

Now the third week rolls around and I am pretty good with this name thing. But to be accurante, I take roll again, and call out "Robert." Well, no answer. I look around and ask the kids, "Where's Robert?" Someone says we've never had a Robert. I think they are trying to pull a joke on me (they are 12 year olds afterall) and I comment, that no, we had a Robert last week. According my attendance book, he was absent the first week, came the second week, and now was absent again.

They promised me they were NOT kidding and there was no Robert and never had been a Robert. I say, "But I remember that he sat right here (pointing to a desk), he had dark hair that was rather long in front, had brown eyes, was about 5 1/2 feet tall, and he had to be here because ( are you ready for this?) I HAVE A GRADE IN MY GRADEBOOK FOR HIM."

There was no Robert. Never was a Robert. But, by golly, whoever Robert was he made an "A" on that quiz. That Robert...he was some smart dude.