Timothy Allan Johnston
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Editor’s Notebook, ATA Magazine, Volume 76, Fall 1995
 
Humour in the Classroom (and occasionally, late at night, on the playground)
 
Last March, when we started looking at theme ideas for this volume of the ATA Magazine, it occurred to me that perhaps teachers might like a break from the kinds of influences that intruded on all of us last year, courtesy of Mr Klein and company. You will recall that there wasn’t a great deal of good news from the legislature for you as educators nor for the students packed ever more tightly into your classrooms.
 
You may also recall that you managed to get through the year by continuing to bring the best of yourself to your work; that just about all of the kids passed their courses; that the school concert/track and field event/graduation took place without too many unexpected difficulties; and that somewhere, deep inside, you found the strength to focus on teaching your students. Teachers have a lot of fortitude, but, just maybe, humour played a small part in helping you get through the year.
 
Most of the stories in this issue are about humour and have a definite funny side to them. I hope they provide a bit of a tonic for you as you near the halfway mark of this school year.
 
Thinking about this theme reminded me of how important humour was to me when I was teaching. Still is. But one particular incident over 20 years ago remains vivid in my memory and has to rank as the all-time funniest happening I experienced as a teacher. The ingredients of great comedy—circumstance, characters and timing—existed in just the right proportions. Here’s the quick version.
 
During my second year of teaching, I organized an option course for Grade 9 students at Wilson Junior High School in Lethbridge. I called it Community Industry and the gist of the program was that students found work placements with manufacturing concerns throughout the city. They spent part of their option time with the manufacturers and part in class learning about the economics of industry as applied to our community. One weekend near the end of the school year, we held a large display featuring many of the products that were then built in the city.
 
The display was set up on the playground on Friday afternoon. It was really quite impressive and featured several motor homes, farm truck bodies, cultivators, beet harvesters, land levellers, vacation trailers and garbage trucks. A small committee of the students and I stayed overnight at the school to watch over all these valuable things until the Saturday morning grand opening. We played cards in a motor home until about midnight when it was decided a snack was in order. The three girls on the watch committee went with me to bring back some of the Colonel’s chicken. The three boys remained behind, promising to be ever vigilant.
 
Do you recall a singer by the name of Ray Stevens? He was fairly popular in the ‘70s and made his fame by singing comical specialty songs. One of his songs reflected a craze that swept North America in that strange decade and was entitled “The Streak”. Does this bring back any other memories?
 
At one o’clock in the morning, returning with the three girls and a couple of buckets of fried chicken, I turned my Volkswagen Super Beetle off 9th Avenue North onto the playground of Wilson Junior High. I flashed on the high beams to scan the display area, looking for anything out of the ordinary. Sure enough, off in the corner of the grounds two kids were hightailing it away from all the equipment.
 
Down shift to second gear, pedal to the metal, lights on high, and two girls squeezing into the opening of the sun roof, yelling and “kai-yipping” like we were in a stampede. Hot pursuit, and those two young fellows were caught in the headlights like a pair of jackrabbits on a country road.
 
And they were wearing exactly the same amount of clothing that any respectable jackrabbit would have worn on a warm spring night.
 
It was suddenly clear to us who the boys were, and I mean really clear. They were two of the three security committee members who had stayed to keep an eye on things while the rest of us went for food. Realizing the situation I had driven into and with the three girls just about splitting their sides with laughter, I reversed course and headed back toward the motor home, stopping the car for just a minute over two neat little piles of blue jeans, tee shirts, runners and underwear that had been laid out for quick retrieval. Thought I’d just give the boys a moment to cool off in the dark and after their brisk little outing.
 
Knowing kids as well as you do, you can imagine how the notion of taking part in the streaking craze by going for a breezy run around the school grounds in the safety of the night might have come about. And wouldn’t that make a great story for their pals on Monday morning. Trouble is, the timing was just a little bit off for them but right on for me and the rest of my students to provide us all with a purely funny moment.
 
This little anecdote is part of the treasure I have accumulated as a teacher. I have lots of other treasurers from my days in the classroom and they range over the spectrum from pure joy to deep grief. You likely have pretty much the same ones. It’s a good idea to bring these little gems out once in a while and remember them one more time.
 
Take heart, keep your smile, and remember you’re doing just about the most important job there is—helping young folk grow and learn for life.
 
 Tim Johnston