1 The beautiful part of teaching is that it is socially acceptable to be a nerd.
2 I joke with my students that at parties, the English department sits around drinking root beer and talking about gerunds.
3 Pretty close to the truth.
4 The other day, for example, we talked about which Shakespeare play we should teach in sophomore year. We had decided on Midsummer, which I absolutely loved. In a classic case of Murphy's law, I purchased a class set from some cheap book website the day before our meeting. I also purchased class sets of Shrew, as well as Much Ado.
5 The website, doverpublications.com, offers cheap books that you could get with no tax and free shipping. You have to purchase over fifty dollars to get the free shipping, but once you hit that amount it is like a gold mine for nerds.
6 At the meeting the other day, we talked about putting together a "common assessment" for Midsummer. Having directed that show twice in my career, I was really excited about having a chance to teach it. I teach Shrew every year, regardless of what the District wants. It's my signature exit to every school year.
7 I had visions of telling my students about my experiences with Midsummer. I directed two entirely different shows, and loved working with both. My first production had one of the best sets and lighting designs ever. We made a forest with various trees, each of which had a name, and each of which with a team that built it.
8 According to me old friend and confidante Evelyn, we collectively made over 50,000 leaves. If memory serves, we had Puck come in on a horse named Star.
9 My second one had a zoot-suit jazzy theme to it, a completely different approach, but with a comedy that to me is one of the best in the history of theatre. There are better stories, but their aren't better long poems. That's the mark of Shakespeare.
10 So the topic of a common assessment came up, always a downer. Leave it to a school to kill the subject with a common test. My feeling is that I want to share the story with my students, to get them loving Shakespeare, and to have them leave with a complete and total passion for theatre. They are already over-tested each Spring.
11 But the department wants to test the students on it first, so that the students realize that Shakespeare wasn't just a playwright trying to entertain, but that he is a difficult and annoying subject in school, and that studying Shakespeare will reward one with a difficult test. Bleh. Why does all learning have to be "assessed"? What would the guy who wrote all that sweeping poetry think?
12 I should bet the poor fellow is turning in his grave.
13 I pretty much didn't care about their test. Can you imagine? Those two incredible shows being put to a number-two-pencil bubble test? Puh-leez.
14 I just figured that I would present Midsummer from the perspective of theatre, and from the perspective of a guy who directed it twice in his lifetime, and who couldn't care less about testing it. Ridiculous. I'm an old guy who wants to share a story of those glory days.
15 It didn't matter. In a classic case of a camel being a horse created by a committee, we had already begun our discussion at the meeting when one guy raised his hand and blurted out,"I hate Midsummer! I think it is Shakespeare's most juvenile and idiotic play. Why don't we do As You Like It?"
16 My immediate thought was, "Dude. As You Like It has the longest soliloquys in the King's English. Rosalyn never stops yapping. I directed As You Like It and was fortunate that I had actors capable of making it magic. Students studying this show, on the other hand, will hate it; they will sleepily drool; their heads will eventually fall to the floor and roll out the door."
17 I really don't think English departments should touch Shakespeare. The very fact that they want a common assessment is like giving a state test on a Disney movie.
18 This guy's suggestion naturally brought a whirlwind of hands for suggestions of other plays we could ruin.
19 Just the day before the meeting I had purchased a class set of Midsummer, and was WAY jazzed about bringing it to life for my students. It didn't cost me a fortune, but it did cost a little. And now the English department had decided to spin out of control, as is their wont.
20 My twenty-thousand crowns.
21 One thing you need to know about English departments: they majored in pondering and discussing. It's a good idea not to say much at a meeting, or you are sure to add twenty minutes. To me, the purpose of any meeting is to get it over with as fast as you can.
22 Of course, that guy's comment triggered everyone to go off on which play would be the best. "Richard the Third!" Yeah, THAT will rivet students. "We should do a HISTORY play!" "Julius Caesar IS a history play!" "Um, isn't Midsummer that one where a donkey falls in love with a wall or something?"
23
24 There are reasons I don't ever play by the rules.
25 That conversation is almost verbatim, I swear to you. It was like a brief flitter of autumn leaves, ending in absolute stupidity.
26 They decided to go to a vote, in order to make things go more swiftly.
27 So around eighteen teachers shouted out different Shakespeare plays with little regard for how they would work with students. I shouted out Much Ado, completely forgetting Shrew for whatever reason.
28 And nearly every single teacher had a comment about every single play, naturally, just to prove to everybody else that they had read each.
29 I thought of escaping and going on a root beer run. Or of perhaps leapking out the window.
30 I decided that it didn't matter, that whichever show they wanted to ruin would still be loved by my students. They would ace the test because they would enjoy the piece.
31 So once the seven or eight final candidates where on the whiteboard, we talked about how to vote. The first vote was this: "Is there any play that someone absolutely hates and refuses to use?"
32 The same guy who had hated Midsummer and loved As You Like It said, "Midsummer!" I immediately stepped up. "I LOVE Midsummer! I directed it twice." <immediate basketball buzzer>
33 With one swift move of a marker, Midsummer was eliminated. "It isn't about whether someone loves a play; it's about forcing someone to teach something that they would absolutely hate."
34
35 Same person who thought Midsummer was the one about a donkey falling in love with a wall. I couldn't make this stuff up.
36 My immediate thought bubble said this: "I'm teaching Midsummer anyway. And thank you very much, but you just added another movie to my students' Spring!"
37 No wonder I never play by the rules.
38 For the record, just as they were about to vote, I blurted out, "At the risk of being killed, may I offer one more play?"
39 Everyone listened.
40 "What about Taming of the Shrew?"
41 Oooohs and Ahhhhs. It broke into an immediate party discussion. EVERYBODY loved it.
42 When it went to vote, Shrew won by a mini-landslide.
43 I felt like the best closer in baseball. Thought of growing a Zeus beard.
44 It became a somewhat bittersweet moment. I never wanted to play the Shrew card because it has always been my crowning ending to each year. It's a tradition to end the school year with Shrew, and very few teachers have ever used it, or even cared that I taught it at all levels. If I had a science class I would have figured out a way to teach Taming of the Shrew at the end of the school year.
45 The meeting ended, and everybody seemed excited about Shrew. What I came to realize is that I have a tremendous amount of experience in teaching, and that I am in a department of pups.
46 So be it.
47 I will tote the company line, because I am a team player, and a consummate professional.
48 And I was pretty much given free reign to free my students from all tyranny, and to have an absolute ball this Spring.
49 That meeting went down exactly the way it was reported here. The quotations are almost spot on. In many ways it's downright scary.
50 But I'm pretty happy that I saved my students, and perhaps future generations of students from having to be dragged through a history play, followed by a bubble test.
51 And now it is a free field.
52 I'm actually pondering Shrew and Shakespeare in Love for my seniors.
53 Sigh no more.
54 Oh, and a personal note to my daughter: go Niners!!! Exciting times in SF! Caitlin, you and Josh have one job on Saturday: Rock Candlestick!!! Oh, and have fun. I'm guessing this will be a game for the ages. Brees will eat turf the entire day.
55 Peace.
~H~
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