The Most Effective English Teacher (1271 hits)
Category: Quotes & StoriesRating: -0.62 on 31 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Ana Gastire <jackparker968.at.hotmail.com> (View user info) at 2002-10-17 21:57:08 EDT
During my freshman year in highschool I was blessed to have the most thorough, analystic teacher I have ever had the privelege to learn from. She tought English 1 honors and throughout the year I was made to understand the true meaning of critical analysis and epiphany. The very first assignment I had in this woman's class was to write a critical analysis of Shel Silverstein's "The Giving Tree". I did this to the best of my ability, being only the 2nd week of school, I was not yet properly into the swing of things. I was amazed to discover that what I thought to be a damn good paper was sophomoric and lacking style. Without a patronizing tone or any sort of smirk (as some teachers are known to do) she pointed out my errors and told me what I should do to correct them. Her style and way of going about things made me admire her instantly. I was determined to learn from her, as she was clearly an excellent educator. My next chance came when I made a critical analysis of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Cask of Amontillado". I conjured up every grain of grammatical knowledge I could muster and wrote what turned out to be the best critical analysis of the 9th grade. She was very pleased with my work, and more importantly- I was pleased with myself. We did many other essays that year. There was never one I couldn't improve in some detail- and the one that followed was always a bit better. I learned from her that whenever you watched television and saw rain in an old movie- an epiphany (a change) was about to take place. Because of her, I find myself to this day analyzing television- even cartoons! God bless that woman for making my year what it was- and for making me as a writer what I am- just a little better than I was before.
User Reviews
Submitted by Falconer (user info) at 2004-04-15 20:05:51 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
Don't explain what words mean. Especially when you get the meaning wrong, douchebag.
Submitted by whywhywhy (user info) at 2004-04-15 19:34:19 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Did she teach u how to write using paragraphs?
Submitted by Random Joe at 2004-04-15 19:30:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
This story reminded me of my old high school English teacher.
Submitted by Random Joe at 2004-04-15 19:28:50 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Manfre (user info) at 2003-06-02 09:40:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Why does that name sound so goddamned familiar? Sounds like someone I went to school with...
Submitted by Agent_FUBAR (user info) at 2003-06-02 09:28:47 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
And here was me thinking it was gonna be a story about how you fucked one of your teachers. youve ruined my day guy.
Submitted by Hairsphincter (user info) at 2003-02-07 21:42:42 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Whilst at University, I had loads of hot sex with men and women.
I also drank a lot and took many drugs, some of which were experimental.
Submitted by BrothaCracka (user info) at 2003-02-07 20:20:22 EST (#)
Ranking: 1
Hey Ana, you wrote that your 1st paper turned out to be sophomoric. It's that good for a 9th grader? just busting yer chops a little. ; )
Submitted by StrongInMind (user info) at 2002-11-28 07:19:40 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Thank you ever so much, Darth, constructive criticism is needed now and again. I knew there was something funny about that word, lol. However allow me to just point out that the wrong usage of a word does not lessen my vocabulary, however extensive, or my intellect to use it. I am indeed a very intelligent girl, and if you disagree with me then that would be your own decision. Nevertheless, I still send wishes, Ana.
Submitted by DarthFaded (user info) at 2002-11-14 13:34:42 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
ok ok privlege is a typo but analystic wasn't but your right I am sorry ana
Just an FYI. it is ANALYTICAL
:)
Submitted by Random Joe at 2002-11-14 12:04:57 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
ah leave her alone- they are typos, darth. As for you donmecca or whomever u are, for the amount of time u spend reviewing this girl's stuff u'd think u knew her personally!
Submitted by DarthFaded (user info) at 2002-11-13 11:14:28 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
With as great a teacher she was she sure didn't do a very good job of teaching you how to spell...
Analystic???
Privelege???
Submitted by DonMecca (user info) at 2002-11-12 14:01:05 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Ana, why did you write about your english teacher? I mean, damn. Noone cares that you have a lesbian attraction to your teacher (I'm assuming it's a female teacher, as men don't care about kids, they suck). Why don't you write something cool, like a story about a lesbian session you had, or when you shot someone in the school toilets.
Submitted by StrongInMind (user info) at 2002-11-09 09:25:53 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Well my dear- I most certainly apologize that you did not benefit..but you know what? No one asked nor made you read it, so you've only yourself to blame. Wishes, Ana.
Submitted by Bill <123fake.at.email.com> at 2002-10-29 14:46:31 EST (#)
Ranking: -2
This one really lacked the edge of most stories... and By edge I mean interest. Why did I bother running my eyes along such wasted use of grammar? Because I'm soooo bored, well at least time has been wasted in an exchange for making me dumber for reading that. Dickweed
Submitted by StrongInMind (user info) at 2002-10-28 06:04:19 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
one* and than* for below- see there? Mistakes are ok- just typographical errors you see..does not mean an IQ has dropped..sorry Bob- but you are exceedingly ignorant. - A.G.
Submitted by StrongInMind (user info) at 2002-10-28 06:00:09 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
ok! First off my dear..Bob, as you so lovingly call yourself, no one in this world is perfect. People without fault would be pointless and so they are not created that way- take the hint, eh? Unfortunately, the sad thing is that I am probably much more intelligent then you..and the fact that my typing speed is apt to produce an error here and there is by no means adequate enough to judge my mental capacity. No one asked you to read or even review this article. Besides, if you feel writing this was such a waste of my time then I believe you wasted even more time logging in, hunting through posts, clicking on mine, reading mine, thinking of some way to sound intelligent (for which you did not succeed), typing the review (which also has it's share of errors, thank you), hitting the send button, and waiting to see if and when I reply. There now, doesn't seem like I wasted as much time as you may have thought. Tip for you- do not be the on to call the kettle black my friend, for you have just been made to look stupider thsn I. Wishes, Ana
Submitted by bob <mad_crazy_hatter.at.yahoo.com> at 2002-10-26 23:27:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
the funny thing is that this gal, although so inspired by a supposed great teacher has the literary capacity of a mongoloid! her spelling is utterly pathetic, and, albeit the use of the thesaurus was plentiful, this individual still has apparently learned nothing. in the first sentence of her post, she has more grammatical errors than dan quayle during his tenure in office... sorry teach, you might be a great one, but your students are about as lack-luster as a rusted nail.
Submitted by StrongInMind (user info) at 2002-10-22 22:19:53 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
LOL sorry had to laugh- glance to the left of the screen and this post is the #1 heat?! HAHAHA- got u beat Snoop baby, lol. That is very funny, and I needed to laugh. Wishes, Ana.
Submitted by StrongInMind (user info) at 2002-10-22 16:22:35 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
lol must keep the balance of negative ratings with positive ones you know. Anyhow snoop, my online nemesis how are you? Been to the dark side lately? I have- lovely there, I took photographs and must share them with you. Hope to hear from you soon..and yes, just keep telling urself that only most hate you and maybe the self esteem will rise on its own :). Wishes, Ana
Submitted by DonMecca (user info) at 2002-10-22 13:08:40 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
Not everyone hates me, just most people!
Submitted by StrongInMind (user info) at 2002-10-22 06:18:05 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
ok ok I take the hint- basically I had nothing to write and wanted to write..well- sumthin! Ah well though, not everything can go down favorably as they say..maybe next time I'll write sumthin racy and angry and have everyone hate me..oh wait Snoop- you beat me to it!! Wishes, Ana.
Submitted by DonMecca (user info) at 2002-10-21 23:01:14 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
Yidele is right. What do you wanna read on this site? "I broke a nail today!" or "I ran down these two old ladies in my lo-rider, then got a hit from my local dealer". Well, not quite that, but sentimantal value means nothing to the people today. We want action, comedy, the occasional political comment (George Bush is having homosexual relations with Tony Blair) and more than anything, a good story. Not some crap about a teacher, hell I once had a teacher that had 36EE boobs, that's interesting. What she was like as a teacher... meh. Her boobs overtook my mind! See, not boring, like the crap Ana writes. Tell us about the time you masturbated wildly in church, or the time you streaked across a football match, only to trip, and then be fucked by all the team. Something that doesn't send me to sleep half way through. I'm bored.
Submitted by yidele (user info) at 2002-10-21 20:09:13 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
Bullshit. It is a self-serving, juvenile, feely-goodie, nauseating panegyric to a HIGH SCHOOL ENGLISH CLASS, fer god's sake. On the other hand, If you do like her work, then maybe you're right about the low quality of education. Luckily I read in class instead of allowing my mind to be poisoned by superficial diction like her's become - she is so full of her words that any meaning is lost, except for "gosh, i relly liked my english teacher". So fucking what? Why don't you write about that poor puppy you saw fall off a moving pickup bed or dead goldfish, hell - you might as well try "what I did on my summer vacation". Tell me about your first heavy flow period, that time your uncle molested you, an especially tasty meal - anything at all, but spare me your fucking homework & teenage heart break - I have had blackheads with more personality than you.
kind regards
Submitted by JDiggity (user info) at 2002-10-21 18:20:23 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
Or perhaps it was a comment on how a talented teacher can inspire a good student (even in a subject as boring as english) (kidding...) to achieve more then he/she ever thought possible. As much as I hate to fill every chance I get with useless propoganda regarding the general shitty-ness of North American Education systems (the proof being one of their graduates writing words such as "Shitty-ness" on a regular basis), I think she raises a good point.
Submitted by yidele (user info) at 2002-10-21 06:09:51 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
Well, I don't "right" very much of anything on this site - mostly I post news items of interest written by other people. As to being long winded & boring - you are right, I am both of those things & by virtue of first hand experience I also know that this juvenile heifer is one.
Submitted by Random Joe at 2002-10-21 02:06:02 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I can't believe Yidele just described some one else as long and boring. Take a look at most of the stuff in this site that you right you egotistical twat.
Submitted by yidele (user info) at 2002-10-20 14:45:58 EDT (#)
Ranking: -1
Wrong. She is one long, boring, pretentious & untalented hemorrhage of halmark brand sickly sweet sentimentality. Of course I could be wrong, but I don't really think that I am. You can find this kind of writing in every other issue of ym & seventeen, that and motivated young dykes telling girls to be all they can.
Submitted by Random Jane at 2002-10-20 07:00:51 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
The thing about you, yidele is that you don't like anything positive. I think she did a fine job, so what if it's a good story devoid of violence? If anything she balances the maturity level on the site (like that snoop guy..what an asshole) anyway, this site is for people to express themselves so let her do so. Keep it up Ana, well done.
Submitted by yidele (user info) at 2002-10-18 21:55:48 EDT (#)
Ranking: -1
please, more nauseatingly sweet reminiscences, the world hasn't heard enough of your self indulgent college stories...
But since we're on the subject, I might as well tell you of a little college story o' myown.
I was spending my first & extremely dissolute semesters & a college that had better remain nameless. I'd gone through my loan and pell grant money in short order & soon we ( meaning I and my two mates) had no cash to spend on going out & had to resort to rationing money for chemicals. Fortunately our campus was a fun place for lads like us, and since lsd is easy enough to produce, we were soon funding our own house off campus. Life was different then - aids was not a factor, drugs were free for the making ( or trade ) and campus police were more concerned with keeping the athletes out of trouble than bothering us. I'm not going to lie & claim that we were exteremly popular or that everybody liked us - that kind of behaviour is not compatible with long term, large dose acid use - besides the more you take the more you have to take to even get high - but we were certainly well provided in the basic amenities of college life ( to wit: dope, dope, dope, pussy, beer ). My grades were ok since the first 2 semesters can easily be done on autopilot & the only thing that bothered me/us was that we'd never done anything truly outrageous. Oh, sure, we sailed giant burning paper aeroplanes soaked with lighter fluid off the colege Ramada. Sure, we annoyed the RA's of our original dorm by affixing surgical tubing to the window frame of our one window ( we lived on the 11 floor) and using it to slingshot water ballons full of red food dye at the other dorm, cars & people on the parking lot. Sure, we poured 5 industrial sized boxes of tide into the reflection pool by the administartion building - all of these things were fine, yet we'd somehow managed not to hurt or injure anyone with our stupidity ( one of us did burn a hole in his pyjamas during the sacred rite of the blue flame, but it served his faggot ass right - wearing pyjamas, fer God's sake! ). Anyhow, where stupid pranks & drug induced stupor failed, dumb luck was sure to succeed by sheer weight of probability. Our college was ( and is to this day ) a school with a proud football tradition. This tradition includes an incredibly evil spirited team mascot, which for reasons of safety, is kept in a glass cage ( actually a small brick building with armored glass front wall) placed in the middle of campus at an isolated, though accessible spot. The mascot - also to remain nameless - is a female mountain lion which is known for its ill temper & as such merits a special formation ( marching girls, o'course ) called the catguardians, to keep it out of trouble. Our evening begun at a small get together in our off campus hole, where having indulged somewhat we decided ( predictably enough ) to go eat pizza before hitting the sophmore dorms. We were not lucky that night. For some reason guy & myself decided to drop early which considerably impeded our attempts to impress a pair of bored blondykes into going to the empty amphitheatre with us or even to let us show them our off campus "pad". Bashir got lucky & we had no heart to interupt him, but apparently he also dropped early - I don't know what he told the girl exactly, but he left in a hurry, with jeans in hand, smelling of bongwater #5. So there we were - tripping on black gel in the middle of our cool nighttime campus which looked like prospero's garden that twitchy night. I don't know who suggested it, but soon we were all of one mind - we were going to fuck with the cat. We were quite methodical about it. We'd decided that the best way to elicit an interesting reaction would be to sneak up on the cat and startle it or to attack it in some way that would be harmless to us but which would seem genuine to the cat. To this end we'd taken two large lava blocks used for lanscaping around the cage and propping them up against the glass together with a small park bench, we made a blind for one of us. The other stood just beyond the corner window mount & both were invisible to the cat inside. Our mock attack was simple - the alleyway leasing to the cage was lit & one of us would start at a distance of some 15-20 meters to run full tilt towards the cage & the other two behind the blinds who, having beforehand startched a voleyball net liberated froma nearby playfiled, would stop him just short of the cage. The plan worked & soon the immediate neighborhood resounded with muffled thuds made as the 60 lb cougar launched itself repeatedly at the glass partition in a succession of spectacular counter attacks. She was a furious one-eyed beast. She spit, hissed, lashed her sides with her tail and tried to claw us through the glass - we kept this up for what felt like hours but must have been no more that 15-30 minutes, after which we found other, more interesting things to do. This would be it - an unremarkable if honest retelling of a moderatly memorable night of crazyness, if it weren't for the fact that the mascott nearly killed ( badly mutilated ) one of the catguardians 3 days later, as she was walking it on a chain.
tell me now, am I lying?
Submitted by Random Joe at 2002-10-18 12:34:58 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
you are an amazing writer, very inspirational without being..preachy. We need more like u 4 the site- well dun!