The Great Expectations School

by Dan Brown

  The class heard what I said about the tremendous importance of this next piece of work, but the words did not seem to register. Everyone wanted to go to the bathroom. “Forget about teaching after lunch,” Ms. Fiore had advised with aggressively furrowed brows.

  I pressed forward. Our Birthday Bar Graph was exactly what every other class was doing for their boards. I made a model data table on the board with my columns—important vocabulary word, kids: columns!—labeled “Month” and “Number of 4-217 Birthdays.” My Bonn-inspired paper passers handed out blank data tables to everyone, and we were all supposed to fill it out together.

  “Raise your hand if you were born in January!” I boomed. As-ante's hand went up. “One. Happy unbirthday, Asante!”

  “Thank you, Mr. Brown,” Asante said, giggling. Asante was a hard-nosed kid. The other kids took her amusement as a sign that the activity might not be wack after all. I could feel the group's focus tighten. It felt good.

  “Okay, who was born in February? I was! February ninth,” I said, raising my hand. “Does anyone else share February as a birthday month with me?” Three hands went up. “All right, four, counting me!” I charted it on the board. The kids marked their data tables.

  “Mr. Brown, how old are you?” Sonandia asked. Several other kids instantly echoed the question.

  “Don't worry about it,” I said, setting off a yearlong guessing game that I would have preferred did not exist.

  “Okay, we've listed how many 4-217 students have birthdays in each of the twelve months. Do I have any volunteers who would like to impress me and tell me how to make a graph out of this, what is it called, what are these numbers called? Tiffany?”

  “Data?”

  “Yes! Data! Outstanding. Excellent use of mathematical vocabulary, Tiffany! A point for group four.”

  The members of group four pumped their arms in silent exultation.

  “Okay, so who wants to tell me what to do first to make a graph out of this data?”

  Athena spearheaded the axes-labeling, and I was pleased that Destiny, who had struggled through most of the unit, correctly explained how to draw the first bars for January and February.

  Before dismissal, I had a beautiful and accurate bar graph on the board. I collected everyone's work, distributed the homework, lined them up, shepherded the group down the steps, accepted Jennifer's hug, and turned back into the school building, renewed.

  Upstairs, I leafed through the afternoon's work and my jaw dropped. Out of twenty-five students, only five papers matched what I had on the board. Eight kids had written nothing, not including Daniel's indecipherable scribbles.

  I sought counsel from the faculty coaches in Al Conway and Marge Foley's sliver-office. Throughout my distressed account, Al nodded as if he could have finished my sentences for me.

  “I know exactly what you're going through. When I was a first-year teacher, I was your age and had thirty-eight kids in my class. I had no idea what I was doing. So many times I thought, ‘I'm out of here. I quit.’ Maybe I should have, the way my marriage is going right now…” Al trailed off, chuckling nervously. “The important thing is, don't get discouraged. For the bulletin board, you said you got five pieces of good work, right? That's all you need! Display them and you're set. Don't worry about everyone's portfolio all at once. You'll get work out of them, but some are just… uncooperative.”

  He leaned closer and turned on his secret-telling voice. “For bulletin boards in the future, it doesn't even have to be a whole-class activity. Just pick a few top kids and bring them up for lunch or set aside some time. Tell them you have a special task for them to do. They'll love it. Or to make it easier on yourself, just write out what you want and have them copy it over in their own handwriting. That's how a lot of teachers do it. The bulletin boards are just to show Dilla Zane that things are under control. You have to do them, but don't let them kill you. There are too many other things trying to kill you.” Then he offered to teach my class a sample math lesson and build my math center.

  On Thursday, I stayed late to mount the magnificent birthday bar graphs against fadeless teal paper. I typed our procedure in flashy fonts, and used magic markers on sentence strips to delineate the New York State standards employed in this lesson. (M4a: Collect and organize data to answer a question. M4c: Make statements and draw simple conclusions from data. M6g: Read, create, and represent data.) The Birthday Bar Graphs were the main attraction, but I also made a smaller literacy display with some “Writing About Me: Autobiography Introductions” from the previous week.

  When I got home, I opened a personal e-mail from Liesl Nolan, the program manager of the Mercy College New Teacher Residency Program. She had paid a random visit to 4-217 the previous day, checking out the bulletin boards and asking me how everything was going. Liesl had typed, “Dear Daniel, I wanted to thank you for welcoming me into your classroom last Wednesday. Your room looks great! I can only assure you that it will get better. You have great support with Barbara and your Mercy instructor, Charles. Utilize them. I truly admire your passion for doing this work! Thank you!”

  On Friday, September 26, I received a surprise. Ten minutes before lineup, Ms. Guiterrez rolled into my classroom. “Mr. Brown, I have to talk to you about your bulletin board. Immediately.” She walked back into the hall. This was her first time in my classroom since her summer complaint about my mom's border paper, not counting the pencil-sharpening incident on the first day of SFA.

  I flashed paranoid. But wait a minute, my bulletin board looked sharp. Maybe this was Guiterrez's way of telling me I had a damn good-looking first bulletin board and to congratulate me for surviving my first month in the inner city.

  Guiterrez did not look at me when I followed her into the hall. “What is wrong with this, Mr. Brown?”

  My bulletin board was a replica of everyone else's on the second floor. “I don't know,” I said, my brief hope that this was some kind of weird compliment dashed.

  “Are you sure everything is spelled right?” she asked in the same even, accusatory tone.

  I was supremely positive that every word on my board was spelled correctly. A second-place finish in the township bee back in ’93 (“tyrannous” did me in) was a major event in my youth, and ever after, spelling was one area in which I excelled.

  “What do you think is misspelled?”

  “That word.” She pointed at the word “announced.” I had written it in magic marker as part of the Activity Procedure. The line read, “Students raise their hand if their birthday falls in the month that the teacher has just announced. The data is then recorded in the data table.”

  “That word is spelled incorrectly,” she deadpanned.

  I squinted and stared at the word. A-N-N-O-U-N-C-E-D. Announced.

  “Is it the word ‘announced’?”

  “Yes, Mr. Brown.”

  I moved my face close to the board. A tiny piece, less than a centimeter, of the end of the “o” did graze against its neighbor, “u.” Did that make the “o” resemble an “a”? Annaunced? No. It still looked like “announced.” I squinted at her in befuddlement. What kind of conversation was this?

  “I see no writing on this bulletin board,” Ms. Guiterrez said icily, changing gears.

  I did not know how to respond without insulting her intelligence, although I felt certain that my own intelligence had just been insulted several times in quick succession. I gestured meekly at the page-long student pieces displayed under my “WE WRITE AUTOBIOGRAPHIES!” banner, just below the bar graphs. “There is this writing.”

  “There is no math writing on the bulletin board!” she snapped. Math writing? I had data tables and corresponding bar graphs. “Take it all down,” Ms. Guiterrez said. “You must check with me first before you put anything on this board from now on. I am very troubled that you thought this was… acceptable.” She walked away.

  I paced around room 217, my blood up. I had never heard of any math writing requirement. And what was all that abou
t “announced”? I didn't want to take my whole bulletin board down.

  When I arrived at lineup, beet-red Ms. Linda Devereaux was reading the riot act to Bernard and Hamisi. “I'll take them for the morning, Mr. Brown. WHAT GOES THROUGH YOUR BRAIN THAT MAKES YOU THINK IT'S OKAY TO HIT EACH OTHER IN SCHOOL? DO YOU HEAR ME?” The boys stared at their shoes, looking bored.

  Ms. Devereaux was the real P.S. 85 enforcer. A member of the first cohort of Teaching Fellows in 2000, she had had her classroom teacher position involuntarily revoked in exchange for a job as the school's full-time disciplinarian. She offered her supportive services to all teachers, provided she was not sent frivolous cases. When kids disappeared into her Alternative Education Strategies room, you didn't need to worry about them. I knew Ms. Devereaux would be a crucial ally, especially since detention and out-of-school suspension had recently been abolished by Region One.

  However, fifteen minutes after the cafeteria scolding, Hamisi and Bernard reappeared at my door, both smirking. “Ms. Devereaux told us to come back,” Hamisi said. A minute later, Mr. Randazzo showed up holding an orange paper strip. Another new student.

  “This young gentleman is Marvin Winslow. He's going to be with you.”

  “Wonderful to meet you, Marvin!” I shook his and his mother's hands. My eyes went to the charm around Mrs. Winslow's neck, a $ the size of a cantaloupe. “Welcome to 4-217.”

  “SFA is about to begin. That's our literacy program,” Mr. Randazzo explained. “See if you can get him tested for a group,” he said to me, and promptly left.

  Marvin had a lazy right eye, but there was nothing otherwise remarkable about him at first glance. He was average height for his age, with neatly trimmed short black fuzz on his head. His eyes were serious and terrified. I asked him if his family had just moved to this neighborhood and he shook his head, mumbling sullenly, “My old school is a bad place.”

  I called the Success for All headquarters downstairs to locate someone to test Marvin for a level placement. Daniel was still un-placed and alternated between drawing and spacing out in the back of the room during the ninety-minute block that Mrs. Baker and I now ran together. Dom Beckles, P.S. 85’s SFA coach, answered the call and agreed to evaluate both Marvin and Daniel.

  Thirty minutes later, Beckles returned them to my room and gestured for me to meet him in the doorway. “Those two are non-readers. They can't read a thing!” he whispered.

  “Why are they in my class?” I asked.

  “It's a bunch of fools running this school,” Mr. Beckles said with conspiratorial hush. “They pull the same thing every year, it's ridiculous. You've got the Queen up there and she has no idea.”

  Just get me to 11:30! Then I have a prep, lunch, our first assembly, and the weekend!

  When my regulars returned from SFA at 10:15, I moved Marvin next to Sonandia. Now was her chance to prove herself “useful to a student in need,” as her blue card assured. Marvin frowned and sat silently.

  Instead of slogging on with well-covered bar graphs or starting a new unit on a Friday, I opted to play Math Bingo. I figured games are a necessary part of school, and this could also be a bit of preassessment for our future multiplication unit. I scolded Maimouna for poor sportsmanship when she gloated in Gladys Ferarro's face, but otherwise everything looked good, like a real classroom. Even Lakiya played.

  Midway through the third game, Lito and Cwasey (mortal enemies earlier in the week when the former stomped the latter's glasses) teamed up to use the fake-penny game pieces as projectiles, targeting Eddie. Eddie immediately retaliated, tossing his board and pieces across the room.

  My brain exploded. Fury, building from Guiterrez's early visit, suddenly frothed over. I felt a unique blast of air erupt from my lungs: “DO NOT THROW!” My face became boiling and screwed up, my words fraying into a guttural bellow. I wheeled, locking my demented-looking eyes with Cwasey's fearful ones, and in a moment I stood over him. Everyone froze.

  Keeping my crazed gaze fixed on the small, sitting boy, I dealt commands in a low voice. “Jennifer, collect the game boards. Dennis, take the plastic bag from my desk and collect the pieces.”

  Cwasey piped up in protest, “But he was throwing them at me —”

  “ZAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!” I cut him off with another dragon-cry. Cwasey shut his mouth. Lakiya grinned. I had outcrazied them all.

  During my prep, I sat in the Teacher Center with my head down. I was sure that I was losing my mind. Through the wall, I could hear Melissa Mulvehill screaming at her class. I realized everyone on the floor had heard me raging like a banshee.

  Thirty minutes into the period, Mulvehill appeared in the Teacher Center doorway, as if looking for some quick advice. “I just had a kid piss his pants on purpose,” she said in a rush, her voice registering something between horror and twisted amusement.

  At least I didn't have that going on, I thought. Besides coaching several baby-teeth extractions, I had had no encounters with fluids since the previous week when Tayshaun Jackson puked up a pack of sour apple Now-and-Later candies at lineup.

  During lunch, I brought Sonandia, Jennifer, Destiny, Evley, and Tiffany upstairs. They were excited to be in the classroom at an unusual hour. I gave each kid a fun-size 100 Grand bar and a printout of the Birthday Bar Graph procedure. They copied happily.

  On 4-217’s direct cafeteria-to-auditorium route for our first assembly, Marvin Winslow tapped me on the arm. “Mr. Brown,” he said, looking at the floor, “I'm not good. I'm a bad kid.”

  “No, no, come on, Marvin. I know that's not true.”

  “I'm bad. I do bad things. I ate lunch by myself.”

  “You did? I'll make sure that doesn't happen again. I saw you hanging out with Dennis when I picked up the class. I'm sure Dennis will want to eat with you,” I said.

  “Yeah!” Dennis enthused from the line. I didn't know he could hear us.

  “But I'm bad,” Marvin insisted.

  “We're friends!” Dennis cheered. “Right, Marvin? We ate lunch.”

  Suddenly caught between his inferiority complex and his new buddy, Marvin hesitated. “Yeah,” he mumbled.

  “We're friends, Mr. Brown!” Dennis repeated. At that moment, I loved him.

  “Marvin, I'm a good judge of character. I can tell you've got a good heart. We're going to work together. I know you had problems at your old school, but you're not there anymore. You're at P.S. 85 with Mr. Brown.”

  Marvin nodded and fell silent.

  The assembly was a gargantuan letdown. Mr. Randazzo spent a huge chunk of time raising and lowering his arm, trying unsuccessfully to implement the Silent Signal. The teachers had to mimic Randazzo's arm movements, like monkeys. Eventually he achieved quiet and gave a banal speech about being one month through the new school year. Then he announced the September scores from his morning lineup rubric.

  Four-two-seventeen was dead last, deep in the cellar. When Mr. R. called up each room's Student of the Month, Sonandia accepted her honor with nonchalance. With the calling of each name, the auditorium roared with wild shouting since, to many, the program solely equaled a license to make noise. Some award recipients could not hear their names. Randazzo had not prepared the winners’ certificates, promising they would receive them next month.

  I was alone in the corridor after school, appending my exterior bulletin board with five pieces of gloriously error-free math writing when literacy coach Marge Foley approached me. Most teachers are out the door as fast as possible on Fridays, but Marge always stayed late. She regarded the bulletin board. “Good, looks good,” she said.

  “Great. It was a bit of a mess…”

  “I know, I know. You did a good job.” A brief pause hung in the air. “I think you have the makings of a very good teacher. Your language when you're questioning the kids and your scaffolding on prior knowledge is excellent. And you care, which goes a long, long way. But I have to be frank about something. You absolutely have to find or concoct some kind of more effective approach to your
discipline. You have to decide on something that works with your personality and commit yourself to it completely. Do you have a main plan and a contingency plan for every second of the day? Do you have a system for putting their coats in the closet, for getting drinks of water, for dismissal, for lineup? Your kids are out of control a lot. People can tell. The ship could sink, if you know what I mean. I've seen it before. And you have a tough class. I know. But once you get some traction on the management side, it'll get easier. If you don't, it's going to be a very long year.”

  I thanked Marge for her advice. I didn't want to sink. I didn't want Sonandia and Jennifer and Evley and Tiffany and Julissa to sink. I really didn't want Marvin Winslow to sink. Four-two-seventeen was at a crossroads.

  October

  Motivation into Submission

  I WORE A SERIOUSLY PISSED-OFF expression when I tramped into the cafeteria for morning lineup. I intended to march the children upstairs and deliver a quick, authoritative speech to the class outside the 4-217 door, announcing new systems for entering the classroom: Go straight to your desks with all of your belongings, unpack your bag completely, because the closet will be off-limits until dismissal, wait for your group to be called before anyone uses the closet (Violation will risk a severe consequence in group points!), place your homework on your desk so I can see it, and get straight to work on this math sheet that I'm about to hand you as you enter the room. Names go immediately on the Rewards List for following directions, the Detention List for failure to do so.

  But something unexpected happened first.

  The 4-217 line routinely passed Wilson Tejera's fourth-grade bilingual class on the way to our room. Mr. Tejera's group began each day by singing “The Star-Spangled Banner” as they entered their classroom and got organized. The bombs were bursting in air as we walked by that morning. I didn't see it, but apparently, Hamisi made some kind of mocking gesture at the singing students, and Tejera was out in the hall like a shot.