Working and Ending

We’re nearing the end of the year — only a couple of weeks to go. These weeks promise to be anything but typical. For one thing, I’m giving assignments with the understanding, on both sides, that I will provide minimal feedback and that the grade depends more on effort than accuracy. That’s the district policy during our quarantine teaching. It might be the state policy. So some kids do their absolute best, like this analysis of chapter 24 of To Kill a Mockingbird:

Chapter 24 is important because it shows how the town of Maycomb isn’t as “Christian” or as “nice” as they claim to be. For example, Mrs. Farrow Mentions how they can educate them and try to make them Christians but till there will be, “no lady safe in her bed.” The antecedent ambiguity that Mrs. Farrow makes using “them” as in the African Americans shows a sense of judgment she has towards them. Not only that but when she mentions how much they are fighting a losing battle and women still can’t be safe shows the hierarchy these white people have put themselves in showing that no matter what an African American will never be better as a person of white ethnicity. Similarly, Merriweather states how there are some, “Misguided people” in the town who think they were “Doing right”, but all they did was “Stir [them] up.” This second case of antecedent ambiguity this time towards Atticus shows the real hypocrisy of Mrs. Merriweather. Mrs.Maudie backs that up with a remark showing how Mrs. Merrieweather doesn’t feel any ounce of remorse talking trash, but eating Atticus’ food. Showing how really bad Mrs. Merriweather actually is.

Other students don’t turn in anything. Despite calls to parents. Despite emails. Despite encouragement. Despite the constant reminder that this the only time they’ll have to pull in a handful of 100s (nine of them, in fact) for simply doing the work. Just putting forth the most minimal effort. It’s frustrating, not to mention tiring.

The Boy, though, gets no mercy. Just try to skip something, or not do his absolute best — K is on him to get everything done, and when she’s not, I am. Truth be told, though, she’s done the lion’s share of the work with him — probably something like 95% of the work with him even if I’m being generous with myself. I have spent most of that time in the basement, “grading” things, sending emails, planning things, meeting on Google Meet. She has kept him on his toes, kept his nose to the cliche grindstone, which means she’s been keeping her own to the grindstone as well.

I am usually keeping my own students’ noses to the cliche at this time of year, especially the English I students. They’ll soon be writing their letters to next year’s students, and I have to make sure their final impressions of the class will help them create the appropriate first impressions in next year’s classes. They’re usually finishing up Great Expectations or Lord of the Flies at this point in the year. They’re out of breath, academic legs aching, making the last mad dash for the finish, and I’m there cheering them on and behind them whipping them faster, mixing metaphors left and right. The letter is supposed to be completed in one class period. That’s what makes it so impressive to the students next year.

“How would you rate this letter’s organization?” I ask. They usually are moderately impressed.

“How would you rate this letter’s length?” I ask. They usually are moderately impressed.

“How would you rate this letter’s persuasiveness?” I ask. They usually are moderately impressed.

“Last year’s students wrote these letters in one class period. These are, therefore, first drafts.” I pause for effect. Everyone begins looking at each other. “Whose opinion of these letters has risen noticeably?” Every hand — every single one — goes up.

And this year? How can I make sure each student only spends the equivalent of one class period on her letter? In short, I can’t.

Not the end of the world, but frustrating.

Reading

E and I finished Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea last night. After complaining about how he didn’t understand everything for the last couple of weeks, he changed his tune when I realized we wouldn’t find out what happened to Captain Nemo.

“Is there a sequel?”

“I think there is. Or at least he appears in another book,” I say.

“Can we read it?”

No — not now. Enough Jules Verne for now.

Our next book: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. We begin with a history and culture lesson: I talk to the Boy about the n-word. It appears in the book. There’s no escaping it. He’ll encounter it in one way or another soon enough.

Then we begin reading. I’m hoping he’ll find it amusing. If he doesn’t… well, I guess we’ll have to try something else. But soon enough, he’s laughing:

The summer evenings were long. It was not dark, yet. Presently Tom checked his whistle. A stranger was before him—a boy a shade larger than himself. A new-comer of any age or either sex was an impressive curiosity in the poor little shabby village of St. Petersburg. This boy was well dressed, too—well dressed on a week-day. This was simply astounding. His cap was a dainty thing, his close-buttoned blue cloth roundabout was new and natty, and so were his pantaloons. He had shoes on—and it was only Friday. He even wore a necktie, a bright bit of ribbon. He had a citified air about him that ate into Tom’s vitals. The more Tom stared at the splendid marvel, the higher he turned up his nose at his finery and the shabbier and shabbier his own outfit seemed to him to grow. Neither boy spoke. If one moved, the other moved—but only sidewise, in a circle; they kept face to face and eye to eye all the time. Finally, Tom said:

“I can lick you!”

“I’d like to see you try it.”

“Well, I can do it.”

“No you can’t, either.”

“Yes I can.”

“No you can’t.”

“I can.”

“You can’t.”

“Can!”

“Can’t!”

The Boy is laughing so hard by the time we get here. We reenact the dialogue a number of times, each time to more uproarious laughter. I’m not sure what he finds more amusing: the idea of “whip” meaning “to beat up” or repetition of assertion and denial.

We continue:

An uncomfortable pause. Then Tom said:

“What’s your name?”

“’Tisn’t any of your business, maybe.”

“Well I ’low I’ll make it my business.”

“Well why don’t you?”

“If you say much, I will.”

“Much—much—much. There now.”

The whole “much-much-much” just about doubled him over. It’s what an eight-year-old might do, after all.

After his evening dental hygiene session (what a way to describe an eight-year-old boy brushing his teeth), we embark on chapter two, the most famous of all Twain’s passages: the whitewashing scene.

Tom gave up the brush with reluctance in his face, but alacrity in his heart. And while the late steamer Big Missouri worked and sweated in the sun, the retired artist sat on a barrel in the shade close by, dangled his legs, munched his apple, and planned the slaughter of more innocents. There was no lack of material; boys happened along every little while; they came to jeer, but remained to whitewash. By the time Ben was fagged out, Tom had traded the next chance to Billy Fisher for a kite, in good repair; and when he played out, Johnny Miller bought in for a dead rat and a string to swing it with—and so on, and so on, hour after hour. And when the middle of the afternoon came, from being a poor poverty-stricken boy in the morning, Tom was literally rolling in wealth. He had besides the things before mentioned, twelve marbles, part of a jews-harp, a piece of blue bottle-glass to look through, a spool cannon, a key that wouldn’t unlock anything, a fragment of chalk, a glass stopper of a decanter, a tin soldier, a couple of tadpoles, six fire-crackers, a kitten with only one eye, a brass door-knob, a dog-collar—but no dog—the handle of a knife, four pieces of orange-peel, and a dilapidated old window sash.

The idea of “a dead rat and a string to swing it with” was just terribly amusing for the Boy.

As he was drifting off to sleep, he remembered another favorite line — once I explained key vocabulary — and muttered it one last time: “would have bankrupted every boy in the village.”