Taking it to Another Level
Sep 20, 2016 23:17:38 #
Reaching the Third Level More Than Once
Jack Finney wrote an inspirational short story called “The Third Level.” It was about a department store that actually had only two floors, but one day when visited by the narrator, a third level had materialized, where all the displays were exhilarating. Finney's masterpiece was more about emotion than event, but ended in a sobering notice that the third level was reduced to a mere memory and vague hope that may never be found again. Teachers, on the other hand, are often fortunate enough to taste of it repeatedly.
A long time ago, when your reporter was only in his twenties, Collis Hines, a sixth grader, appeared in his science and math classes. To be quite blunt, he looked and acted goofy, but underneath his entertaining facade was on iron will and an inexhaustible drive to succeed. Unlike other kids in that same class, he took notes, then immediately subvocalized them. He was so eager to learn the material, that he began studying it on the spot, as soon as he heard it.
It turned out that Collis was a part-time special education student who just the previous year had taken a full load of special education classes. He worked his way out of “modified” classes in the days when there was no “inclusion” to expedite such a move. A year later, as a seventh grader, Collis shed his last special education class, completing what anyone would have to admit was an extraordinary accomplishment, but he was not yet finished producing miracles. As an eighth grader, he won the excellence in science award, when his closest rival, a girl with considerable native intelligence, tried to rest on her laurels before actually collecting them. The proverbial tortoise had beaten the hare in real life.
Two decades later, Roan, a well-dressed, polite, hard-working history student, churned through the class without making less than a B on any test. About halfway through the semester, a belated note from the Special Education Department disclosed that he was a “mainstreamed” special education student with several serious learning disabilities. The notice dictated that his burden needed to be lightened with shortened and diluted assignments, assistance with note-taking, and extensions on deadlines. The teacher simply ignored these, since it somehow never registered on Roan, that his disabilities could in any way detract from his performance. He was already the best student in the class, and had no doubt he would pursue and earn a college degree.
In the intervening decade, the eighties, there was no miracle student, but there was a miracle classroom. Early in the year a girl exhorted the class to start making “A's” since she was tired of having to hear that Nobleton Jones made the only “A” on every test. “He ain't got nothing we ain't,” she exclaimed in the vernacular. For the rest of the year, no one in that class, except the chronic absentees, made less than a middle B on any exam. They had reached the third level, because an unheralded prophet had given them that elusive and precious spark that impels some people to reach beyond the ordinary; beyond even their own theoretical limits.
The only tragedy inherent in Finney's “The Third Level” is that it was a rare and chimeric phenomenon, perhaps a one time event. In the classroom, however, like Haley's Comet, it can make cyclical reappearances. Teachers have an opportunity to inspire it, shape it, or just step out of the way, as ordinary people tap into an extraordinary power within themselves. In the darkest moments brought on by escalating insurance costs, deteriorating classroom autonomy, and enslavement by uninspirational testing schemes, there is the comfort of knowing that the boys and girls featured in the anecdotes above, and others like them can have additional defining moments as adults working with test tubes, with a computer keyboard, or in a court of law. They will have reached the Third Level more than once, and all of us, especially their former teachers will have risen with them.
Jack Finney wrote an inspirational short story called “The Third Level.” It was about a department store that actually had only two floors, but one day when visited by the narrator, a third level had materialized, where all the displays were exhilarating. Finney's masterpiece was more about emotion than event, but ended in a sobering notice that the third level was reduced to a mere memory and vague hope that may never be found again. Teachers, on the other hand, are often fortunate enough to taste of it repeatedly.
A long time ago, when your reporter was only in his twenties, Collis Hines, a sixth grader, appeared in his science and math classes. To be quite blunt, he looked and acted goofy, but underneath his entertaining facade was on iron will and an inexhaustible drive to succeed. Unlike other kids in that same class, he took notes, then immediately subvocalized them. He was so eager to learn the material, that he began studying it on the spot, as soon as he heard it.
It turned out that Collis was a part-time special education student who just the previous year had taken a full load of special education classes. He worked his way out of “modified” classes in the days when there was no “inclusion” to expedite such a move. A year later, as a seventh grader, Collis shed his last special education class, completing what anyone would have to admit was an extraordinary accomplishment, but he was not yet finished producing miracles. As an eighth grader, he won the excellence in science award, when his closest rival, a girl with considerable native intelligence, tried to rest on her laurels before actually collecting them. The proverbial tortoise had beaten the hare in real life.
Two decades later, Roan, a well-dressed, polite, hard-working history student, churned through the class without making less than a B on any test. About halfway through the semester, a belated note from the Special Education Department disclosed that he was a “mainstreamed” special education student with several serious learning disabilities. The notice dictated that his burden needed to be lightened with shortened and diluted assignments, assistance with note-taking, and extensions on deadlines. The teacher simply ignored these, since it somehow never registered on Roan, that his disabilities could in any way detract from his performance. He was already the best student in the class, and had no doubt he would pursue and earn a college degree.
In the intervening decade, the eighties, there was no miracle student, but there was a miracle classroom. Early in the year a girl exhorted the class to start making “A's” since she was tired of having to hear that Nobleton Jones made the only “A” on every test. “He ain't got nothing we ain't,” she exclaimed in the vernacular. For the rest of the year, no one in that class, except the chronic absentees, made less than a middle B on any exam. They had reached the third level, because an unheralded prophet had given them that elusive and precious spark that impels some people to reach beyond the ordinary; beyond even their own theoretical limits.
The only tragedy inherent in Finney's “The Third Level” is that it was a rare and chimeric phenomenon, perhaps a one time event. In the classroom, however, like Haley's Comet, it can make cyclical reappearances. Teachers have an opportunity to inspire it, shape it, or just step out of the way, as ordinary people tap into an extraordinary power within themselves. In the darkest moments brought on by escalating insurance costs, deteriorating classroom autonomy, and enslavement by uninspirational testing schemes, there is the comfort of knowing that the boys and girls featured in the anecdotes above, and others like them can have additional defining moments as adults working with test tubes, with a computer keyboard, or in a court of law. They will have reached the Third Level more than once, and all of us, especially their former teachers will have risen with them.
Sep 21, 2016 05:23:44 #
Sep 21, 2016 08:35:17 #
Sep 21, 2016 09:25:06 #
Keldon
Loc: Yukon, B.C.
Or if you want to be really pedantic about it: 1P/Halley
pipesgt wrote:
It should be spelt 'Halley's' Comet
Sep 21, 2016 11:14:59 #
Sep 21, 2016 12:37:41 #
Sep 21, 2016 19:24:21 #
Sep 21, 2016 19:27:37 #
Skip-M wrote:
I too think it was worth reading, If U don't like something JUST KEEP QUIET
Mind your own business
Sep 22, 2016 06:07:19 #
Keldon wrote:
Or if you want to be really pedantic about it: 1P/Halley
It is gradually turning into 1PHalley-1pPHalley.
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