By George Manthey

It may be possible, now and then, to learn something by oneself. But most of the time we learn because we were lucky enough to encounter someone who both cared and was able to teach.

In my second year of teaching I was responsible for 27 first-graders. They were great students. However, I noticed that three of them weren’t learning to read. At conference time I asked their parents if these students could stay after school each day, for just a few minutes, so that we could work on their reading skills. During the second week or so of this routine, as we sat in a small circle, “round-robin” reading a story, I was transported back to my own first-grade experience.

Catching up

I remember being in trouble a lot during first grade at Riverside School in Sacramento. While other students had projects to do, I was given the opportunity to sit alone and draw. I had no idea why this was. I do remember that I wasn’t particularly upset when I was told mid-year that I would be moving to Mrs. Strong’s class.

Soon after transferring, Mrs. Strong met with my mother and me after school. I remember Mrs. Strong saying, “George is the second-best reader in our classroom, and I think he could really move even further ahead if he stayed with me after school and worked with the best reader.”

So every day Robert and I stayed after and read “Janet and Mark” with Mrs. Strong. We’d read the stories and then she’d get me to read the vocabulary list in the back of the book. Without the context I really struggled with the words. But I was motivated to be able to read them as fast as Robert. Mrs. Strong made me believe that I could catch him.

We’d race to see who could read the list the fastest. Robert always won. After days of practice I could read the list nearly as fast, but then Mrs. Strong started giving me the words on 3 x 5 cards and it was like starting over. I remember learning some of the words by the smudge that was on the card: “The card with the thumbprint is ‘street,’ I would say to myself.

I kept practicing until eventually I could read the words in whatever order she flashed them — and with time I was able to see that the words on the cards were the same words as those in the book. I worked and worked because I wanted to be the best reader in the class, and because Mrs. Strong made me believe that I could be. I improved steadily, but so did Robert.

At age 24, teaching first grade, I understood what had happened to me in first grade. As I stayed after school with my poorest readers, I realized who had been the poorest reader in my first-grade class. And I loved Mrs. Strong in a new and profound way. She had tricked me into becoming literate by making me believe that I already was.

Helping every student become literate

ACSA is about to embark on a journey to have a greater impact on the issues of learning and teaching as they play out in classrooms throughout California. The Learning and Teaching Task Force, to be chaired by Jeanie Cash, will be meeting during this academic year to study the issues and create a long-range plan so that every student can become literate in the very best sense of that word — literate as readers, for sure, but also as writers, mathematicians, consumers, citizens, scientists, technology users.

My efforts in support of the Task Force’s work will be guided by the lessons taught to me by many great teachers like Mrs. Strong. I look forward to what we are able to teach, but even more so to what will be learned.

George Manthey is assistant executive director of ACSA’s Educational Services Department.