(Literacy) Volunteers of America

If you're my age, Gentle Reader, you saw the blog title and instantly flashed on Jefferson Airplane cover art and people in funny hats saluting ironically.  Just wanted to get that off my mind.

But this is not actually going to be a piece about members of dinosaur bands wearing funny hats and saluting ironically.  At least, I don't think it is - I never know where my blog is going to take me, and sometimes it's like Betsy Trotwood's dear friend Mr. Dick and  King Charles' head in David Copperfield - no matter what poor Mr. Dick sets out to talk about, up pops King Charles' head and there he is, at it again, talking about decapitated Stuart monarchs.  I'll do my best, though.

My point - and I did have one - was going to be that I am now halfway through my training as a volunteer in Rockland County's Literacy Solutions program, and I am surprised by how enjoyable I am finding the process. So let me get back to that.

The training is done in six three-hour sessions taking place at the library.  There are roughly 20 aspiring volunteers, many of them retired teachers.  The three ladies leading the sessions have been working within the program for a very long time, and they are dynamic, enthusiastic, and well-prepared for every class.  Excellent role models, in short.  There is also a backlogged waiting list of almost 60 aspiring students waiting to be paired off with a tutor.  20 volunteers. 60 potential students. Even I can do the math.  There is a distinct need for this service.

A confession. . . Yes, another one. (Don't tell me you are weary of my confessions?  We haven't even gotten to the spicy ones yet.) Some years ago I thought I would get an advanced degree in education and look for a job as an English teacher.  I lasted exactly two days in the program before withdrawing in confusion and haste.  Dear Gentle Readers Who Are Teachers - I don't know how you did it.  How on earth did you choke down all those never-ending mouthfuls of Dead Sea fruit known as Educational Theory?  Especially in the despairing knowledge that the Powers That Be were planning to change it all up on you anyway in a few years, tell you nothing you'd learned was relevant any longer, and sporadically present you a nice fresh plate of Dead Sea fruit to consume in the lofty name of Professional Development (meaning that you'd have to go to school and sit in the classroom listening to somebody drone on about adolescent psychology while all your students took the day off.)

Now, it will be said, and with some justice, that I did not give the education program a fair shake, and that some of the classes would undoubtedly have proved interesting and inspirational, which is probably so.  No matter.  I have found my niche in the literacy volunteer training, which provides pithy advice on what to tell a student who wants to go out drinking with you after class, ("No, thanks") down and dirty tips on how to inculcate the use of the definite article in those students whose native tongue does not have definite articles, and which, above all, urges me to make the lessons fun.

Fun, let me tell you, was sadly lacking in the postgraduate education classroom.

And that, to me, is a problem, at whatever level you are planning to teach.  Because if you can't get your students excited about learning... if you can't figure out a way to engage them, to make them sit up a little straighter, to make their eyes sparkle as they make a connection they can't wait to share with you - then chances are that everybody - teacher and pupil - is going to go home thinking, "I don't wanna do this anymore."

Now, I am not necessarily planning to use this particular illustration of the importance of proper capitalization with my literacy students (at least, not until they are very advanced, and then only when we go out drinking after class . . . ahem! - which, as you know, we are not going to do.)  But here is a sample of the dynamic lesson taught to us today by the Literacy Ladies:

Correct capitalization is extremely important.  It can make the difference between helping your Uncle Jack off a horse, and helping your uncle jack off a horse.

It's like I said. . . Lessons should be fun.