It takes a strange bird to take up this job. Not so much those that teach at a primary level, but at secondary school and above, the geeks, freaks and fascists come out to play!
We had more than our share, during my school days. I don't know if they were psychologically damaged prior, or the problem was more of a situational psychosis, but some of these characters should have been in an institution- we still had them in New Zealand in those days.
Like any pack of predators, we could smell fear and baited them with no mercy! Unlike today, straight out abuse was crossing the line, so we had to be more subtle. Hiding any writing materials was always good for a wind-up, as was gluing locks and sabotaging lab equipment.
Anyone who wore socks with sandals had to be fair game, as was a person who wore their trousers up to their ribcage!
Then there was 'Bacco Bill', an ape-descended lifeform very loosely called a science teacher. Rumour had it that he was a wartime friend of the principal, thus he had a job for life. I can't recall ever learning a single thing in his classes, off the syllabus, anyway!
He was about as stable as a pissed priest sitting on a keg of gunpowder, with a lighted candle up his arse.
His class had two types of student. Those as dumb as mud and considered write-offs and a few bright enough to pass the subject, regardless, thus not making him look so bad.
The inevitable would happen, as it does in these circumstances- the bright kids make the bullets and give them to the dullards to fire. Nothing like someone being dragged off for a good thrashing to brighten up a dull period!
The highlight of the year was a lesson involving the Van De Graaff generator, an ingenious gadget that generated loads of static electricity. Normally this would be the display and lecture on a defunct machine, dragged from the storeroom and dusted of for it's annual showing. Not this year- a couple of the brighter and more devious types repaired it, so it was fire it up or lose face!
For a mental picture, just imagine Homer Simpson entangled in an electric fence of 3/4 for an hour! Every time he went near this thing-POW!
At least 4 beatings were given out for uncontrollable laughter.
It was a lesson alright. Wisdom does not always come with age!
1 comment:
Reminds me of a mad science teacher I had - except he was deceptively smart and we'd wind up on the wrong end of smelly, explosive experiments.
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