A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops. ~Henry Brooks Adams

I was inspired by Jomamma to talk about my teachers... also a recent post from Olga reminded me of how much a teacher can affect your view of certain subjects.
So here goes the teachers that I remember
Grade 1 Gosnells primary school - Ms Stibby (mum and I called her Mrs Skippy for the first 6 months - forgive us - we didn’t speak English and Skip was on the TV every day.) She was great
Grade 2 Gosnells... have no idea... just remember that 3 eights are 24... we all had to get up in front of the class and recite tables and we each had a multiple to recite... not sure I learnt what came after me - was more worried that the kids before me remembered their lines...
Grade 3 Maddington Primary School... Mrs Clews for half the year then Mrs Telfor (I think that was her name)
Grade 4 Maddington Mrs Clews - she was brilliant - such a nice understanding and caring person
Grade 5 Mr Biggs... from Sri Lanka - or was it Malay - can’t remember - just know that he told us the best stories after afternoon recess. All about jungle adventures and ghost stories... Half the time we were shitting ourselves, once literally one boy pissed his pants... he was too excited by the story to put his hand up to ask to go to the loo.
Grade 6 Mr Bailey - he read the hobbit to us and taught us to sing some Carpenters song - snowbird?... anyway he was brilliant, I loved reading and he encouraged me so much. He was also working part time for the ABC and used us as a test group for things that they were thinking of doing for primary students. In his class I had to sit next to the "special" needs boys - i.e. in special need for a kick in the balls... anyway...(I think these thoughts on why I was seated next to certain people in primary school needs a different post).
Grade 7 First Mrs Ellis, she went on maternity leave... she was sooooo lovely - a carer, totally nice... then came Mrs Damen... the name says it all. She was kicked out of the Catholic school down the road as she had become born again... (I think it was for another reason). With her came my arch nemesis Tony Pisano. Under her we took tests every week to see our class standing. At the end of every week we then had to move desks according to where we were in the "smarts" hierarchy. Needless to say I never reached the top row... was always at the end of the second one - just but not quite there - no tell a lie was there for one week. Any who, in her class I learnt to cheat - i.e. get the cards for this weeks math and the answer card at the same time - whoopee got them right but did I learn - nah.. God I hated her so much. In her class Leon Blurton was sat next to me on one side (the only exception to the smarts rule) Leon was a really nice kid - an Aboriginal whom I had known since grade 3 - we got on ok and so it didn’t worry me too much... Tony on the other hand was on the other side of me most weeks, only because he always cheated off me in tests!!!! (sidebar - he got put in the big house a few years back for fraud - cheated his clients when he was pretending to financially advise them - he also married the only person who I have ever been deliberately mean to - think mean girls times a few).
As you can see I was traumatised by this half year in year 7.

Years 8 - 12 Thornlie Senior High School. Now we get teachers for math, English, social sciences, science, sport, home ec, art - or in my case French.... (Why???? I still don’t understand).I will just highlight the ones that stood out in each year
Year 8maths - Mr Rissman... short American with great blackboard writing skills... pity he actually couldn’t reach the top of the board. From memory a fair maths teacherSocial Studies - Mr Reid - redhead. Nice guy - I love geography, history and all that crap so this was a favourite subject and I was a teachers pet
English....
Science...
Year 9Maths
Mr Maths White, moustache... smoked and was a good teacher...
Science - Mr White - came to us from somewhere in Africa, told us about the elephant foot coffee table he had (totally not right these days)... smoked a pipe - was fairly short and a brilliant teacher
Social Sciences... either Mr Reid again or Mr Ponambolum... (This is written in phonetic spelling - I honestly can not remember how to spell it - he was from Sri Lanka) again - I loved the subject they could do no wrong.English...... (Obviously not my favourite subject)
Year 10
Maths... Mrs Hatch - with the highest pitched voice I have ever had to endure
English... Mrs Edwards... no comment
Science...
Social Studies... Mr P????
I coasted in year 10...
Year 11 and 12
Mrs Maynard - maths teacher extraordinaire - she was so nice... followed by Mr ... can’t remember - but had a dodgy leg and was most amusing.
Chemistry Mr Graham... loved year 11 hated year 12 organic chemistry
Physics, Mr B... Biggins, Bean... oh he was so weak looking and so totally uninspiring (I also did not understand....)
I think a Mr Decker may also have been involved in these two years... I was just soo out of my depth... Calculate the time taken for a block of ice at -3°c to melt in a bowl of water 10°c .... volume blah blah blah...
Geography - Mr Hanrahan - looked like a freaky musketeer (of the French variety - all the hair and the mo) a very very good teacher

Have to mention my French teachers Ms Teo and Ms McPherson, such sweeties - I can not understand how they had the patience with moi...

I look back and think they were all in their own way quite wonderful... apart from Damen, Hatch... and Mrs Whitan... English teacher from hell in year 12... she was from India... had a classic Indian accent - loved the good/good looking people in the class, had little time for me - I got sweet revenge though in the TAE final exam (that meant 100% of your final grade) was written totally for me.. I had such a blast in that exam - I can even say that I had a wonderful 3 hours of exam time... and aced it... (she had never given me more than 5 out of 10 for every assignment she marked - I stopped handing them in after a while).... just as well that in those days what you actually did all year had no effect on your grade average for uni entrance...oh dear.. What a long post - but what a trip down memory lane.

Flickr had new photos from here... in case you care to see more photos of the same stuff

Oh yeh in other news.

Skagafjorður now has a sailing club - I went to their inaugural meeting last night - it is called Siglingaklúburin Drangey. Maybe one day I will learn to sail..... and perhaps spell.