Grade Six, Day One

Feeling tightly packaged and wrapped in my new school uniform, butterflies fluttering in both brain and belly, I walked into the Grade Six classroom. Day One in Grade Six at an all girls school. I felt foreign and missed my friends, yet determined to be brave. Our form mistress, Mrs. Harker, barked a welcome at the door and told us to sit in the seat with out name on it. She was short, stocky and terrifying, not a suspicion of a smile on her face, tight lipped and bushy browed. I thought of my heroine from Grade 5, Miss Becker, who was always so encouraging and inviting, I felt a slight lump in my throat.
” Stand in turn and recite the 12 times table” came the command from the female version of Napoleon at the front of the room.
No way to refuse the invitation, or rather, command, each of us in turn, stood and stumbled, tripped, and struggled through.
Her comments were anything but complimentary, we were united on day one in our fear of Harker the Barker as she came to be known. Rarely a ‘well done’ or a ‘good work’, mostly ‘could have done better’.
What a relief it was to finally make it to June and know that the grade six chapter had ended and each of us could recite the times tables backwards, forwards, in any order.
Years later, back in the city where the school was located, I looked for Harker the Barker. taking my young son of 5 to meet her. She seemed smaller, less frightening, in fact, we hugged each other, and my son, who had heard the Harker the Barker stories, got in the middle. A lovely afternoon, cups of tea and chocolate biscuits in her garden, and astonishment at how the memories of terrifying maths classes disappeared.
I have often thought of this teacher throughout my teaching career in various countries in various cultures and of how she, in her way, encouraged us to stretch for the stars, to do our best. I interweave that more gently into my teaching tapestry, no barking allowed.