Lucky #13-- Obsolete Practises

Obsolete means "no more".  So what was once in use is now no more.  Buggy whips are

obsolete. We get about today by vehicles, cabs, buses, trains and planes not by horse and 

buggy.   Old products, out of date items and out of practice  become  replaced with something new.   Somehow old-fashioned and no longer useful seems rather harsh,  especially to people who regularity had these things in their lives. Why are jobs like a pinsetter, a projectionist, a log driver and a wheelwright  obsolete?  My dad was a projectionist.  Will these jobs become obsolete cashier, a dispatcher, a teller,  a telemarketer and an accountant?  When I started teaching the school secretary used a typewriter, a rolodex and a gestetner and a hand crank pencil sharpener. Where did the landlines go and where is the carbon paper?  What do you mean there is no fax machine and no chalk  or brushes for the blackboard ?  Start classes, the teacher is on line. What I have to use a computer?  No room encyclopedia or dictionary, you can use your cellphone or chrome book  to do research.  Change is inevitable. Thank GOD teachers aren't obsolete!  We aren't, are  we?  BUT..........

Habits teachers once used for behavior and classroom management are obsolete.  I remember actions that are considered physical and mental punishment and are certainly not used today. As a student I remember kids getting strapped and laughing afterwards. It was still regularly used in my early years of teaching. Someone was slashing winter boots on the boot rack, so the principal tried to get students to tell him who was doing it. After strapping many of the older boys, my brother being one of them, he started on the girls. Some kids rubbed onion juice on their sore hands, which caused their hands to hugely swell.  He was fired. Little did he know my Dad was in charge of hiring and firing for the school board. Bye bye  Principal.  They never did find out who was slashing the boots but it stopped  once the principal was gone.......

Since many kids got punished at home by getting the belt, the strap didn't help.  It just made

kids angry, parents mad and behavior stayed the same and often got worse.  I saw teachers

get desperate to control the behaviors, Kids were non-compliant, yelling, fighting, bullying,

excluding kids, saying slurs and calling each other names. Some of the actions my teachers were:  pinching ears, some  wrapped tacks to their thumb with tape and pricked kids heads in their hair (no marks, no proof) ,  a nun teacher used to have students kneel on pencils with their arms out stretched and if they dropped their tired arms they had to start their time over again, some teachers slapped  rulers on a kids'  desks and sometimes broke them , some teachers would dump a kids' desks and tell them to pick it up.   Gone are the days of kids 

sitting in the front of the class on a stool with a dunce  hat on their head or standing in the corner with their nose against the wall.  Next time I will write about the two times I actually gave the strap.  A horrible experience, I will never forget . I was the one that ended up 

crying, bruised and feeling like puking afterwards. Strapping didn't work for me either, LOL   Till next time .......

Faith always