posted
Taken from an MSN Messenger conversation, slightly edited with term-translation and coherence:
The Tanakh (Bible) teacher took my ice-cream today.
I bought a magnum, and was a tad late to class. And I started eating it. He notices, and asks me "האחרת גם אכלת?" ("you are late and yet you eat?" - based on what Elijah told Ahab after killing Navot from Yizra'el, 1 Kings 21:19).So he confiscates my ice-cream. I had to give it to him.
The lesson discussed the whole thing in Exodus 24 about שומר חינם, שומר שכר, שואל and שוכר (free-keeper, paid-keper, lender and renter). He kept on using the case of the ice-cream (a coffee Magnum which he complained about - he said it's one of their worst tastes) as a case of שומר חינם (free-keeper). I told him that it's שואל (lender) as it wasn't my initiative but his. He asked me whether I'm sure about it and I told him yes. What I didn't notice was that שואל (renter) is one who lends something for the actual use of it.
He started eating it in class. When he finished, he put the bare stick [that was previously] holding the ice-cream on my desk, "tapped" me hard on the upper back and thanked me for the ice-cream.
I came up to him during the break and complained that he did something wrong. His reply was "I asked you whether you were sure I am a שואל (renter) and not a שומר חינם (free-keeper) as I kept on using. You said yes, so I ate it". I told him that I didn't realise at the time that the usage of those two was different, and asumed only the initiative to be the difference. He said "well, at least you learned a valuable lesson - always to look at the small script". I told him that nonetheless he owed me 7.50 NIS, and he only said "you're lucky you learned that lesson for the price of a Magnum, and not the price of a house".
"Why did you eat it, then, if you hated coffee so much?" was my next question. He said "בל תשחית" (a law the forbids you to waste anything valuable - particularly food).
He was perhaps my favourite teacher, really funny and witty. But he crossed all the lines.
Here I was commented that I was being proud of, as I didn't punch him in the face.
I did, actually. During the next break, I took the wrapper of both Magnums (the second one being the one I actually WANTED to eat), put the sticks into them, and a note saying "you just wait for Yom Kippur!", snuck through the window into the vacant, forbidden, teachers' room which was locked, and put it into his compartment.
I think I'll ditch all his lessons now. I got on all the tests so far 10/10 and in the exam I had 92/100.
He could've offered me to go out of class and eat the ice-cream there in turn for a "חיסור" (absent from lesson). He didn't. He could've kept it all as a joke and pay me. He didn't. As for the legal issue in the lesson which "made him it eat it" - I had a misunderstanding. Either he understood that and is a corrupt teacher (more likely), or he's a damn idiot and oughtn't be one.
Posts: 2978 | Registered: Oct 2004
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
you probably should've eat it outside the class first then walked in late, you wouldn't have had to give up 7.5$.
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quote: Either he understood that and is a corrupt teacher (more likely), or he's a damn idiot and oughtn't be one.
There are other possibilities. He could have thought that you were a cocky kid who needed a blatant, line-crossing lesson to get the point across. He might have felt that your being late and eating in class represented enough disrespect that you needed to be put down publicly. And so forth.
What you need to decide, IMO, is whether you're studying fiction or politics. If it's the former, he was way out of line; if it's the latter, the lesson was cheap at the price.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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posted
Mmmm. I'm sympathetic to what you're saying, the guy sounds like he wasn't showing much tact towards you, but on the other hand, that note can be taken the wrong way. It's something that he can get you in trouble for. In the final analysis, it was unecessary and counter-productive.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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posted
I don't give a flamin' damn about his lessons anymore. Even if I am a cocky little bastard - that is completely inappropriate! It's one thing when I eat in class, but where's HIS setting-an-example?
It's still makes him either corrupt or a friggin' idiot.
Posts: 2978 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
Mr. Howard, you were in the wrong. I think your teacher reacted well to what was, frankly, an example of very rude behavior in class. Now, complaining about him and making unwarranted accusations about his character, you are again in the wrong. I suggest you get over it and get your act together.
Posts: 202 | Registered: Nov 2005
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posted
I dunno - at the high school I attended, students bringing food and drink to class was common and wasn't a problem as long as it wasn't messy. Fries, apple fritters, sandwiches, coffee, pop, water... Pizza, even.
Or maybe that was just my honors classes? Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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quote:It's still makes him either corrupt or a friggin' idiot.
Or, again, someone who thinks that by angering and moderately humiliating you, he achieves a greater purpose.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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posted
Once upon a time in a museum of "500,000 Natural and Artificial Curiosities from Every Corner of the Globe", there was a door with a sign posted prominently overhead. To the left of the door, there was a poster labeled 'OGRESS' with a painting of a brute dressed in animal skins bearing a large club. To the right of the door, there was a poster labeled 'EGRET' with an accompanying poster-sized blow-up painting of the bird. From the entrance way and each exhibit room, P.T.Barnum had caused to be placed a direction sign pointing toward that door. And at the entrance way, the OGRESS and EGRET posters were prominently displayed on each side of the direction sign, which read: THIS WAY TO THE EGRESS Naturally, folks being folks, they'd wanna see this (implied) result of an unnatural mating of an ogress and an egret, and often immediately headed through the egress door. After which, they would find themselves in the back alley used as the exit walkway from P.T.Barnum's museum. Where they would laugh at themselves for having experienced an amusing lesson, then buy another set of tickets to tour the museum.
Take your teacher's intent as being exactly as he stated. You learned one of the most valuable lessons concerning the transition from childhood to adult status. You learned it cheap. I paid the equivalent of US$6000 for mine.
If you want "revenge" to properly balance things out: Secretly find out what his favorite icecream is -- using a fellow student to make the inquiry, or asking one of his collegues -- then present it to him as a gift, for "forcing him to eat the yucky stuff".
And stick with his classes. He's likely to be one of the wisest teachers that you'll ever run across.
quote: If you want 'revenge', make it a proper balance. Secretly find out what his favorite icecream is -- using a fellow student to make the inquiry, or asking one of his collegues -- then present it to him as a gift, for "forcing him to eat the yucky stuff".
So I buy him his favourite ice-cream for taking mine away? I don't see just how that's revenge.
Posts: 2978 | Registered: Oct 2004
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quote: He might have felt that your being late and eating in class represented enough disrespect that you needed to be put down publicly.
I'm a school librarian, it's not really like a teacher but there are some close enough aspects that I feel "on the other side of the bareer". I'm quite sure I would have taken it as irrespect if you had arrived late in the library and then started eating in it. I don't think I would have eaten your ice-cream (especially if you had already licked it) but I would have punished you, and probably in front of your classmates, yes.
Posts: 3526 | Registered: Oct 2001
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posted
Does it seem to anyone else that we've gotten a lot of people coming in here lately to kvetch about problems they seem in large part responsible for?
Jonny, you were wrong. If you did that in one of my classes, I'd take the ice cream off of you too. I don't think I'd eat it myself, but I'd likely offer it up to one of your classmates who could pass some sort of challenge. In this case, I'd probably ask who could tell me the important difference in meaning between lender and free-holder and give the ice cream to whomever got the difference first.
Despite what you seem to believe is true, the world does not revolve around you.
edit: Your teacher sounds like a wise man. You'd do better to get over yourself and try to learn the lessons he's trying to teach you, but who am I to deny you the pleasures of angry self-absorbsion.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
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posted
Jonathan, had I been your teacher when you arrived late and eating an ice cream, i would have been annoyed, too. But I wouldn't have eaten your ice cream. I'm lactose intolerant.
Perhaps, both you and your teacher were behaving inappropriately. But you started it. A little derech eretz is called for in this situation, I think.
Perhaps you can humbly apologize for your behavior, promise to try to do better in the future, and move ahead in a better relationship with your teacher. And maybe your offering of an apology will soften your teacher's heart and he will apologise to you, too.
Posts: 10397 | Registered: Jun 2005
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posted
You were in the wrong. You got an ice cream and it seems it made you late to class. And then you proceeded to eat the ice cream in said class. That's insulting to your teacher.
I mean, come on. If you're stopping for ice cream and you're going to be late, get one for your teacher too.
(I did that in college with coffee. And chocolate. Mmmm, bribery.)
Posts: 14745 | Registered: Dec 1999
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posted
I did that too, but I preferred to think of it as curtesy and a mark or respect. Yeah, that's right. Not bribery at all.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
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posted
Wait a minute. You show up to the class late, and start eating the ice cream (which means obviously you either stopped somewhere to buy it on the way, or paused at home to snatch it out of the freezer), and he takes it away from you.
You're complaining that he didn't let you keep it? And he's corrupt for that? What planet are you from, man? You blatantly disrespected your teacher, your other classmates, and the rules of that particular class by your behavior, and you're whining because your hand got slapped for it.
Grow a pair, man up, and admit you were being a childish person. You already cross the line by being late to class, and another by starting to chow down in class. And don't start calling people corrupt(!!) because they eat your damn ice cream!
Which certainly isn't the real issue anyway. You're not really concerned about the money lost, are you? Nor even these "lines" he crossed (line-crossing doesn't trouble you, after all, when you do it, right?). No, you're pissed because he embarrassed you in front of others.
That's what happens when you walk into a classroom late and chowing down.
Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
Well, bribery is a gesture of respect, sort of, right? It's saying, "You're like me. We can both be bought, right?" Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
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I recall walking into an english lit course late and carrying chocolate.
Professor. "You're late." I hand the prof the chocolate. Professor. "And you think I can be bribed?" Me. "Yes." Her. "It's a good thing you're right. Take a seat."
Posts: 14745 | Registered: Dec 1999
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posted
Reading the event in the wrong way, TanteShvester. JonathanHoward provided the straightline for his teacher's punchline. A formal apology is an awkwardness inappropriate to the situation. My suggested "revenge" returns the punchline with the humor in which the lesson was given.
As mackillian's annecdote demonstrates, sometimes humor leads to the most favorable resolution.
Posts: 8501 | Registered: Jul 2001
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posted
aspectre's got it. A little humor goes a long way in making awkward uncomfortable situations settled again.
Posts: 14745 | Registered: Dec 1999
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posted
I do think that attempting to eat ice cream in a class is a little bit... not allowed. I mean, we weren't allowed to have food, really, unless you shoved it all into your mouth at the beginning of class. An ice cream would be unthinkable.
I pity you for the loss of an ice cream but since when is eating icecream in class, as well as arriving late a respectful or accepted thing anyway?
Posts: 8473 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
Yes, the teacher was right to have Howard get rid of the ice cream, but just because Howard was late and eating ice cream, that doesn't give his teacher license to humiliate him. That's wrong for the teacher to do, both morally and, I think, because it is practically going to achieve the exact result we see in this thread.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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posted
I was in eighth grade science, reading a book in the back of the room while the teacher was lecturing.
The teacher came over, took my book, and tossed it in the trash. I had to dig it out at the end of class.
Was I wrong to be reading in class? Yes, it was rude.
Was the way he handled it a bad idea? Boy, howdy. It was humiliating and an abuse of power. Humiliating people doesn't teach them anything other than resentment and mistrust.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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posted
I obviously had a much different educational experience from you. Humiliation, generally good natured, was a primary tool used in my high school's discipline. Then, again, this was combined with the presumption that we should at least be trying to act like adults. When you screwed up, you were expected to acknowledge that you screwed up.
From what Jonny has said, and knowing what I do of him (namely, that he's got a lot of growing up to do), it doesn't sound to me like the teacher acted mean-spirited at all. He even included a valuable lesson in with the relatively mild chiding. I don't see anything wrong with his actions.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
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quote:Yes, the teacher was right to have Howard get rid of the ice cream, but just because Howard was late and eating ice cream, that doesn't give his teacher license to humiliate him.
I agree with that. The Teacher should have told him to get rid of the ice cream. If he confiscated it and decided that he was going to eat it he should have been forthright about it, instead of tricking JH.
Posts: 8473 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
How big is a "magnum" of ice cream? It sounds huge, but from the description, it is what I would call an ice cream pop. That is, a snack-sized bar of ice cream, on a stick, preferably dipped in a lovely chocloate coating.
Variations on this theme include the popsicle, which is fruit-flavored ices on a stick, creamsicle, which is orange sherbet and vanilla ice cream on a stick, and fudgesicle, which is a denser, skim-milk chocolate ice cream on a stick, uncoated.
Posts: 10397 | Registered: Jun 2005
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posted
kat, I wasn't asking for your sympathies. Maybe I wasn't being clear. I regard this as a positive thing. It was designed to help build character and, from my perspective, it worked.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
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posted
Skipping class is only hurting yourself. My guess is that the teacher won't give it a second thought--he's still going to get paid nomatter what. You'd be better off arriving early to every single remaining class, pencil in hand. The guy was trying to teach you, at least make an effort to show that you learned something. You were in the wrong. He was wrong by humiliating you, but you were *more* wrong by inciting the incident. You previously liked this teacher--was that only because his style was never directed at you personally? Get over it.
Some of my favorite teachers in HS were the ones who would heckle you out of your comfort zone every now and then. One of the teachers was responsible for giving me the idea for my screen name. Posts: 4089 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
When I was in high school, it was not uncommon for teachers to call us "little punks" and throw erasers at our heads.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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posted
I had a coach teacher that did that. He would also say, in response to an incorrect answer, "ENH! Wrong! Thank you for playing!" (This is the same coach who informed the class that I had a right to believe whatever I wanted, no matter how wrong it was.)
I had another coach teacher that would throw erasers at people who had fallen asleep. Unlike the first coach, though, for the most part, he was a pretty good teacher.
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posted
Yeah. As odd as it sounds today, the eraser-throwing teachers I had often stand out in my memory as the good ones.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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posted
I agree, Tom. And in the more general sense, I think that as we get older, a less "hands-off" approach in terms of humiliation is merited.
Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
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quote: I think that as we get older, a less "hands-off" approach in terms of humiliation is merited.
I'm not sure what this means. Does that mean as students get older, teachers don't need to be as careful about not humiliating them?
I'd love to hear the perspective of some teachers about this - how effective humiliation actually is at improving learning and the teaching environment. I've herad Coccinelle tell some stories, and from those, it sounds like a spectacularly bad idea even still.
For humiliation to be effective, it needs to "break" the student a little. How is that something positive?
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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posted
Not everyone is going to be cuddly and nurturing. If teachers were all like this we would have no preparation whatsoever for the real world.
Posts: 4089 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
I think there's a huge difference between mean-spirited humiliation where the teacher is just using their power to make the student feel small and more good natured stuff where there is a lesson being taught and maturity expected.
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posted
I had one eraser thrower. He was also rumored to have shot his lawnmower, to have ripped a speaker from the wall when an announcement interrupted his lecture, and other assorted wacky stuff. He was widely believed to be insane by his students, something he actively cultivated. I learned quite a bit from him--he was a good teacher--but I see this as being in spite of his carefully cultivated eccentricities, rather than because of him. I'm with kat and Storm Saxon on this one.
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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posted
MS: That could be true. But it needs to be okay with both parties.
It's like the difference between mocked by a stranger doing it for kicks and being teased by a friend. However, there is the added factor of the power imbalance. The teacher has more power in the situation, and that brings a greater responsibility.
The teacher had better be very sure of their relationship with the student, and they need to be able to recognize and stop when it clearly isn't working.
--
For the real world argument, I don't think so. There's no danger of the real world not appearing, and it's better to have a sturdy, personal foundation with which to confront it.
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