~with the hope of making her proud~

Bette Harris was my fourth grade teacher back home in Haven, Kansas.  She was a pretty woman of slender build with impeccable appearance each and every day.  Her hair was always neatly coiffed, lipstick applied just right, and cologne dabbed on before she walked out the door as she headed to school.  Her fingernails, long before the days of fake sets of nails, were always painted with a beautiful shade of bright red.  We kids never saw her dressed in pants or jeans for back in those days, teachers wore dresses and skirts to school.  I'm still amazed that she wore those pumps with about a 2-inch heel every school day.  She never let on that her feet hurt, but I'm sure they must have.  Come to think of it, she never let on that she took a bathroom break either because she was hardly ever out of our sight.

She was a great woman and a tough act to follow.

I think of Mrs. Harris every so often, especially when I'm at school and faced with a busy and challenging day.  There were 18 of us kids and with little help from anyone else, she managed to keep us together as she prepared us to go on to 5th grade as well as for the most important of lessons she wanted us to learn, those of life.

The 4th grade class of Haven Grade School, 1964-65

The little girl in the blue dress standing next to her teacher is me.

Bette Harris was kind and loving, yet she could also be strict as the need arose.  She was a smart woman who had been teaching for a very long time, and she knew when kids were up to something.  Not too much got by her.  I can still hear her voice as she called me up to her desk to let me know that I'd be retaking the geography test from the Weekly Reader once again tomorrow, and she meant it too.  I was admonished to read the lesson more carefully the next time.  She was sure that I could do better and usually I did.

As the years have gone by, school has changed so much.  In the time of Bette Harris, there was no technology to utilize in the teaching of children.  She didn't pull her smart phone from her purse to see who the 29th president of the United States was or to answer an email.  Bette gathered what information she needed from the set of encyclopedias on the shelf of our classroom and wrote letters to correspond with friends and family.  Her classroom grades and lesson plans were recorded neatly into a plan book, not typed into an online computer program.  No teacher's aide walked through the doors to help her manage us, especially those who might have been having difficulty with math or reading. 

She did it all alone and never complained.

Mrs. Harris believed in getting involved in the lives of children.  She wasn't one bit afraid of sending a note home when we had done something wrong or calling our parents when something happened at school that she knew they would not approve of or be happy about.  At the same time, she praised us daily for things we had done, even the simplest of them.  At noon recess, she often times took part in what we were doing instead of merely standing back and watching us.  I learned to play kickball that year with Mrs. Harris doing the pitching of the ball.  She was good at it and enjoyed getting us out from time to time.

I'm now 63-years old and it has been many years since I was in her classroom.  The little 9-year old that I used to be has kept the memories of that 4th grade year tucked tightly into my heart.  Bette has been gone for such a long while, but the influence she had upon the quiet little girl that I used to be now carries on in the classrooms I have had for so very many years.  In my own way, I believe I've tried to emulate bits and pieces of her teaching style as I have grown into the educator that I now have become.  Perhaps she might have had an idea back then that one day a little girl named Peggy Scott might become a teacher of children herself one day in the future.  

And if she did, I hope I have made her proud.