Let me tell you about the greatest teacher I ever had. He wasn’t great like in a Mr. Holland’s Opus or Lean On Me type of way, but nonetheless, he was great. I took four years of German in high school, and from that first day on, I knew he was different. As a freshman, we had no desks in German I. The chairs were lined in a circle along the four walls of the room. Mr. Englyng would simply converse with us, but mostly at us the whole period, completely in German. We would talk about nothing in particular, but on most days Mr. Englyng would just talk. He would talk about his life, his wife, his problems, and things that ticked him off. Very early on, we learned to conspire against him. All the kids realized that the more questions you asked him, the more he would talk, which meant less work. Not that we had very much work to begin with. Maybe once a week or every couple of weeks Mr. Englyng would hand out homework, or a test, or a handout to complete, and usually when he wanted to spend the hour on the phone talking to his wife. But, as kids will, we learned and we learned well. We learned to distract him not only with our questions, but good questions. Questions that required a lot of detail in answering. It was beautiful. We’d take turns asking him questions and as soon as we did, we’d turn to each other and laugh. Mr. Englyng would be off on a long-winded tangeant, explaining away his life philosophies. I remember for about a week or two, every single day, Mr. Englyng would complain to us about how he was not allowed to go to the damn park up the street, during his lunch hour, and have one damn beer. “Un kleine bier!” he would yell. I was and still am of the opinion that he had been caught drinking at lunch.
A couple months into the first year, I remember walking into German I to see Mr. Englyng looking very dour. He told everyone to take a seat and the tone in his voice was very unfamiliar. He was being serious. We all took our seats and he dimmed the lights. He explained to us, in English, that it was report card time and he was very disturbed by everyone’s grades. He projected his computer screen onto the board so we could all see, and he began to go through each student’s current class percentage. The first kid had all zero’s, followed by a zero-point-zero-zero average, followed by an “F.” Everyone sat quiet, a bit nervous. The next kid had the same: zero’s all the way down, followed by an “F.” Virtually no one had ever turned in any work. After about three or four students’ identical statistics, the class began giggling at the results. After a few more, the class began to clap. One student after another, zero-point-zero-zero, followed by an F. The class began to cheer. Every student who came up pure zero’s and an F average got a classroom full of cheers. Anyone with anything other than a zero got booed. My name came up: zero-point-zero-zero. F. The class erupted. I erupted. It was probably the single greatest memory I have of high school. We were all united. Mr. Englyng said nothing. I remember leaving class in the greatest mood ever, but knowing in the back of my mind that my parents were going to kill me for having an F.
I staked out the mail for the next few days, knowing my report card would have a big, black F. I remember it finally arriving and me snatching into my shirt like professional shoplifter. “Here’s the mail,” I announced to my parents, only offering whatever else there was. I remember going up to my room, pulling out my report card, and opening it. I looked at my grades. It read, German I: A.
Mr. Englyng had given us all A’s. It would’ve looked just as bad on him as it did on us if virtually his entire class was failing. After that, Mr. Englyng got wise to our methods. He still spoke to us in German, but he never really took any questions. He stepped up the workload, but nothing near any of our other classes. Every now and then, he’d revert back to his old self and do away with his day’s lesson to vent to us, in German, about his son pissing him off.
There’s another memory and reason I loved Mr. Englyng. I remember my senior year and German IV. I remember his methods had not changed too much, and the class being very small due to his “advanced” German-language expectations. I remember I had a friend who was a teacher’s assistant during the same period, and him always telling me that all he did was sit in the hall the whole period, occassionally running errands for his teacher. I remember one day I decided to accompany him. I ditched German IV and sat with him in the hall the whole hour. It was an enjoyable experience for me. It was so enjoyable, I remember I did it the next day again. As a matter of fact, I enjoyed it so much I ditched German IV for somewhere between 17 to 19 consecutive days, if my memory serves me correctly. I had a friend in that class for four years, Joe Silvoso, and I remember on my last day of ditching him telling me I needed to come back, that Mr. Englyng had asked, “has anyone seen Charles?”
I remember returning on a Wednesday. Nothing seemed any different and Mr. Englyng seemed mentally preoccupied with his own ordeals, as usual. One thing was different though, because early in the period he began taking roll. I forgot to mention Mr. Englyng virtually never took roll until the office would call his room and say he hadn’t turned in any roll sheets for weeks. He began taking roll this day and when he got to my name I answered, “here.” He stopped and looked up at me.
“Where were you yesterday?” he asked, very seriously.
“I… I was here, wasn’t I?” I responded.
“No, you weren’t. Do you have a note?”
I shook my head.
“That’s an unexcused absence,” he said, marking it in his roll book.
He looked up at me again. “Where were you Monday?”
“I… I think I was here, wasn’t I?” I responded.
“No, you weren’t,” he responded again, “do you have a note?”
I shook my head again.
“That’s two unexcused absences. Where were you Friday?”
“I think I was here on Friday, wasn’t I?” I said.
“Were you?” Mr. Englyng asked, innocently.
“I think so.”
“Okay, well that’s two unexcused absences you’ll have to talk to the people in the office about.”
There was a very subtle groan among everyone in the class, followed by murmurs of “oh my God.” Everyone heard it but Mr. Englyng. I remember Joe turning to me and whispering, “you are the luckiest S.O.B. in the world.” I laughed and agreed. I never got called into the office to have to explain anything.
Mr. Englyng wasn’t all absent-mindedness. I remember he took the class on a field trip to watch a German play in Hollywood one night. It was a memorable experience for me because I was like, 14, and had never been anywhere. He would show us very avant-garde German movies that disturbed me for years. I still remember scenes from some of them. He was a very colorful teacher and had lots of personality. He was a self-proclaimed beer-lover and had the protruding belly to prove it. He would make inappropriate jokes without hesitation and I remember one year one of his sons was even in our class. He would yell and argue with him during class as if they were at home. In English.
After four years of this, why do I consider Mr. Englyng my greatest teacher? Because somehow, some way, Ich kannst Deutsche gesprachen, aber nicht so gut. Somehow, I can speak enough German to get by. I don’t know how, I don’t know why, but somehow Mr. Englyng had taught me to speak German. I wasn’t trying to, I didn’t realize I was learning, and I don’t even know if it was his intent, but it turns out I did.