BOOKS
Teacher Man Can: An Interview with Frank McCourt
By Pat Olsen
After a six-year-hiatus, Pulitzer Prize-winner Frank McCourt has a new book out. Teacher Man is the third in his memoir series that began with Angela’s Ashes (1996), which chronicled his poor childhood and harsh living conditions in Ireland and the United States. In ’Tis (1999), McCourt revealed his trials attempting to make a living upon his return to the U.S. at age 18, and his foray into teaching at age 27. The latest book delves into his 30-year teaching career and generously dispenses his hard-won wisdom. McCourt may have retired from the classroom, but he has a lot to say to those still teaching.
P.O.: Did your education courses prepare you for teaching?
F. McC.: Not at all. Those courses were taught by professors who didn’t know anything about teaching in high schools. The teachers had great theories, which had nothing to do with problems in the classroom – defiance, hostility, sex, love, yearning, and so on. Maybe the courses laid the foundation for a philosophy of education, but there was nothing practical.
In the book you show such knowledge of psychology. To what do you attribute that?
Coming from Ireland, where any form of self-exploration was discouraged by the Catholic Church, I really knew nothing when I started teaching. I began to learn about the human heart from the kids, and also about myself. If I hadn’t gone into the classroom, I would have died ignorant. I believe that.
Can teachers learn from kids today?
Sure. The teacher today who goes into the classroom thinking he knows it all doesn’t know anything. You have to be open. I didn’t realize I was learning when I was teaching, but I was.
How are teachers supposed to compete today with things like instant messaging and the like?
Now you’re asking the big question. That’s the hardest part of teaching today. Cell phones in the classroom, the plagiarism that computers allow, pornography on the Internet … Kids can lift whole term papers. And the family has changed since I started teaching. Most women have to work today, and unless the kids are in a special [public] school like Stuyvesant, a lot of parents want to send them to private school. Some parents work two and three jobs to do it.
So what’s the answer?
The communities can decide to reward their teachers – pay them more – but are not going to do that, because the communities are controlled by politicians. The middle class has to take back the schools, demand standards, and demand to participate. Middle-class parents can get together and reclaim the schools. It’s been done in some areas. Stuyvesant and Bronx High School of Science in New York City never had a problem. [Stuyvesant is a top New York City high school where McCourt taught; students gain admittance through a competitive exam.]
It happened after World War II. But then drugs decimated the schools and the middle class fled to private schools and to the suburbs. Kids get a better education in public school anyway. They’re exposed to a variety of [fellow] students.
What is the teacher’s role in this grassroots effort?
Teachers are also deprived of power by the politicians. But they, too, have to have a fighting attitude and more respect for themselves. Teachers are on the lowest rung on the professional ladder. They’re too often regarded as people who failed in other areas. When was the last time you saw a teacher on a TV talk show? You see movie stars, athletes, politicians ... never a teacher.
Do you think teachers are better prepared today than you were?
Not unless education professors are getting into the bigger problems of computer use and cheating and all of that. The only answer is for a complete ban on anything technical in the high-school classroom. Students have cell phones for emergencies, but if I were a teacher now, I’d go out of my mind if a cell phone rang while I was trying to give a brilliant lecture.
What were your keys to success in teaching?
I didn’t analyze everything. We didn’t look for the “deeper meaning” in what we read. We discussed things. I would tell [today’s] teachers to use children’s literature — use what students remember from their childhood — Mother Goose rhymes. Use [references from] Saturday-morning cartoons. I would also encourage teachers to sing more.
You’ve said you had a problem with assigning grades. Why?
There are always circumstances in people’s lives. Some of these kids were tormented by their family situations. You have to take these circumstances into consideration. I eventually let kids assign their own grades or grade each other, which was an extraordinary experiment. They were always within five points of what I would have given them.
We discussed how grading was all about what someone knows, and at the end of the term I’d ask: “What is it that you know now that you didn’t know at the beginning?” I think this is just as valuable as studying a subject. How do we arrive at a judgment?
An anecdote in the book tells about how you had your students write outlandish – fun – excuse notes as a writing exercise. How else did you capture their interest?
I used food a lot. I was always hungry. I’d have vocabulary lessons where we listed all kinds of dishes on the board, from all different countries. Their mouths watered; it livened things up. They also learned that English is a living thing that keeps changing instead of just hearing rules, rules, rules.
You say in Teacher Man that you were only planning to stay at Stuyvesant for two years, but you stayed much longer.. Why?
The more I got into it, the more I was challenged and the more I enjoyed it. I wasn’t able to think about it abstractly at the time, but I knew that what I was doing was worthwhile.
At 75, you call yourself a “late bloomer” when it comes to your writing career. How do you stay vital?
I lead writing workshops. I do it for selfish reasons. I’m also planning a new project, a novel. But my overall strategy is simple: Find what you love to do and do it.
