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Students Learn At The Feet Of Teach-In Master

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By Daniel Ruth / The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 20, 2007

From time to time, a Hillsborough County school educator will extend a gracious invitation to participate in the Great American Teach-In, perhaps with the intention to expose the young students to a real, honest-to-goodness old coot.

While flattered, I'm always tempted to decline these moments for I know in my heart of hearts that what I have to offer the kiddos is like showing up on the Food Network to demonstrate how to butter a piece of toast.

But I am an idiot and a glutton for humiliation, so when Kathi Bateham, who teaches fourth-grade language arts at Lake Magdalene Elementary School, asked me to speak to her class, without thinking of all the pitfalls that awaited, I said sure.

For someone who has spent 35 years hunched over a keyboard, it is a bit of a challenge to inspire fourth-graders to yearn for a life of nouns and verbs and dashes, although I will admit I do have a thing for - dashes.

Pretty scintillating, huh?
Fatal Earlobes

Over the years that I've participated in these teach-ins, I always promise myself this will be the last time, and for good reason. Here's why.

As I strolled across the Lake Magdalene campus on my way to Bateham's classroom I passed a Hillsborough County sheriff's deputy allowing the excited little dickens to climb all over his gleaming motorcycle.

Elsewhere, some Tampa police officers were giving tours of their heavily weaponized squad car.

Also on hand was a unit from the Tampa fire department, complete with the huuuuuuge truck, the siren, the hoses and the nifty axes.

I would not have been surprised if U.S. Central Command had sent over some Special Ops types to demonstrate how to kill someone with their earlobe.

How do you compete with that?

How do you make a lifetime spent annoying people with impertinent questions more interesting or glamorous than running into burning buildings, or chasing down bad guys, or killing people with your spleen?
Recoil In Horror

What was I going to show to impress these young minds? Hey, kids, wanna see a pica ruler? Fun, fun, fun.

If this wasn't daunting enough, the dirty little secret of my life is that I don't do children well, having something to do with the fact, I think, that they all hate me.

For some reason, most children recoil in horror around me - and those are just my nieces and nephews.

So as Bateham welcomed me to her class, I had a momentary fear the children would make a run for it, perhaps to the class where an accountant was explaining the intangible tax.

Still, Bateham's engaged, attentive, well-mannered charges turned out to be a pleasant surprise, asking probing questions about newspapers and journalism. Hardly anyone reverted to a fetal position.

One of the students asked if I had ever interviewed anyone famous, and it dawned on me there was absolutely no celebrity I had ever met who they would know. I was tempted to mention Henry Fonda, but I didn't want to run the risk of the tots rushing for the door.

By then the class was over, too late for me to tell the children how to kill someone with a dangling participle. Perhaps next time.

Keyword: Book of Ruth, to read and comment on Daniel Ruth's new blog.

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