Fifth Grade

Recently, when I was looking through a particular photo album, I came across my Grade five class photo, counting the students and testing my memory skills on the names of my classmates. I remember about one third by name, but I can’t imagine teaching a class of thirty-five ten/eleven-year-olds! Have you found me? There is one girl between myself and Mrs. Antenbring.

Some special memories come back of that year, mainly because it was my first real class in Canada after spending part of a year in a New Canadian class. At the moment, it's a year worth reminiscing on as I observe my granddaughter, who is turning ten this year, adjust to school in Canada.

My Grade five homeroom class was in the school library, the librarian teaching us language arts. Instead of sitting at school desks, we sat in groups around large tables. I remember a form of weekly musical chairs around these tables, as we got seated according to how well  we did on our language exercises. It was not done in a derogatory kind of way, but rather to motivate us to aspire to a higher table for the following week.

A book we studied was The Secret Garden. I was somewhat confused by what was reality and what was imaginative, but plodded through it. I remember Mrs. Antenbring taking time to point out books to me that I might like, knowing that this would help me in my language skills. She introduced me to the Little House on the Prairie series and then to mystery books, which I really liked.

One girl in particular stands out, partly because she tried to be my friend. She was always dressed very well and she was a confident type of girl. One day she came to school wearing baggy pants that she called elephant pants. I wonder if pants were not the norm. I am surprised to see all of the girls are wearing dresses. Was it because it was picture day?

Another memory that I have of this school year, is how I got caught playing hide and go seek in the bathroom at recess, or was it lunchtime? To this day I do not know if I actually played or just watched, but I was in the bathroom when a toilet tank cover broke and every girl who was at the scene got sent to the principal’s office. I had to hold up the palms of my hands and get the strap. Not only did my hands sting like fire, but there was the added humiliation of coming late to the next class. A couple of the boys on that photo came to my locker after class. Did we have lockers? Maybe so, because our classroom (the library) was used by the whole school. Anyways, they wanted to know all about the strap. I felt quite flattered by their sympathy and inquisitiveness. Cute boys.

And that was Grade Five at Charles Dickens Elementary in Vancouver.