Devonne Brown

The state took over our school and taught me how to teach the way they wanted me to. They didn’t demand I command a hundred seat auditorium, they were more concerned that I orchestrate three classes in one classroom. They noticed I had leadership skills. They didn’t say        whether they were good or bad, they just took note that they were pretty darned evident. 

They noticed that I could pass out spare iPads quickly, write bathroom passes without losing my mind, and teach a lesson in analyzing a poem’s main idea to a small group of students on both the iPad and verbally. The students in my group were reactive and receptive to the questions of strangers. 

So now, in my forty-some years of teaching, besides writing hall passes,  this is what I have done. I have performed in front of thousands, all at once and in clusters, taught the classical literature of Shakespeare and Dante in a classroom of thirty-five students without enough chairs on two different continents. Taught students how to produce a play completely without me come opening night. Let the actors solve their own problems and teach the audience to believe in their characters.

I’ve taught criminals in two alternative schools in two different states. I have no delusions about the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of my work there. Reality is that they grew up to be mostly unsuccessful and a right many of them went to jail as they should have. Some escaped their fates and found fortune and some died. Some died in jail. Which was also right. 

Now that the state has taught me to teach the way they want me to teach, I think the world will be a better place.