This episode shows how much teaching has changed over the years.
An older spinster teacher who has created a class called Preparation for Marriage every day teaches her class reading aloud from her well crafted lesson plans. She doesn't engage her students in conversation until a substitute teacher shows her how active her students can be in class when they are allowed to be actively involved with the discussion.
When the principal gets involved since the students have organized a petition to have the original teacher replaced, the principal asks the substitute who is the school's guidance counselor (who really would never have been asked to substitute a class) "What did you do to her class yesterday? Read them Valley of the Dolls?" This made me laugh since Jacqueline Suzanne's novel was a ground-breaker in many ways, and it is still read, even if it is no longer shocking and influential.
In the end, the teacher begins to see that she can still teach the course she created, but now realizes that she must allow her students to be able to become part of the class as active not passive participants.
An older spinster teacher who has created a class called Preparation for Marriage every day teaches her class reading aloud from her well crafted lesson plans. She doesn't engage her students in conversation until a substitute teacher shows her how active her students can be in class when they are allowed to be actively involved with the discussion.
When the principal gets involved since the students have organized a petition to have the original teacher replaced, the principal asks the substitute who is the school's guidance counselor (who really would never have been asked to substitute a class) "What did you do to her class yesterday? Read them Valley of the Dolls?" This made me laugh since Jacqueline Suzanne's novel was a ground-breaker in many ways, and it is still read, even if it is no longer shocking and influential.
In the end, the teacher begins to see that she can still teach the course she created, but now realizes that she must allow her students to be able to become part of the class as active not passive participants.