After retiring, as many of you know, I began to substitute teach in middle and high school within the school district I now live. Once again, I'm working. Only now as much as I want and absolutely loving every minute of it. The pay is minimal but adequate; however, the daily rewards more than compensate. I have people ask me all the time why I love substitute teaching, especially in middle and high schools. Well, yesterday was a great example. Let me share just one day with you, and I think you will then understand why.

Yesterday, I substituted in orchestra. We had 25 minute classes which did not give a class of middle school strings time to set up and tune. The time constraint was due to no fault of the regular teacher but solely to an altered schedule and a short school week. So instead of doing nothing, the "Theo Smith" came out in me and I decided to teach them all the flats and sharps and how to determine the major key signatures they were playing in.

I then simply taught them all the flats in order, BEADGCF, and them simply showed them that the sharps were simply the same in reverse order, FCGDAEB (yes, I do know there are acrostics for remembering both, but I have always thought this was easier, and yes there are other methods of teaching this but I only had 25 minutes). I then told them that the two key signatures they would have to remember was the one with no sharps or flats = C Major and the one with only one flat = F Major. Following this I taught them how to determine all the major key signatures, regardless of the number of flats or sharps shown in the key signature.

With class participation, this took about 20 minutes of class. When I finished, I returned to the teacher's desk and realized that many of them had left their chairs and begun to write on the whiteboard. I asked what they were doing, telling them that their teacher might disapprove of them writing on her whiteboard. When I stood and realized what they were writing they simultaneously began to say, "Mr. Smith, you're the coolest sub we have ever had. That stuff is really neat." Although far from being true, I was humbled to the point of being able to say nothing but, "Thanks!", yet, at the same time, I had never been more prouder.

I allowed them to finish writing on the whiteboard. When the bell rang and they had all left, I made a point to read all of their comments, one by one. Then, with a tear in my eye and an extended chest bursting with pride, I erased them all from the whiteboard. After all, I didn't want to take any chance of hurting this teacher's feeling, for this particular teacher is an excellent teacher and just a super person. Just proves that kid's minds are ever more super absorbent sponges just begging for some knowledge spilled for them to soak up. Next time I have 25 minutes, I think I'm going to tell them about all the relative minors.

YEAP! THIS IS EXACTLY WHY I LOVE DOING WHAT I AM DOING! DAYS LIKE THIS! IT WAS A VERY HUMBLING DAY INDEED!