Elly Has the Same Attention Span She Did in First Grade
Defying the promise of straight reprints comes the first new-run on the very first day of the second year of new-runs in For Better or For Worse. Elly and Michael are in attendance at Michael’s “First Grade” orientation. Wait a minute! Isn’t it called “Grade 1” in Canada?
In any case, we get an indirect introduction to the Story of Shelagh Campbell, who had the misfortune of having Michael Patterson as a student in her first year of teaching school. Despite this experience, Shelagh Campbell continued to work as a school teacher.
Lynn Johnston, on the other hand, is running in full silhouette mode, not even drawing in a picture of Connie and Lawrence Poirier in the background. By Panel 3, even Michael has gone to silhouette and disappears in Panel 4.
Elly spends the strip busy remarking how everything is the same in school since she went to school. I remember my own school experience with my kids. When we went to the kindergarten orientation, I realized that my kids were being taught things in kindergarten that I had been taught in First Grade. I guess Elly must have missed that orientation, given that Michael skipped straight from preschool to Grade 1. Looking around the classroom for my kids, I remember seeing things like the computer lab setup, the DVD projector, the white marker boards and the terrarium and thinking, “Wow! Things are lot more advanced than they were when I was in school.” Elly says the smell is the same, but that was not the case for me. In my day, the smell of chalk and chalk boards was commonplace. My kids have never seen a chalkboard in a schoolroom, except in the movies. So, once again, Lynn Johnston is going for a commonplace experience with the parents who read her strip, and it does not even come close for me.
In any case, we get an indirect introduction to the Story of Shelagh Campbell, who had the misfortune of having Michael Patterson as a student in her first year of teaching school. Despite this experience, Shelagh Campbell continued to work as a school teacher.
Lynn Johnston, on the other hand, is running in full silhouette mode, not even drawing in a picture of Connie and Lawrence Poirier in the background. By Panel 3, even Michael has gone to silhouette and disappears in Panel 4.
Elly spends the strip busy remarking how everything is the same in school since she went to school. I remember my own school experience with my kids. When we went to the kindergarten orientation, I realized that my kids were being taught things in kindergarten that I had been taught in First Grade. I guess Elly must have missed that orientation, given that Michael skipped straight from preschool to Grade 1. Looking around the classroom for my kids, I remember seeing things like the computer lab setup, the DVD projector, the white marker boards and the terrarium and thinking, “Wow! Things are lot more advanced than they were when I was in school.” Elly says the smell is the same, but that was not the case for me. In my day, the smell of chalk and chalk boards was commonplace. My kids have never seen a chalkboard in a schoolroom, except in the movies. So, once again, Lynn Johnston is going for a commonplace experience with the parents who read her strip, and it does not even come close for me.
posted by howard at 11:27 PM
4 Comments:
Your post could just as easily been titled "Lynn hasn't set foot in a school for a long, long time"; that's because I don't think that Lynn hasn't actually set foot in a classroon of any sort since Kate graduated from High School which means that she doesn't know how much things have changed since she was growing up stupid under the Red Ensign.
Why is the school such a revelation to Elly? Did Michael attend preschindergarten in a bunker down by the river?
So, once again, Lynn Johnston is going for a commonplace experience with the parents who read her strip, and it does not even come close for me.
Because actually entering a school to see what a grade-one classroom is like now would be RESEARCH and Lynn has banned research from her life. Bleah.
As an aside, what school has orientation for first grade/grade one? My kid starts first grade next week, and there's no orientation.
DreadedCandiru2,
she doesn't know how much things have changed since she was growing up stupid under the Red Ensign.
Very true. Interestingly enough, this is a theme with Lynn. When Michael and Deanna returned to Milborough, Deanna went on about how Merrie and Robin were going to get to grow up in all the same places Mike did, including his old school. There was never a sense of understanding that things might have changed in Milborough since Mike was in school. When I went to my high school reunion and talked to the people who stayed there and whose children go to the same school that they did, we both have an understanding that the school is the same in name only. In the decades that have passed since then, new buildings and facilities have been built. Why such a thing never occurs to Lynn, I can only guess. Maybe no one updates school buildings in Corbeil.
aprilp_katje
Why is the school such a revelation to Elly? Did Michael attend preschindergarten in a bunker down by the river?
LOL
As an aside, what school has orientation for first grade/grade one? My kid starts first grade next week, and there's no orientation.
Where my daughter goes to school, they did not have an orientation. However, after the first week of school they had an open house for all the grades, where the parents get to meet each of their children’s teachers. There was an orientation for all new students to the school before school started.
There was also an open house for all grades in my son’s high school in the second week of school. However, there were 2 separate orientations for incoming freshman, one for the parents and one where the students were walked around the campus with their class schedule, so they could find out where all their classes were.
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