Blumenhof High School - Blue and Gold Yearbook (Blumenort, Manitoba Canada)

Page 13 text:

Teacher’s Report ROOM II SOUND From a few minutes before nine until a few minutes after four, the school day is filled with sound. There are the sounds of a car driving up to the door, feet crunching on the gravel, doors opening and closing, happy laughter and talking, and then a cheerful “Good morning”. Soon comes the sound of the school bell rung by the principal. After “O Canada”, sounds float through the classroom that the teacher, students, and visitors will certainly remember after all else has been forgotten. Who will ever forget the students of Room Two singing song number 85 from the Spiritual Life Songs, “Marvelous grace of our loving Lord”, or number 129, “The Twenty-Third Psalm”, or number 98, or 91 or 13 or a dozen others. Following this refreshing singing period is the usual Bible reading and prayer. Arithmetic produces its typical sounds. There is the sound of chalk writing on the blackboard, with an occasional eery screech coming from a piece of chalk that is being- held at the wrong angle, intentionally or otherwise. If thinking could be heard, there would be quite a bit of sound emanating from some corners of the room where the thought machinery is going at a great speed. On the other hand, in other corners there might be a deathly silence. Take out your Health texts! There is the sound of books, slamming shut, being put into desks and others taken out. The teach¬ er discusses certain aspects of the problem; the pupils answer questions, or help in the discussion, or ask questions themselves, questions which may or may not apply to the subject under consideration. W. K. Schellenberg Recess is the time of greatest sound, in quantity at least, even if not in quality. Recess is also the happy time. Some pupils would like nothing better than a system of education that would allow a school day composed of nothing but recesses. Others again get just as much enjoyment out of the periods between the recesses. After recess readers are taken out. The students love to read aloud. Some read quietly, others loudly; some read with ex¬ pression, others in dull tones; some read fluently, others stumble along. What’s this I hear? Here’s someone who has taken advantage of the teacher’s back being turned and who has been playing instead of working. Here’s a sound that does not belong. We’ll have to see someone inside at recess time, perhaps after four as well! And so it goes through the whole day. The final period of the school day is either German or Bible. German, while not ex¬ actly a foreign language, has many sounds that are foreign to ears unaccustomed to it. Bible is the subject that could produce the most beautiful sound in the world — the sound of a soul praising God. Certain¬ ly the school has missed its mark if the student has not been made aware of our even-present, all-powerful, loving Creator, who made us and has a claim on us. W. K. Schellenberg. 9

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Gerry B. Doerksen From The Principal’s Desk The word “one” seems to have lost much of its value and prestige in our modern world. Weekend fata 1 ities are counted by “hundreds”, a certain number of “thou¬ sands” of immigrants are allowed to enter the country per year; people’s possessions are frequently counted by “mil’ions”; while the human body is said to be composed of approximately “so many billions” of cells. Certain of the political leaders of today seem to look at the people in their coun¬ tries and see only a “mass”. Is that the correct evaluation of humanity ? A stranger, when seeing the number of students in our school would certainly feel that we were only a very small “mass”. He might see that the enrolment in our high school is “only fifteen”. I have not found it to be so. I have found that this “little mass” is composed of individuals, individu¬ als who are facing a single whole life as their very own, individuals who are or will be personally making decisions about their eternal destiny and even the destiny of others, individuals who have decided to face our modem civilization with an education that will help them to be successful. May I give you graduates and students this challenge. Think of minutes as single units which you may spend at your Mas¬ ter’s bidding. Think of work as made up of individual pleasures so that you may do it lovingly and with joy. Think of people around you as individual hearts that are longing for at least one cheerful word or one act of kindness from you to make their pathway through life more pleasant. Think of your life as one life that shall be totally surrendered to God. Then, I am confident, the One “who seeth not as man seeth” will give a smile of approval upon your life — one life that will be really worthwhile. Gerry B. Doerksen 8

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Miss Elvira Schroeder What is a typical day in the Blumenhof Primary room ? Maybe you would come along with me into the classroom during a typical day. Remember, this is not Parent’s Day, so you must remain hidden; for which child can act like a typical child with its parents watching? We start, like other mornings, with Devotions. Pupils listen attentively to the Scripture passage and help heartily with the singing of choruses. After the opening exercises we get down to work. Reading and Arithmetic come first in our work schedule. After everybody finds their books and pencils everything goes smoothly. The Grade threes, who are doing arithmetic need some help with their prob¬ lems, and then comes oral reading with the grade ones and twos. After the twenty- two pupils have read their stories they do their reading workbook at their desks. When this is finished we watch the stu¬ dents as they drill their arithmetic facts and reading words. Now comes recess. Everybody outside. Visitors, you may remain in the classroom to see the pupils work. You will see neat work, sloppy work, many mistakes. Teacher’s Report ROOM i After recess the pupils come back to work. Again we have reading and arithmetic. This time the grade ones and twos learn their numbers while grade threes review their reading skills. After dinner school begins again. My! the boy who could not find his pencil this morning has lost it again and another’s writing scribbler has disappeared. Oh well, after a few minutes everything is straigh¬ tened out again and everybody is working. The writing period which we have right after dinner is followed by spelling. Here everybody strives for perfection so as to get their names on the board. After this we have a languag e period. The correcting of many language errors along with many efforts to write and express ourselves have filled the many minutes of Language peri¬ ods with work. Now comes recess. Let’s go along with the pupils to the football field. We have two fairly even sides. Everybody is helping — or wait a minute — some of the girls seem to think this is talking period. After a time the bell rings again. Today is Mon¬ day, so we’ll have singing. How we all sing! Then comes our last period, our Bible story. Everybody listens very quietly. Even our class wrigglers sit still, enjoying the stories. Finally it is four o’clock. Everyone is eager to get home as fast as possible. So ends a typical school day. A day in which children — quite well-behaved, are eager to learn as much as they can. Elvira Schroeder. 10