...a One-room Schoolhouse Teacher Margaret Sloan

It was with some trepidation that I opened the door to the one room schoolhouse on my first day as a teacher in 1943. I was only 18, a few years older than my eighth grade students. And there were basic things I was worried about-like how to keep the children warm and how to bank the fire in the pot-bellied stove overnight.

But I hadn't thought to worry about what actually faced me that first day. When I opened the door to the school, Center #5 in Salt Creek Township, Davis County, Iowa, I disturbed a nest of hornets. They showed me in no uncertain terms that they did not like my presence one bit. By 4 p.m. that day, my eyes were almost swollen shut. I went home exhausted and was in bed by 4:30 p.m.

With time I grew more comfortable in my new position. It was a nice change from helping out on my parents' farm, though I still had to do chores at school. On winter mornings, I filled a coal bucket and got the fire going in the stove in the back of the room using corncobs soaked in kerosene if the fire had gone out during the night. I can still smell the wet mittens drying on the stove. Then I'd fill the water bucket with drinking water for the day from the old iron well pump out back and place it on its special shelf in the back of the room. Finally, I'd write assignments, quotes, or poems on the chalkboard.

One of my early concerns had been discipline. I'd heard that the students of a previous teacher had given her such a bad time that she quit before the school year was over. Luckily, most of the problems I dealt with were minor, such as whispering, teasing, and star gazing instead of paying attention. I tried to be creative in my discipline so that no one could predict how they would be punished and decide that it wasn't worth it.

I taught 18 students in all eight grades. There were five beginners, one first grader, two second graders, one fourth grader, four fifth graders, two sixth graders, one seventh grader, and two in eighth grade.

We started each day by saying the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag-one of our few pieces of decoration, along with a map above the chalkboard and portraits of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln.

The county superintendent of schools gave all the rural schoolteachers a schedule identifying how many minutes per week we were to spend on each subject. Reading and arithmetic were taught every day for the early grades. The later grades focused mainly on history, geography, literature, and arithmetic. Once a week I taught penmanship, health, science, music, and physical education to all of the students as a group. We also had weekly spelling tests and an occasional spell down on a Friday afternoon.

One of my favorite things about teaching in a one-room school with so few students was the flexibility. On a nice spring day, the whole school could go into the woods that bordered the school to see wildflowers. On a winter day, I could extend the recess period to play Fox and Geese in the new snow. From time to time we challenged a neighboring school to a game of softball.

Our school day ended at 4 PM. After the students left, I would bank the fire in the stove and sweep the floor where that sticky clay mud typical of southeast Iowa had been tracked in on the children's boots.

Despite being responsible for 18 students while I was still a teenager, I enjoyed the job. In the end, it was more like a family than a school.

Margaret Sloan (BA '55, MA ' 61) taught at the one-room school for one year before she decided that teaching in town "might be more fun." In her hometown of Eldon she taught third grade two years and a year at fourth grade. She then moved to Ottumwa, where she taught sixth grade one year and third grade for four. During these years she attended classes and took correspondence courses at several area colleges finally earning a B.A. degree in education.

Then adventure called and she spent three years teaching for the United States Air Force Dependents Schools in Japan and England and conducted a Reading Workshop in Germany one summer.

After earning her master's degree, she spent two years as a junior-senior high school reading teacher and two years as a K-12 reading consultant in the Winona, Minn., schools before moving to Rochester where she then served as a K-12 reading consultant for 20 years.

In 1971 she finished her doctorate in education at the State University of New York in Buffalo. In 1982 she accepted a position as assistant professor in education at Eastern New Mexico University in Portales, N.M., where she taught six years.

After a teaching career of 42 years, Sloan retired and is now living in Rochester, Minn.