The School Teacher

Morton’s Point School
March 29th 1923
Granddad is the teacher in the rear

My Grandfather’s was a school teacher during the one-room school era.

Granddad would sometimes tell stories of his life as a country teacher. The teacher would be hired by the school board year by year. Ladies were only employed as long as they remained single. The job entailed much more than teaching the students. Cleaning the school, splitting firewood, firing the stove before and after school along with disciplining the students was all a part of this demanding job.


The teacher would be roomed near the school. The school board would provide these accommodations by contracting with a nearby family to provide a room and meals for the duration of the school term. It was common for teachers to only serve one or two years at a particular school before being moved on to another location.


I recall hearing Granddad reciting poems he used while teaching his students. Poems such as, Thirty days has November………., Red sky at night, sailors delight, red sky in morning sailors take warning, were used to teach useful lessons to his hardscrabble country students.

Needmore Normal School
1918
Granddad has a small asterisk above his head

Becoming certified as a teacher was considerable different in those days. Following completion of the eighth grade the prospective teacher attended Normal School for the summer. Following this course they were then qualified to teach. They were also required to attend Normal School each summer during their teaching career. Granddad first attended Normal School at a local one room school and near the end of his teaching he attended State Normal School at what is now Shippensburg University.

Granddad left the teaching profession in the summer of 1927 to take up farming. With a wife and a new son it was time for him to settle down to live in one place with his family. Little did he know that teaching was about to undergo a revolution that would make combining family and teaching much easier.