The Lansdowne Letters: A Narking Situation

The day after Mr. Foss, Dad's boss, spent the day
observing him in his one-room northern classroom,
my father solved an ongoing and perplexing problem
causing contention between his Indian students and him.

It doesn't matter where or when someone teaches,
puzzling situations are bound to arise
if the students must learn a new language
to function socially and academically in the classroom. 




On Wednesday, January 11, 1961 
My father wrote to our extended family:

Here we go again Folks:
The cottonpickin’ weather closed in on us, and Mr. Foss is in for an extra day.
  
Thank goodness, though, that he spent all his time with Uno.  
I don’t think that I could have stood another day with him in my room. 





I do know, though, that it is a good sign for me 
that he elected to spend his time in Uno’s room.  
It shows that he saw nothing in my room that he wanted changed,
or he would have been over advising me.  
It shows that he was pretty well satisfied with what he found.

Well, I finally unraveled a mixed up situation 
that had me up in the air for quite a spell.



  
Previous to today, whenever I saw a kid not doing anything,
I’d ask him:  “You’re not through with your work, are you?”  

Most of the time the kid would say:  “Yes.”  

Then I’d tell him to put away his books and read a magazine or a storybook.  
In a very short time I’d have most of the kids in, say grade three,
reading magazines; and when this happened, I’d tell them
to take out their books, and we’d start to correct the work. 

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue All Rights Reserved

Always, as soon as I started to correct the work,
I’d discover that no one had anything done.

Of course, I’d be understandably narked
about the whole thing,
and relations would be a bit strained
for a while in the classroom. 










The funny part of the whole thing was that the Indian children
would be just as narked as I would, and after I had given them Hell,
they wouldn’t be a bit repentant, merely righteously indignant.

Well, as I said earlier, it finally untangled itself today
and turned out to be a language problem.
  
Whenever I asked a kid, “You haven’t got your work done, have you?” 
and he’d answer, “Yes,” I’d assume he meant yes he had it done.  

The Indian, on the other hand, was only confirming that he didn’t have it done.  
In other words, his “yes” meant “Yes, I haven’t got it done.”

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue All Rights Reserved

As it turned out, the Indians were just as puzzled and upset
about the whole thing as I was. 










They couldn’t figure out why I would tell them to put away their work
right after they had told me that they weren’t finished with it;
and, if you think this confused them, just imagine
what a crazy white man they must have thought me
when I’d bawl Hell out of them for not having their work done.  

Anyway, it’s all sorted out now, and we all had a great laugh
over it when we finally discovered each other’s confusion.

I bought a nice new Harris Tweed sport coat today for $15.00.  
Uno had this coat that he had bought last summer 
and had only worn two or three times.
It was in perfect condition.
The nap had not been worn a bit.  

He didn’t like the color, and it was too large for him.  
It fitted me perfectly, and the color looked good on me.  
Harris Tweed sport coats usually cost from $35.00 up.

This is just about it for tonight, as I am very tired, 
because I hardly got any sleep last night.  

Uno was all worked up worrying about Foss, 
and he was up wandering around and smoking all night, 
with the result that I got no sleep either.

Bye now,
Love, Don.
My father considered the language barrier
one of the biggest challenges for Indian teachers.

When Indian children first entered school,
they had no knowledge of English.

They also came from a remarkably dissimilar cultural background
and perceived concepts such as time, property, or spirit
very differently from white people.

Mix in the students' reticence and diffidence when confounded
by an idiosyncrasy of a "crazy white man" teacher,
and my father had a potentially serious situation developing.

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue All Rights Reserved

My father later wrote of this incident:
"If I had not stumbled
on the solution myself,
they would have put up with it
for a while longer,
and when they were finally fed up
with the whole issue,
they would have stopped school.











"It has quite frequently happened that Indian teachers have opened school
in the morning and not a single pupil had turned up for class.

"Investigations would always disclose that the teacher
had offended the children, confused them, or perhaps just bored them,
till finally they had had enough.

"When a situation like this develops, 
a teacher has a serious problem on his hands,
and unless he can do something to regain the interest
and confidence of both the children and their parents,
he might just as well pack it up and go home."

Fortunately for my adventurous heart
my father didn't have "to pack it up and go home."





Till next time ~
Fundy Blue


Bay of Fundy out of Westport, Brier Island
© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue




Notes:  

1.   Mr. F. Foss:  
      Mr. Foss was the Indian Schools Inspector.  I have not been able to track down his home
      office.  He would have visited each of his various schools two or three times a year.
      Getting stranded by bad flying weather was a hazard of the job.  Mr. Foas probably spent
      both nights as Father Ouimet's guest, which meant he also shared his meals with Dad and Uno.
     

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