When I was a freshman in high school, ever-so-long-ago, I took typing. I had a really mean teacher, Mrs. Groskopf (and, yes, that is her real name). She was really old, like 50. Many years before, she had had a stroke, which affected the right side of her body, which was apparently the side of her body that she used for writing and such. Okay. I just took out my yearbook and it doesn't look like she was as old as she looked in ninth grade.
She was a very strict teacher and had a rule for everything.
1. No talking.
2. No borrowing supplies. (And this was in the days of carbon paper.).
3. No using White-Out. She only allowed correction tape.
4. No getting out of your seat.
5. No doing anything but typing.
And no--it wasn't known as "keyboarding." It was typing. With a typewriter. An IBM typewriter with one of those letter balls. We had a "Return" button instead of "Enter." And "F4" was two characters you typed, not a "Function."
If you failed to follow a rule, and I honestly think there were about one-hundred of them, you had to type that rule ten times. The next time you broke the same rule, you had to type the rule twenty times. Get the picture?
So imagine everyone's surprise when she announced that she believed (and science supported) that listening to music aided in learning to type! And, because she wasn't the ogre everyone thought she was, we could bring in our favorite audio cassette tape (the thing that was used before CDs, which was what everyone used before IPods--back in the almost-Pioneer-days). All we had to do is sign up and bring in our music.
It seems she didn't really care what music it was. If you signed up, brought it in, and pushed "Play" before the tardy-bell rang, we could listen to it. The person who was playing DJ for the day could even get out of their seat to turn over the tape. (If you don't understand that, ask your Grandparents-they might be old enough to explain it.).
I don't really remember much of the music people brought in. It was the second half of 1984, so it must have been fabulous music.
Lori Stevens was in my class. Now, don't think we were great friends or anything. I looked her up in the yearbook just now, too. She loved Madonna. No she didn't. She L.O.V.E.D. Madonna.
So I learned to type to Borderline, Lucky Star, Holiday, and Everybody.
Whenever I hear any of the songs on that album, I am instantly transformed to Mrs. Groskopf's typing class.
If you don't believe me, play one of the songs. I sit upright, looking forward, with the look of a scared deer, and assume the asdfjkl; position.
4 comments:
What's correction tape?
;)
So whenever I hear MADONNA, Lucky Star, Everybody, Bordreline and Holiday...I'm taken back to the Sherman Oaks Galleria walking around with my friends carrying our BOOM BOX playing, of course, our Modonna tape! Oh and we had bobs!
If I need a smile or a chuckle, it is always just a mouse click away to your blog! Love ya!
yup, I remember.... ju ju ju lp lp lp ft ft ft hj hj hj My teacher would call out the letters we were to type. I remember the IBM ball, correction tape, liquid correction, carbon paper, etc. Stephanie, are you as old as me??? I get so mad now when the teachers at school require my kids to type a 5 page report without ever having gone to any sort of typing class. They are almost as obsolete as the typewriter itself.
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