I have written four previous posts reflecting on my teaching career. One of the posts was reflecting on all the types of students one would encounter in a teaching career. I think I admitted that my favorite assignment would be to take about a dozen students who were not having success in a regular class and teach a modified program where they could meet with success. Usually these students had some behaviour difficulties resulting from their lack of success. It was usually at the gr. 9 level as they could continue in highschool with a similar program.
I found one of my former students on face book the other day. H6WGQ5V65CYG I knew that he had become successful,but I didn't realize how successful. When I had him for gr.9 math he did not know up to the 5 times table and had difficulty dividing with just one place divisors. I had some success in these areas but not a lot. He was very interested in algebra but had not too much hope for success because of his arithmetic limitations. Factoring polynomials takes some basic arithmetic skills.He was pleasant, cooperative and willing to work. He wanted to learn. He was always thinking about some various type of device that would be really cool to do something with and it was always remotely controlled. He was a little rough around the edges socially. He was a little guy but had a record of being able to pound kids twice his size if he was pushed into it by their teasing.
I knew that he had some very successful inventions. He had designed remote sensing controls for gas wells in isolated areas. He was discussing a plan to set these devices up for gas companies and then monitor the fuctioning of their wells for them. Smart plan! He was going to borrow $1.7 million dollars . He was a cautious kid and he was hesitant about borrowing this much money? After that I lost contact with him.
Yesterday I find out that he owns a multi-million dollar oil well servicing company! Was I proud of him! It made my day.
