Inspirational Teachers - My Personal Experience, Ruairi Quinn, TD, Labour Party Spokesperson for Education and Skills

I have been fortunate, during my school days, to meet many teachers who made a positive impression upon me then and whose memory, forty years on, remains particularly strong. But one stands out.

At the age of 14 I moved from a small feeder school, St Michael’s, into third year in Blackrock College.  There were approximately 130 pupils in five classes.  Seamus Grace was the English teacher in 3A, the top streamed class.  He was a big imposing man with gentle authority as a School Master.  On our very first day, he instructed us to take out our poetry books and turn to a particular page.  When we did, some of us immediately informed him that it was not on that year’s course for the then Junior Certificate examination.

“I know” he said. He then asked Kevin Connelly to stand up and read it aloud. “It is an excellent poem and I want you all to listen carefully to it”.  When Kevin had finished reading the poem Mr Grace asked each of us to take ten minutes to write down what the poem meant to us.  I was astounded at this, as were many others.  We were all primed to concentrate only on those poems that were on the course.  When we had finished writing, Mr Grace then asked three pupils to read out what they had written. He proceeded to ask us, at random, what we thought about the remarks.  Soon, the class was in full discussion.  This method of teaching by discourse and dialogue was new to me, but very welcome.  We were being taught how to think and not just how to remember.

The classroom became a place to explore ideas and defend opinions. Informed with facts, we learnt how to explore the world with reason and debate.

Ruairi Quinn, TD

Labour Party Spokesperson for Education and Skills

24^th March 2010