contracts => Mr. Peterson, 7th grade

 

Mr. Peterson, 1966/67

One of the things I remember from grade school (Maple Dale School, Fox Point, WI, 1962-1969) was Mr. Peterson's class in 7th grade.  Although I can't remember what it was called, social studies ?  History ?  Civics ?  But you get the idea.

The thing I remember was that the class wasn't taught in the usual way:  lecture, assigned reading, test.  It was done through "contracts".  I can't remember all the details but Mr. Peterson sat at a table in the front of the class with piles of papers (the assignments, color coded) and slips (the contracts).  The student would get the assignment pages from Mr. Peterson and you'd agree on when the work would be done.  At that due date a conference with Mr. P. and then advancement to the next contract.  

Some kids (OK maybe 2) were competitive and tried to do all of them.  I can't remember how many I did but I do remember one contract in particular.  It was to write and have performed in front of the class a play using the characters from Peanuts (popular at that time 1967-68).  This might have been the first/last time I ever typed up homework and of course, used carbon paper to do multiple copies.  I can't remember the theme of the play (probably something civics/history/social studies related) but I got a couple of jokes in there and got several classmates to perform the play in front of the class.  I wish I had kept that, hopefully it's still around here somewhere.

Contracts were a novel approach to education, at least in our school, I won't say it was all fun but it was different/interesting.  I don't know if this was his idea or some kind of partially developed curriculum ?

I also have a vague recollection of  SRA, a box of curricula for reading/English which was similar.  There were color coded cards and some kind of tests and teacher interaction.  The only thing I remember from SRA was the phrase:  "you're simply bovine" (a story where a girl was insulted by implying she was cowlike instead of the more conventional:  you're simply divine).

I'm afraid that self directed learning was never going to work well for me, just too lazy !

Best Regards,
Chuck, WB9KZY
http://wb9kzy.com/ham.htm