Who was the best teacher you had and why?

The person that comes to mind quickly is Becky Combs.  She was my sixth grade teacher in Silver Spring, Maryland at Oakview Elementary School.  She was amazing.  She knew my strenghths were English and reading, so she played on those.  She did not make a big deal about me being in the lowest of low math groups.  She tried to figure out why I could do everything else and could not do math.  Finally she realized I did really well with story problems.  She literally made tests with mostly story problems for me - because I could somehow grasp that but just looking at the number I somehow could not get it.  She was also my brother Bob's reading tutor for a while because her specialty was reading problems.  I think she had an inkling that I was dyscalculate but there were no tools to diagnose me.  They were just coming up with the tools to diagnose dyslexia. 

My other incredible teacher was Mr. Micket.  He was my senior high school English teacher.  He made you want to read and write.  He made English come to life.  I loved the fact that he used contemporary novels in the classroom instead of the old boring ones that we had been reading for the last 4 years.  When we did Shakespeare - we were given parts and read it out loud as a class.  Shakespeare is not to be read silently but heard.  I never wanted to miss his class.