fandomhigh | Learnin' with Mr. Peanutbutter, Thursday, period 1

"Oh captain, my captain!" Mr. Peanutbutter howled when the old fashioned school bell rang to start the class. Yes, actually quite literally howled. "Oh! Captain! My! Captain! This is the beginning of a very famous poem! You know it's very famous because it was used as a central theme in a very famous movie. Which just goes to show you: poetry, while seemingly silly and completely inconsequential, can actually have a big impact on society." He shrugged. "Or, well, it used to. That movie's pretty old. And the only lines from that poem I know are 'oh captain, my captain'. But it really probably isn't super important."

Mr. Peanutbutter pulled his chair around to the front of his desk and sat on it backwards (he'd been practicing -- it turned out it worked best when you had a chair without any arms on it!), leaning his forearms on the top.

"So let's talk about poetry today. As an adult with a successful career, a large house, and a beautiful wife, I have very little need for poetry in my life. But as teenagers, full of confusing hormones, looking forward at a ruined economy with nothing to show you what your future will look like but wildly popular dystopic YA fiction, poetry might mean a great deal to you. Perhaps you have a little journal you keep in your room where you write down all of your greatest worries in awkward meter. Maybe you wander around campus in between classes trying to find that eternally elusive rhyme for 'orange'. Poetry can be a great escape for the disaffected teenager, apparently. I don't really know; I was really popular as a child and everyone in my hometown looked and behaved exactly like I did. But this class isn't about me. It's about all of you."

He nodded empathetically at the students for a long, awkward moment, then stood up and went to the chalkboard.

That's right, not a whiteboard, an actual, old school, salt-of-the-earth, covered-in-still-vaguely-legible-'erased'-words-and-math-formulas chalkboard. We're not real sure where he got it.

"So what do we know about poetry? Well, first off, it rhymes." He wrote "rhymes" on the board. "Also, it does something I've heard referred to as 'scanning'." He added "scans". "I don't know what that is, but it seems to be important. And lastly, it's expressive." "Expresses" went up on the board, and the whole list -- of three things -- was underlined. "And for some reason, they're not songs, even though songs are clearly more fun. That's -- I think that's everything? Sure! Okay. So we're going to write poetry today! About something we really care about, like -- balls! Let's write poems about balls. I'm going to say it should be at leeeeeeeeeeeast . . . four lines. That rhyme. About balls. Take . . . twenty minutes." He tapped his piece of chalk against the base of his chin, leaving a little dusty streak in his fur, then nodded. "And then read them out loud!" Who needed lesson planning when you could make an assignment up on the fly?

"Oh, and just to let you know, I did not receive any notes from the producers about last week's episode. So let's keep up that good work! And Faith -- don't think I forgot about your homework assignment! I want to hear all about your five mile run last week. Now -- get poetring! Poetric? Poemish. Write poems!"

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"Mr. Peanutbutter?" Hanna had a very important question. "I have a question about the class... goals. I think."

"Really?" Mr. Peanutbutter's ears pricked up in surprise. "Well! You've come to the right place! What's teaching about except answering questions?"

He was maybe actually asking. Maybe.

"What are we being graded on?" Hanna said. "Or rather, what are we trying to learn? What is the class about?" Because this week had been a major departure from last week, and she had the feeling she was missing something.

"I'm glad you asked that, Hanna." Not because he had an answer. But because this part would be great for the promos. "What is any class truly about? It's about . . . learning. Learning how to be. Learning how to think." That last bit was actually a purpose of good education, but he'd only managed to stumble over it. He had no idea of the actual depth.

"Oh. Oh, okay." That made a kind of sense. Hanna still had her moments of credulity even after various very strange teachers. Chalk it up to the ones who were very non-traditional (see: Pinkie Pie). "I wanted to be sure that I wasn't missing something."

"Oh, no, you should try to never miss anything." This was terrible advice. "Carpe that diem, Hanna. Carpe that diem like it's a ball someone's just thrown for you. Go get that ball!" He barked and panted. "Go get it! Go get it, girl!" He howled -- then cleared his throat self-consciousl. "Er, the metaphorical ball, I mean. Though real balls are fun too!"

Edited 2016-09-09 04:52 (UTC)

Hanna startled when he howled, and started to reach for a knife she wasn't even wearing, before stopping herself and looking awkward. "Right now?" she couldn't help asking. "I mean, yes. Of course." Wait, what was she agreeing to? It was hard to be sure, except that Mr. Peanutbutter had an awful lot of enthusiasm about it.

Learnin' with Mr. Peanutbutter, Thursday, period 1

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