A MIRACLE

That's what I feel I witnessed last Monday.

Karl (not his real name) had been struggling with stage fright (according to him) since he was in Grade 3.

Now that he was in Grade 7, he has gotten used to getting zeroes for oral performances. "I'll have to tell your parents," I said. His reply was: "They already know."

So I didn't give him a zero yet because I wanted to understand his problem more.

I asked him about it outside of class and he explained his predicament very fluently! So I decided to scaffold his entry into the speaking world, as it were.

We had four storytelling tasks. He could tell his story quite well outside the faculty workroom when he only had me for an audience. We're on the way, I said to myself. My plan was to make him do the  next one in front of 5 selected friends, to scaffold his eventual speaking in front of the class. But he never did that.

Instead, his behavior followed the same pattern: his name would be called, he would curl up in his seat, mumble things to himself, and freeze. He wasn't just paralyzed, he was immovable, as proven by 2 or 3 classmates being unable to pull him to the front of the class.

"But he already did it in music," his classmates reported. What? I was intrigued.

So I asked him after class. He had stood up with three other classmates. They were to sing one verse each of their song. "And when it was my turn, I did it," he said. "Was it because you had people on stage with you?" He nodded.

So I called three of the funniest students in class and asked them to act out what Karl was saying. It just happened that the topic of that particular story was "a challenge I overcame". So Karl told the story of successfully singing his verse, with the clowns inventing appropriate choreography. And he did it, in front of the bench outside his class!

I wanted to strike while the iron was hot, so I asked him if he wanted to tell his story right then instead of waiting for another chance two days after. But again, he wouldn't budge, talking silently to himself. Until one of the clowns said: "If you do it, I'll bite my socks off!"

He smiled and suddenly, we could pull him up and into the classroom. He delivered his speech to those who were left inside (it was a free study period). There were about 15 people there, clapping loudly after he said "Thank you!" But I didn't hear them anymore.

It wasn't a perfect presentation. Far from it. But he started and finished it. And I knew I had witnessed a miracle. Just because someone was willing to bite his socks off, which he didn't have to do anymore.