<Begin Segment 29>

SY: And so when you finally got your degree and you started teaching, where did you, what was your first teaching job?

GN: At Jordan High School in Watts. And that time that was a solid African American school, and a rough, rough neighborhood. You had the Jordan Downs federal housing project where a lot of the students came from, and you had these white teachers that would come on campus to teach and they, you know right away they're not gonna make it. And the kids would know, right? The moment you opened the door, the classroom door, they got you figured out already, whether you're gonna make it or not.

SY: Was it was your choice to go there? Or how did that, it just got assigned to you?

GN: You get assigned because there're openings at different schools, and so you'll go there for an interview, you'll probably be interviewed by the principal and the department head, the math department head, and so that's what happened to me. I went there for an interview and they chose to hire me over there.

SY: And so kind of describe what your teaching technique was with these kids.

GN: Well, one of the things is that, they do an in-service for teachers who are going to go teach in those kind of areas and one of the things they tell you is that you can't become friends. You have to know your role as a teacher. And what happens with some people is that they try to become friends and they lose it, and they have no control as a teacher. It just doesn't work. Because some people, because there were a lot of free schools that were popping up in those days that, where you have affluent kids going to free school, but it doesn't work in those kind of areas. Kids want structure. And they'll tell you, they'll come up and tell you, "So-and-So teacher has no control."

SY: So you would be considered kind of strict. You had certain things that you, that were required. I mean, how --

GN: Oh yeah, you're always open to listen to them if they want to come and talk to you, you don't talk down to them, but it has to be clear that you are the teacher and they have to be respectful toward you for that.

SY: And did you experience any kind of confrontations there?

GN: I didn't. In fact, my first year when I was teaching there, just before the Christmas holiday, I decided to show the film from my kendo tournament in Okinawa, and so I did, to the class. And then in September when school opened, one of my former students who saw that was walking around the campus, or in the hallway, with a couple other students that I didn't know, and that other student happened to open my classroom door and peeked in. Then the student that I had from the year before told him don't mess with him, and so the, he pulled out, closed the door. [Laughs]

SY: That's very cute. [Laughs]

<End Segment 29> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.