The Lost Children: Part 3 of 3. Mary MacCracken

poor performance and, on occasion, failure. When you have failed often and painfully enough you will do almost anything to avoid having to try again. But I was sure – I knew – that he could learn to compensate if I could reach him. What I was trying to do was to remove his blockades of fear so that I could get through. I knew my best chance was through success. As a construction crew bulldozes through a jungle, so I tried to bulldoze my way through Rufus’ fears. Calculate how far he’d come, open up the situation to the degree where success was ensured – then get him to try.

      The main difficulty was trying to teach on widely spread levels and keep everyone interested and learning.

      As Rufus hands me an M, I say to Brian, “Give me a word that begins with M, Brian.”

      “Mother,” he says.

      “Good. Spell it, Alice.”

      “M-o-t-h-e-r.”

      “Okay, fine. Use it in a sentence, Stu.”