Sowerbrower's Superheroes

My head jerked as it began to fall to the desk. I was drifting quickly into slumber as all I could hear of the teacher's voice was, "blah blah grammar rule this, blah blah grammar rule that." I was positive that I could care less about an appositive. If I had to be dragged through another year of these stiff rules, I was sure to pull my hair out. Though my anger with grammar has reached its maximum, I had never experienced learning grammar from Mrs. Sowerbrower.

A paper titled "Think, think, think" landed on my desk with grammar in the first sentence. As I continued to read through, I was thrown for a loop. My teacher wanted us to envision a grammar-type superhero. Her trademark saying, "I'm not exactly sure how this is going to work; just run with it" somehow just made the creativity begin to flow through every students' veins in the classroom. Topics that were to be taught to the classes were things such as apostrophes, colons, active and passive voices and different rules that apply to the comma.

Props ranging from capes, massive afros and costumes were used to trigger students' memories of where to put a comma in a series or making a subject and verb agree. Some groups of students (such as Daniel Cunningham, Justin David and Jason Lettis) put pencil to paper and created an unbelievably impressive comic book of Semi-Colon man. In this educational yet hilarious comic, these boys did not just split my sides with laughter talking of evil clauses (a pun on Santa) but cleared up questions on the most commonly unused punctuations. Staci Addison, Ashley Baker, Kayla Brisbay and Rachel Hudson put their knowledge of graphic design to their topic, correct comma usage. The girls defeated the Praying Mantis, which was symbolic of a common error, using parentheses instead of a comma.

Mrs. Sowerbrower is quoted as saying, "This is one of the most amazing projects I have ever done as a teacher. It will definitely be something I repeat every year." It is definitely a cherished moment when a teacher emanates with creativity and can educate is an unconventional yet effective way. Mrs. Sowerbrower, never being one to bore a class to sleep, is a life-changing educator.

Amanda Carl-- Spotlight Editor