Boishaaier 2020

HULDEBLYK - MARCELLE STEMMETZ

I, Marcelle Steinmetz, née Horne, matriculated from La Rochelle Girls High in 1978, obtained my BA (majors Afr. & Dutch and English) and I started my teaching career at Strand High School in 1982 while also qualifying as an IDTA dance teacher.

work done. We eventually agreed on their cooperating from Monday to Thursday and then on Fridays they could entertain the class with their own “shows”. I am not sure they were all so “kosher”, but we always ended a Friday having laughed ourselves to bits. How any of them passed matric English I still marvel at, but they did, despite the fact that they always wanted to play. Miracles do happen. Franco Bassi’s poem that was selected for the English Alive in his matric year is another highlight of my teaching career. At first, he did not want to enter but with a little coaxing (any maybe some bribery) I persuaded him to write a lovely poem. He was awarded at a ceremony held at Rondebosch Boys’ High. High school pupils’ poems from around the country were entered and only a select few were chosen for the English Alive. Over the years I was privileged to work with the champagne girls and the cheerleaders (normally a naughty bunch) and also to be part of the first aid group with Interschools in July or August. I worked in the dungeon most of the time, but how exciting to experience the tension, excitement and heartbreak there under the pavilion. Every year was the same yet different, vibrant, exciting, and deflated afterwards. Another incident I shall not forget was an injured boy from one of the Southern Suburbs’ schools who was brought to the first aid room. He had a cut in his face and a torn ear. Dr Kobus Uys, his usual calm self, told the boy that he bystander in stitches. I shall also not forget the film competition I coaxed Nicolaas de Jongh into participating. The first year we entered he produced a short film, which did not make it, but the next year, his matric year, he produced a film which placed him along with the other two winners. That was a proud moment. The three winning short films were screened at the awards ceremony held at the Libertas Theatre in Stellenbosch. And so Nicolaas once again produced a short film as one of his study projects in his Honours year of Technical Drama Studies. In his matric year, Gregory Kriek asked if I did not have something he could use for a drama competition. I had just finished a book “Only cowgirls get the blues” by Tom Robbins. It was a warped but hilarious story and definitely very difficult to perform. I loaned Greg the book, he chose a passage and performed it in the competition. Long story short, eventually he won the overall competition. Of course, one could go on and on, but one thing is for certain, teaching is extremely rewarding and never dull. To all past and present pupils, remember we teach because we care and we love to share in your future successes and heartaches. We love to hear where you are, what you are doing and to know that you are all right. would give him stitches. The next moment a hysterical mom burst into the first aid room, ranting about her boy who should not be touched by anyone but her plastic surgeon, because her son is a model and could not afford to have any scars. Her frantic calls for her plastic surgeon who was on the golf course, had many a

Then followed Swartland High School, Hoërskool Jeugland,

Wordsworth High and Paarl Gimnasium before I finally settled at Paarl Boys’ High School in July 2003. During all this time I completed a BEd (Hon) and an MEd, specialising in the teaching of English with the incorpo- ration of thinking skills. From 2013 to 2015 I completed post- graduate certificates in editing and translation, most from the Uni- versity of Stellenbosch and one from UCT.

I spent seventeen and a half years at Paarl Boys’ High where I had been presented with many opportunities in my teaching career, especially in English as well as extramural activities. The school afforded me the opportunity to become a senior marker, deputy-chief marker and finally chief marker for English Home Language Paper 2 (Literature),

having marked that paper since 1999 and Papers 1 and 3 before that. Mr Swart never said no if any of us wanted to mark, despite any inconvenience the school would suffer while we were marking. Extramurally, Mr Swart gave me numerous opportunities, especially in driving the swimming team to move from fifth position

M A R C E L L E STEMMETZ

in our first year of participation in the big Cape Schools Swimming Championships to second position the last time the competition was held. Rondebosch was placed first. I irritated Mr Swart into allowing us to start water polo which in turn afforded the boys the opportunity to participate in tournaments against other boys’ schools in the Eastern Cape. Our Interhouse Drama competition led to our houses offering some humorous short one-act plays and from a rocky start, the self-written dramas improved over time, becoming quite presentable. I introduced our boys to the Cape Schools’ Arts Festival at Artscape and took boys there since 2004, with the exception of 2018. There our boys were exposed to actors, dancers, musicians, authors and so on, in the arts. Then the Klipkopkletter revealed some wonderful poetry of our learners. In teaching one is bound to teach along with a teacher who taught you or with pupils you taught in previous schools. Thus, Mrs Gaum, my Biology teacher in La Rochelle, became a colleague and friend. Some ex-pupils, Mmes Marissa von Mollendorf and Lize Visser, and Mr Stéfan van Hansen, all from Gimnasium, became my colleagues. In teaching, one experiences many unforgettable incidents. The year Eddie van der Walt, Sean-Marco Vorster and Ian Visser were in my English Home Language matric class, I shall not easily forget. They were impossible, apart from talking non-stop. So, I had to devise a plan to get some

Marcelle Steinmetz

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BOISHAAI 152 YEARS