Allen Elementary was a small school in San Bruno, California. I wasn’t there for very long, but a couple of experiences deeply impacted me and set the tone for my education moving forward. It’s often the little things that stick with kids the most, shaping them in ways they never forget.
One particular story explains why, when I try to speak Spanish or German, my pronunciation is a little off—and why I often get ridiculed for it. The thing is, I don’t care what others think. I try, and I know what I’m trying to say. A series of events in second and third grade led to this quirk, and honestly, I’m eternally grateful for it.
I have something called a crossover bite. Unlike an overbite or underbite, my teeth cross over on the right side of my mouth. It’s not noticeable unless you’re kissing me, but the result was that I had a horrible lisp as a child. Even now, when I’m very tired or have had a couple of drinks, you can still hear it. My teacher noticed that I avoided talking because kids made fun of me, so she referred me to the school’s speech pathologist. This was long before IEPs or 504 plans, so I don’t know what the process was, but I do remember our sessions. She retrained me to speak without a lisp, which required me to over-enunciate my words. I learned to focus carefully on how I spoke, and it worked. In fact, I gained enough confidence to join the speech team in high school and even earned a speech scholarship to the University of Northern Colorado.
So how did this lead to my struggles with other languages? The key technique I was taught involved using the very front of my mouth. The problem? Spanish and German rely heavily on sounds produced in the middle and back of the mouth. For example, I can’t roll my Rs in Spanish, and German requires a lot of throat work. I know the words, but after fifty years of training myself to avoid my lisp, I simply can’t pronounce them properly. I’ve picked up a few tricks, and sometimes I just mumble and hope context helps me out.
Teachers have an immense responsibility to make students feel welcome. Since I attended so many schools, I have plenty of stories about being the new kid. One of the most touching ones happened at Allen, not long after I arrived. It was around Valentine’s Day, and we were exchanging cards with our classmates. I made my bag, and the other kids did the obligatory “new kid” cards. But the one that meant the most came from the teacher.
Our regular teacher was out for eye surgery, so we had a long-term substitute. Even though she wasn’t there, she had written out Valentine’s cards for every student in the class—including me. She had never even met me, yet she still took the time to write a card welcoming me. It would have been easy for her to wait until she returned, but she didn’t. That small gesture had a huge impact on how I felt at Allen, and I never forgot it.
Sometimes, it’s the smallest acts of kindness that leave the biggest mark.
Edited for clarity and grammar using AI – Randy