Letter from the Editor: August '05.

Higher Consciousness

When I was in seventh grade, my English teacher abandoned all pretense of grammatical enlightenment and decided to raise our consciousness instead. It was the i70s, and the hippie movement came late to the Kelly green suburbs in Connecticut. She pushed the desks against the wall and ?divided us into small groups. Our assignment was to write down five positive things about each person in the group.

A girl in an embroidered jean jacket who smelled like lemons read her list first. She said she liked one girlis earrings, another guyis smile, and my hair. No one ever said anything nice to anyone in junior high school. And although we were embarrassed by the hokey exercise and knew weid do anything to avoid diagramming a sentence, it still worked. Even the gloomiest student looked almost cheerful. It was one of the rare days in junior high school when I remember being truly happy.

Our consciousness was raised for a good three weeks. We sang karaoke in class one day to ?help loosen our inhibitions, and no one snickered. At another session, the teacher bellowed out the dictionary definition of each swear word, urging us to think before we mouthed off. And some ?of us actually cleaned up our acts, saying darnI and ratsI like sitcom teenagers. This could have gone on indefinitely, with trust games, dream-catcher workshops, and ...