About Jivin' Johnny...
a brief bio

I grew up in the 1950's in Brockville, Ontario, where I attended local schools.  I was an average student, mainly due to boredom, not talent: I can't recall ever being challenged to think or create.  'Here are the answers, write them down, then feed them back' ~ sadly, that was public education at the time.

I entered Queen's University at 17 and perhaps because I'd never been forced to really think or work independently, I failed year 2 and left for the work force.  That same year I was 'de-enlisted' from the university naval officers training program for having a 'lower deck mentality.'

After an eye- and mind-opening trip to Egypt and Greece with my grandmother, I began my working life as a reporter with the Woodstock, Ontario daily, The Sentinel Review (At university I'd reported on and off for the Queen's Journal).  I was a good writer, but far too emotional to make a good reporter.  I remember the mayor having to feed me tissues when I was supposed to be interviewing him on his reaction to the JFK assassination.  Covering a car accident that killed two teenagers finally did me in.

I worked with a slide rule for a year in the Fluid Dynamics department of Canadian Allis-Chalmers in Lachine, Quebec, and then joined the Reader's Digest as an 'advertising sales promotion copywriter'.  I enjoyed this job immensely, but was let go after 4 years, I suspect because of weak managerial skills, not poor writing output.  While with the Digest, I completed my B.A. at Sir George Williams University night school (which included a creative writing course with poet Irving Layton).

While looking through the classifieds, my wife Carol (a Brockville girl I've known all my life and married in 1964) spotted ads seeking high school teachers and she suggested that I would be good at it.  It's funny ~ I'd had so little use for my own teachers that I'd never once considered teaching as an attractive career.  Time, however, changes all opinions and, looking back later, I realized the influence and importance of some of my teachers in my life and thoughts.  I got a teaching job over the phone (this was definitely 'another time, another place'!) and began teaching in September 1968 in Sioux Lookout up in Northern Ontario ~ and I loved it!  From the moment I entered teaching I was fascinated with the field of education and, breaking all the rules about not smiling until Christmas, struck up instant friendships with my classes.  From the start, it was interesting, challenging, rewarding, and fun.  For the next 31 years ~ including 4 years in Bracebridge, Ontario, where I taught English and Journalism, and 25 years at Midland Secondary School ~ I was passionate about teaching, learning and the even greater rewards that being in the company of friendly faces and active minds brings.  And although sometimes our studies were serious and seriously undertaken, my classroom was a centre of creativity, music and good cheer.

I think that I have been fortunate in being laid back, non-threatening and full of humour ~ qualities my students soon mirrored ~ because just by 'being me,' I was able to encourage a lot of reluctant learners to try ~and succeed at~ things they had never before attempted because they had come to perceive themselves as failures.  There were no 'gift credits' in my courses, but by providing students with real life work, lots of choice and encouragement, and a real chance at success, I was able to get remarkable results from many (some who 'aimed' for failure because they'd never known anything else).   Guidance continually directed the 'misfits' into my classes where they were welcomed and appreciated ~ and usually proved everyone else wrong.

Now, the above isn't meant to present me as 'Superteacher!', only one who genuinely loves kids, life and learning.  On looking back, perhaps I had the success I did (note: there were failures too!) because of some of the events in my past that became my most lasting 'teachers.'

1. I knew failure:   I had failed at university, been booted out of the navy and been fired from a job.   But I also was no quitter; I believed ~and still believe~ 'Success consists of getting up just one more time than you fall.'

2.The death of our first son Christian at 1¸ changed all my priorities about what was important: 99% of the things adults worry about and maneuvre for ~power, money, control, rules, pride, 'their share of the pie,' etc. ~just disappeared from my life as I came to realize that life and health were the only real things that mattered.  Looking out at the kids in my classes, I am reminded that life is fragile and fleeting and although I don't hug them physically, I try to 'hug' their minds to let them know that, just as they are, they are important and wonderful and unique.  That doesn't make my expectations of people's behaviour low, or cause me to forgive rudeness or racism, but what it means is that my perceptions aren't (I hope) cluttered with unnecessary baggage; I see each person as a gift and until they prove me wrong 3 or 30 times, I am their cheerleader/coach and together we're going for it.

3.Working on 'civvy street' for 5 years before entering teaching, I think gave me a different perspective on what's important versus what are mere education bookkeeping details.  It's also responsible for a greater 'direct-to-life' approach, both in what I've taught and how it was presented.  On top of that, being 'different' myself has made me expect and accept differences in others, differences that make life both interesting and rewarding.  When I look at a class, I don't see 1 student X 30, all thinking alike, all heading in the same direction; rather, I see 30 students X 1, each a unique individual (even if they're identical twins) and to be valued as such.

The differences in what's inside people was made very clear to me in my first year in Sioux Lookout.  One parents' night I commented to a minister who was the foster parent of one of my Native American students;

The minister answered;

This was a total shock to someone like me who had been raised in a culture where silences were embarrassing and you filled the air with talk, even if it was meaningless.  It was a total shock ~ and a complete eye-opener.   Since then, I've looked out on my classes and seen students from different countries, different cultures, different religions, different economic backgrounds, of different interests and abilities, and realized that no two are alike.  One has 3 brothers, another's an only child: it all creates a uniqueness that can't be steamrolled over.

4.Lastly, as you may have guessed from my Jivin' Johnny nickname, I'm a music nut and have been all my life.  I have over 45,000 LPs in the house, with almost no type of music overlooked because I like it all ~ from Brahms to Chuck Berry, Hank Williams to John Coltrane, Gilbert & Sullivan to Queen Latifah, Lyle Lovett to 'How to Belly Dance for Your Husband'!  I read about music, write about music, listen to 6-8 hours of it a day, and use it often in my classes.   It's an unusual week that each of my classes doesn't study a song or use music in their poetry presentations.  At my last staff meeting in June of 1999, the principal introduced me as 'the world's oldest teenager' and I think it was a compliment!   Music has kept me young and I can think of nothing I like more than swapping musical preferences with a student after school or downtown.  I turn him on to the New York Dolls, he turns me on to Nine Inch Nails.  Music becomes not just entertainment (though it certainly is that); it enters one's life as a vital force ~ exploring and expanding the emotions, causing one to weep or shout, perhaps even pushing away the borders that separate us from each other.

Philosophically, I do have some codes that I try to live by.  They are simple 'ways to live' that govern my interactions with students and everyone else.

1.  Try to do the greatest possible good, while doing the least amount of harm.

2.  Never take away a person's self-respect.

3.  If you have a chance to criticize someone, don't; you never know what hills and valleys that person has travelled through to the place where you met him.
But,
if you have the chance to praise (not flatter, but praise) someone, do...because if he doesn't deserve it for what you're praising him for, he's probably done 10 other worthy things that have gone unrecognized.

I enjoy life, and I enjoyed writing these books.  Thanks for listening.

Peace.

Jivin' Johnny (a.k.a. John Philips)