Following a brief and disastrous attempt to sound out the first row of a middle school seating chart, an area substitute teacher permanently switched to pointing.
OAK PARK, IL — Following a brief, disastrous attempt to navigate the first row of an eighth-grade Earth Science seating chart, area substitute teacher Gary Hersch formally abandoned all efforts to pronounce student names by the third desk Tuesday morning.
Witnesses report the 61-year-old retired actuary started the period with a confident, albeit overly enunciated "Ash-lee," hesitated visibly on "Siobhan," and completely surrendered his remaining pedagogical authority upon encountering a "Kaelael" at desk number three. Students noted that Hersch lowered the district-issued clipboard slowly, removed his reading glasses, and stared out the window for several seconds before pivoting to a universal system of index-finger pointing.
I realized very quickly that my midwestern phonetic toolkit was completely unequipped for the modern middle school classroom.
According to classroom sources, the remainder of the 28-person roll call was conducted in absolute silence. Hersch merely gestured vaguely at occupied chairs, making a small checkmark on the attendance sheet whenever the corresponding adolescent offered a sympathetic nod. When a student in the second row later attempted to politely correct his pronunciation of a hyphenated surname, Hersch reportedly held up a single hand and announced that all individuals would henceforth be addressed exclusively by their shirt color.
By the second period, Hersch had reportedly streamlined the administrative process even further, skipping the seating chart entirely to simply ask the room if anyone was currently missing. At press time, Hersch was seen pointing his ballpoint pen at a student in the back row and asking "Blue Hoodie" to please stop tapping his pencil.