Sherri Moshman-Paganos

Teaching: you’re frustrated and exhausted one day, gratified and fulfilled the next. Teaching is not like other careers; we teachers give our whole self to our students day after day. Blending humorous memoir and classroom ideas, the author of “Miss, I wish you a bed of roses:” Teaching Secondary School English in Greece, looks back on her 40 years of teaching international students. She writes about her teaching insecurities, secondary school and college composition classes, the difficult and the great, the base and the sublime. She describes school grades, bells and meetings, routines of any high school, and although teaching in Greece has unique challenges, Greek teens are like teenagers everywhere, full of hopes and dreams for the future. Besides looking at her own career growth, the author offers advice for language and literature classes, and ideas for using poetry, songs and film to create a lively atmosphere for learning. Whether you are a new teacher interested in suggestions for your classes, including ESL or EFL teachers, or an experienced teacher looking for new ideas, “Miss I wish you a bed of roses:” Teaching Secondary School English in Greece is for you. But not only teachers -- anyone who has taken an English language or literature class or has children taking literature classes-- will enjoy this spirited memoir, enhanced by the author’s poetry and student comments. Her main advice: content counts but more so, formulating your teaching philosophy. And don’t forget to keep your temper and your sense of humor!