Welcome to the Classroom Narratives Healing and Education Podcast, the space where education meets resilience.
I'm Dr. Joey Weisler, and in each episode, we dive deep into the personal stories of educators, students,
leaders, and frontline advocates who are navigating the complexities within modern education.
Whether you're just starting your teaching journey or are a seasoned professional looking for inspiration,
we'll explore how to foster meaningful change, prevent burnout, and build trauma-informed communities within our schools.
Now, let's take a seat at the front of the classroom as we get started.
Welcome to a very special and unique episode of the Classroom Narratives Podcast.
This week, I'm honoring my own beloved grandmother, Francine Langer Weisler, as my guest.
Francine Langer Weisler began her teaching career in New York City in 1947.
Her 41-year-long legacy of a career, following a childhood during the Great Depression,
was dedicated in excellency to elementary school instruction and principalship throughout New York City, particularly in the Bronx.
Francine Langer Weisler, who was the oldest daughter in a family of six, having three younger brothers,
was known for her charisma and humor, which always led to a commanding presence.
She constantly laughed and made others laugh with her quick humor and inside jokes, along with her no-nonsense attitude.
She always provided wisdom to her family, especially to her grandchildren.
Francine passed away peacefully last year on January 30, 2024, just days before her 96th birthday.
For those who are tuning into this segment here in February 2025,
you are listening to an archived conversation between me and Grandma Fran back from March 2022,
when she and I had a wonderful conversation about 20th century academia, which I asked her at the time if I can record and save.
Grandma Fran serves as one of my earliest inspirations to follow a career in education.
As I assemble this archived dialogue right from her New York City living room, where we recorded the segment and where I now live,
I wish to thank you in advance for your listenership as I observe the one-year loss of Fran,
while honoring what would have been her approaching 97th birthday.
So sit and enjoy a special conversation as we step back to understand education before many of our own times.
Welcome to the podcast, Grandma Fran.
So what was it like for you to be a student during the Great Depression?
What were your classmates like? What were your teachers like?
Do you remember what even your own classrooms were like? And what was school about when you were growing up?
Everybody was very poor. In the classroom, the ethnicity of the faculty, as I observe, came in waves.
During the Depression, I had wonderful little friends. Nobody had anything.
Nobody complained about anything. Nobody was jealous of anybody because nobody had anything.
And whatever we were taught, we were able to follow through. We followed the teacher's instructions to a T.
We were very obedient. Nobody acted out. And education was rigid, repetitive, and we learned.
And that's the way it was. In school, nothing was expected of us except good learning habits and achievement.
And on the outside, we were happy if we had a nice meal, if we had a warm hat.
We were grateful for every little thing because there was just no money.
And who or what actually inspired you to become a teacher?
I think I wanted to become a teacher because I looked up to the teacher as somebody in charge.
Somebody who was very smart. And I remember when I was in fourth grade,
I had a teacher who brought her slides of her travels to school.
And one of the slides showed her riding a camel. She was in the Middle East someplace, North Africa.
And I said, someday I'm going to ride a camel. But like Miss Zemansky was her name.
And I will be a teacher and I'll have my summers off as teachers did.
And sure enough, one of our first trips was to Morocco. And the first thing I wanted to do was to go where they had camel rides.
And I said, I want to get up on that camel and have a picture taken to remind me of my fourth grade and fourth grade teacher who inspired me to become a teacher.
And sure enough, that picture hangs right in my den right today.
And what were your first what first what year did you begin teaching?
And what were your first couple of years of teaching?
Like, what did you learn about even yourself as an educator in those opening years?
I started I was too young to teach in New York City on the lower grade.
And I was I had a certification to elementary school.
I would have to be. I think.
Wait a minute. Twenty one years old and I was 19 when I graduated from college.
But to teach in New York City on the low grades to take the exam, you had to take an exam.
You had to be 21. So somebody told me Yonkers, New York.
You could get a job there and you didn't have to be 21.
So I was like 19 and a half and I went to Yonkers and I got a job.
And I had the slow sixth grade.
The kids were 16 with 13 and I was 19.
And I said, oh, I'll treat them like my brothers.
It's going to be such a nice time.
It was hell at the beginning at the beginning.
Too familiar, too nice, too good.
Didn't set the tone, did the wrong things.
But then there was a loyalty there.
And I would say in the middle of the year, the superintendent was coming to visit my classroom.
And I told them the superintendent is coming.
She's going to see how you are doing.
And one smart Alex said to me, no, she's going to see how you are doing.
Oh, I thought to myself I'm cooked.
But I will tell you, they were so good and so receptive.
Not anything out of place.
So I must admit they were very loyal.
It's a true story.
So as a sidebar, it really begs the question as to why educators get caught up in this
timeless fantasy of a perfect linear career from the start.
And I would love to know what factors contributed to Fran's fantasy of an educator and how she
was able to restructure her on paradigm.
Unfortunately, that question was not asked during this conversation.
But from knowing my grandmother as well as my own teachers, I feel that teachers tend
to make their jobs look much easier as they're in front of their own students.
But I can say that in my first year of teaching that I was certainly not that way and approached
my own classroom with extreme vulnerability.
And our other conversations on this podcast will also serve to think about that a little
bit further.
So as you grew as an educator, tell us about your time instructing, especially during World
War II.
Who were your colleagues?
What were your students like?
What were their parents like?
What was the school you worked for like and how about its neighborhood as well?
How was your administration?
What was academia about?
And what did you learn about the profession that helped you grow as a person?
Were any of your revelations during your career shocking or was everything to be expected?
Well, firstly, after spending two years in the first school in New York, I told you about
Yonkers.
Then at 21, I took the exam for New York City.
And it happened that most of practically all of my friends from Hunter, when they were
appointed, they were older than I, so they were appointed before I was.
They took the exam before I did.
And they were sent to Harlem.
And I said, if I get sent to Harlem, I'm staying in Yonkers.
Well, as it turned out, I did comparatively well.
I scored higher than most people.
And maybe because of my score, I was not assigned to Harlem.
I was assigned to a school about 10 blocks from my house.
So I was very happy about that.
The children were Italian, coming from Italian immigrants.
Now there's little Italy in today's environment.
Parents were very cooperative, very cooperative.
And I was a little loose.
I brought in the, I guess they called it the progressive method you learn by doing.
Yeah.
And it was really the Dewey method.
And the superintendent of schools from New York City was coming.
And my principal said, I'm taking her into Ms. Langer's room first.
Ms. Langer will schmouse her up because I had a background.
Because I had a background in the progressive method in Yonkers.
So I had all kinds of signs and all kinds of things that Dewey was promoting in his
theories about education.
Yes.
She came and she was very pleased with what she saw of course.
And that was it.
It was second grade, but the kids mostly Jewish.
They were very eager to learn.
But there were a couple in there that needed help.
A good social worker would have helped out one of the kids.
But we didn't have those educational aids available to us.
So we managed.
And it really went along without any kind of untoward incidents.
A little discipline here, a little discipline there.
The parents were cooperative.
There were no parents who were angry.
We didn't have angry parents that I knew of.
And so it went.
And so if a child didn't behave, you could tell the parent or you could try and handle
it yourself.
And you worked it out.
And when the child went on to the next grade, there were no big problems.
The problems really came later on with the narcotics.
Narcotics was a big thing.
And of course it impacted on children.
But everything has a way.
They say a problem that's not resolved, there is a resolution by it being evolved.
It just happens.
If you don't resolve the problem at that moment, chances are
the problem resolves itself through an evolutionary step by step change
kind of process.
And that's really what it was after that.
It was very good with parents.
And teachers had very good relations.
The narcotics came in that entered into the picture.
I mean there were multi-factors that entered in, that enters, I shouldn't say entered, still
enters to this day, that enters into the education that spills over into the schools.
A kid comes from a home, whether it's this, that, or the other thing, it has to have an
influence over that child.
And the child brings it to school.
That's it.
How would you describe your leadership style and what do you consider made you an effective
leader?
I remember the first day I took over the school was in a mess and I called a meeting
and I said, just one moment, remember this.
Do not interpret kindness for weakness.
And if you think you're going to get away with anything,
I may seem very kind and I am, but I am not weak.
And that kind of set a tone, also, so they knew I wanted something on a professional level and
wouldn't accept less.
Throughout your career as an educator, you have consistently been a pillar of strength,
courage and charisma through your own leadership.
But what was an experience that made you feel stalemated during your career, if at all?
And what did you learn from those moments?
Okay, and my door was open and sometimes kids would wander in after school if they didn't
go to the program, they'd come in.
And I was very receptive and I would listen to whatever complaints or remarks or what
their day went or how their feelings were, but it was really few and far between.
But one day this kid comes in, a nice kid and I liked him very much.
He did get into difficulty and we were talking and I don't know how the subject came around,
but he was telling me a little bit about his life.
And we had a number of children in foster care and he said to me, you don't know what
it's like to be a foster child.
And to this day, I become emotional about it, to think of the deep hurt that this child
must have gone through.
And yet I kind of thought I knew the foster mother who was a very nice lady, but it was
probably just a separation from his own family.
But it was the one thing that made me think this is it.
There's no more I can do and I'm retiring.
But I think we need more social workers.
I really do.
Absolutely.
Honest to goodness social workers, not those that are looking to see what is behind the
mystery behind the veil.
No, no.
Interact with the child in the here and now.
How do you feel and what is making you feel that way should be the guiding light.
And then try to get to the solution.
Absolutely.
Can you share one of your funniest memories throughout your career?
We had a teacher who was really very stern to the male teacher, to the point of lunacy,
but okay.
They made him, the motto is those who can teach and those who can't teach, teach gym.
Anyway, this teacher used to set off on, look at the contract, I think, not really, but
things would come up and he would set into effect a grievance.
He was the biggest pest to a principal because he would find a grievance in everything and
if he couldn't find people who were afraid
to go to the principal would go to him and say, hey, do you know that?
Whatever it was.
Anyway, one day after being made a gym teacher, he was playing ball with the kids or the kids
were playing kickball or whatever and the ball went into his head and he fell to the
floor in the gym.
And of course, an ambulance came, the gym was up on the sixth floor, all gyms are, they're never
in the basement someplace, and an ambulance was called and he was put on a gurney.
And a colleague came to me laughing and he said, I just saw the funniest thing.
I said, what did you see?
He said, they took away AG.
He's on a gurney.
And a kid ran up to the gurney and said, "Mr. G, Mr. G, are we going to have gym today?"
It shows the innocence.
I'll never forget that story.
Every time I think of it and I want something to laugh about, that's the story.
Gym overrode everything.
What about your time beyond the classroom?
What did you do as an administrator or a leader and how did your classroom skills transfer
into that part of your career?
Well, beyond the classroom, not very much.
When I was working full time, but I'll tell you what I did after I retired.
After I retired, I was told principals were given a budget and within the budget,
I don't know if they had extra money, I don't know where they got it from, but it was in the budget.
And they would ask me to come in and do certain things on certain days
to help out within the school.
Well, I decided one day, I went to the principal.
I said, listen, there's a teacher in this school who's very interested in the arts and drama
and theater.
And I think that children have a lot to learn and that these children never get the opportunity
to go to the theater, never ever.
Lehman College on Friday at that time had presentations,
dance, drama, music, open to the public.
So I said to the principal, there is a teacher who's very interested in the arts.
What I would like to do is take a couple of children, three, five, up to five children,
four children, take them to Lehman College, show them what a performance is,
give them a play bill, introduce them to theater.
And I want to take it from a certain class because I know that
teacher is interested in that and she will follow through.
Now, in retrospect, that was a big responsibility.
My husband was coming, grandpa was coming, and I told him, bring chocolate donuts.
Went down to the lunchroom, saved the milk for five children.
And we would take five children in the car, take them to Lehman, to the cafeteria,
where they would have their donuts and milk, upstairs to see the performance with their play bill,
with their program.
And then they would go back to their classroom and discuss it with the teacher.
I didn't follow up on that.
But I managed to get through the whole class by the end of the school year.
And to me, that was a terrific thing.
It was also the nuttiest thing I can ever think of.
From the principal's point of view, he was a lunatic to allow me to do this.
And from my point of view, I was a lunatic for taking on this responsibility.
I prefer to say innovative.
But you know, I contacted the parents.
I did everything I was supposed to do.
Contacted the parents, said, this is what I'm doing.
If you have any objection, I will not take your child.
And not one parent said to me, no, don't do it with my child.
They all got their chance and they had a little introduction into theater.
And so just reflecting on like the latter part of your career, even into retirement,
what can you still say about the students that you keep in touch with, if any of them?
And if you sat down with one of your students today,
what would be a timeless memory that you would have about them?
I just have timeless memories about all students.
I have met a couple, not students, but student teachers, new teachers coming in that I have
mentored, and I have met them at a place for retired teachers where they give courses and
they play bridge and they have activities for teachers who are retired.
And I can show you cards that teachers sent me when I retired.
Oh, wow.
thanking me for taking the time.
One word, I could never have gotten through it without you.
So I'm gratified.
I feel I did my job on both ends and it was not a job.
It was a calling.
That's what I always say.
And I enjoyed it very much.
Absolutely.
What do you understand about how education works today in 2022?
I really think that there are too many cooks spoiling the broth, too many hands in the pot.
Everybody feels that he or she is an expert and you don't know who you are,
what you can do, how you can do it until you get there.
That to me is the sign of a good teacher who can walk into a room, look around, gauge the needs,
and say, I'm ready to go.
Thank you for joining us for this exclusive Archive Legacy interview.
It was a sentimental opportunity to laugh, cry, and reminisce alongside Grandma Fran.
And I hope that this segment has given you even the simplest taste of who she was
and the life she carried with incredible honor.
As our season continues, stick around to hear from our innovative leaders and extraordinary educators
who are working to make a difference in education one conversation at a time.
Thank you for joining us on the Classroom Narratives Healing in Education podcast.
If today's episode inspired you or made you think differently, I'd love to hear from you.
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