"Here's the scoop," Jordana said upon entering the room at ten in the morning. "Your assignment is," She broke off as the class groaned.

"Come on, Jordana," someone whined. Someone else added, "Give us a break, already."

Jordana looked around the room with a grin and finished, "Well, class, I was going to ask you to write a skit. Of course if Eugene and Michael think that you should have a test instead ..." She let the sentence trail off as the class grabbed for notebooks and pens. One of the girls crumpled up pieces of paper and started throwing them at the two boys who had spoken. Jordana appeared behind her. "Would you like to have a test too, Debbie?" she inquired sweetly. The girl blushed, and slowly shook her head. "Then, let's proceed," said Jordana to the class.

Jordana's tests were incredibly difficult. When she gave a test, she always emphasized how easy it would be. The easier she said that a test would be, the lower the grades would be. But no matter how many D's a kid got, everyone still found her to be a fun teacher.

Jordana looked and acted so much like a kid that she was often mistaken for a student. When Jordana was in a good mood, she would let people eat and chew gum in class - though both were against school rules. We called her Jordana because she thought that it was too complicated to say "Mrs. Schein-Levy." She hated to lecture; she was afraid that she would sound like a priggish old woman. She had lots of little anecdotes that livened up what could have been a boring social studies class. She had stories about the schools where she had taught: in one school the students were always being secretly monitored for disobedience-x in another, in Harlem, she was called "Woman." She told stories of her "real" life; her husband, Stuart, was her favorite topic, and she often repeated the story of how she had been mugged in New York City.

When Jordana left the school at the end of her first year to return home to New York City, her students debated about what going-away gift they should give her. They finally agreed on a plain white mug, on which one of the girls, in colorful magic marker, printed some of Jordana's favorite sayings. "Here's The Scoop" curled around the handle, "What's So Funny?" marched up the side and "Come On, You Guys" was written on the base. The markers were cheap "Mr. Doodle" and scented, and rubbed off as Jordana lifted the mug from the box. She laughed, thanked them anyway, and said, "It's the thought that counts." They told her that day that they'd miss her. In a way, they did. Their next year's social studies teacher gave detentions for one missed homework assignment. n