“this girl is on fire looks like a girl but she’s a flame, so bright she can burn your eyes, better look the other way….” is one of the songs my old teacher Mrs. Fritz would have us label grammatically as a warm-up in class. Mrs. Fritz teaches seventh and eighth grade language arts, reading, and social studies at Mount Aviat Academy.

Mrs. Fritz is not your classic “sit down and open your book to page…” teacher. She always had something fun in store for us. Having her classes label a couple of lyrics from a NEW GOOD song was not only a fun way to have us practice our grammar but also a way to get the whole class involved . While we would be labeling the lyrics, Mrs. Fritz would play the song on our warm up. I remember we were always eager to hear the song she chose for the day.

One of my best memories of seventh grade was surprisingly during social studies class. We were learning about the Civil War, so Mrs. Fritz had a couple of people come in for us and show us replicas of the uniforms, bags and weapons. One person actually showed us how to load an old-fashioned gun with the gunpowder and everything, and shot one round off for us. We dressed up in the clothes that people wore during that time, and Mrs. Fritz made some of the food for us that the soldiers ate during the war.

I have not seen many teachers come in to school excited to see their students early in the morning when everyone is tired. She always had a positive attitude. Mrs. Fritz seems to teach by “no man left behind”, she would make sure everyone was comfortable with the lessons before moving on to the next one. She would have her students set high standards for themselves AND help us all achieve them. If I could say one thing to Mrs. Fritz today, it would be thank you for all you did, and especially for never giving up on me even when I did.