DELTONA — Late in the morning, the students in Leontyne Mason’s seventh-grade language arts class at Deltona Middle School were dragging even before she announced their new study topic: poetry.
The reaction wasn’t exactly an audible groan — with more than an hour to go before lunch, there wasn’t energy for that. A sleepy-eyed boy with a wicked case of bed head spoke for the class in dismissing the subject.
“Poetry is for old people.”
Undaunted, Mason fought to hide a smile as she outlined the lesson plan: They would compare poems they’ve read with songs they’ve heard. She concluded, “You’re going to end up liking it, I believe.”
It was more than false confidence that girded her words. Though in just her fifth year of teaching, Mason, 30, has demonstrated a knack for connecting with students, using an approach she describes as “respect and rapport.” The current teacher of the year at Deltona Middle — where she's also the unofficial deejay for dances and other school functions — was also nominated for The News-Journal’s monthly “Amazing Teacher” series for the impact she makes on students.
Mason didn’t come to teaching right away, even though her father, Leon Mason, was a teacher at DeLand’s Blue Lake Elementary, where she attended. “He was the one all the kids wanted as a teacher,” she recalled.
In her gifts for self-expression, he saw her one day filling Oprah Winfrey’s shoes rather than his own. After completing the International Baccalaureate program at DeLand High school, Mason studied broadcast journalism at Florida A&M and worked for nearly two years in TV news at a station in Sarasota before she heard her true calling.
“I always knew I wanted to come back to teaching,” she said. “It just happened sooner than I expected.”
Her adjustment was made easier by coming to Deltona Middle — another of the schools she attended. Former teachers are now colleagues and mentors, guiding her in establishing a classroom management style that both capitalizes on and belies her age and experience.
"Ms. Mason goes above and beyond to reach her students," Assistant Principal Susan Reaves said in an email. "It’s not just about student achievement, but about the relationship. Because of this, it is not merely quality instruction that brings her students to proficiency on state assessments, but the addition of having a teacher who truly cares for them."
Mason's "respect and rapport" was on display during a recent eighth-grade language arts class. With Mason perched on a desktop among the kids in the back of the class, a visitor might need a moment to identify the teacher until she started leading a discussion on Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart.”
"It's all about proximity," she said of her tendency to move about the class and sit among students when it helps stir conversation about the lessons.
In addition to seventh- and eighth-grade language arts, Mason also teaches a drama class and intro to technical theater. In all her classes, she seeks a connection with students that she feels is more important these days than when she was a student.
“There’s a lot more conversation and discussion now,” she said. “You’ve got to let them express themselves. You can’t just teach at the room all day. They just don’t learn like that.”
Her approach paid off with "The Tell-Tale Heart" when students started dissecting the murderer's motives to see past the bluster of an unreliable narrator and recognize the growing guilt of a madman.
Later, during a rehearsal for a performance of “Lion King Jr.” being put on by the school’s performing arts academy students, Mason set aside her teacher’s role and picked up a script to take the place of an absent cast member. She got to be a hyena.
Her glee at playing one of the bad boys of the story proved infectious as she sidled up to a queenly lioness, her dark eyes alight with a roguish gleam. The girl playing the lioness practically shivered with revulsion. In that moment, she understood the direction from her teachers about how she was supposed to react to the vile interlopers.
Later, as she helped another student fix her costume headdress, Mason laughed off the moment. Connecting with kids is more than trying to be the "cool" teacher, she explained; it's about creating an atmosphere where everyone can learn.
“They spend more time here than they do at home, so they need to feel comfortable here," Mason said of her students. "That’s the only way they can be motivated and reassured that they are capable of going beyond the limits they have become accustomed to working within.”
Reaves sees the advantage in that approach, too.
"Ms. Mason commits all to her students," the assistant principal said. "Her students know this and respect it. It is our firm belief that when students have a strong academic teacher on top of one who cares for them, they will be more motivated to be successful."
Shortly before the bell released the seventh-graders from their poetry introduction, Mason brought home the lesson with a new slide: a page of lines, their even spacing revealing them to be a poem even before she began to read.
“I fly with the stars in the skies, I am no longer trying to survive.”
Though Mason did not sing the words, recognition started to set in as students picked up on the rhythm in her cadence.
“I believe that life is a prize, but to live doesn’t mean you’re alive.”
Laughter rippled across the room and students started clapping in time with Mason’s reading. By the time she reached the end of Nicki Minaj’s “Moment for Life,” Mason had established her connection. Maybe — just maybe — these kids would find that poetry isn’t just for old people after all.
“We done everything they can think of, greatness is what we’re on the brink of.”