TEACHER'S CORNER: ENGLISH TEACHER FAVORS SHARING LITERATURE

Most English teachers enjoy teaching literature more than other aspects of their discipline, and Cape Girardeau Central High School's Dr. Al Nicolai is no different.

Nicolai, who has taught English at both the collegiate and high school levels, said literature is a favorite because teachers can share a part of themselves with their favorite selections. He believes teachers get satisfaction because stories don't lose their potency regardless of how many times they are read.

"The satisfaction in sharing literature comes on those days when the selection has an impact on the majority of the students, and they react as if a light has just gone on in them," said Nicolai, who has been teaching language arts since 1976. "I call this the 'Wow Effect.' It's when we read a literary selection and pause at the end for reaction and thought: At the best of these times one of the students says, 'Wow.'"

Nicolai, whose academic specialty is Shakespeare, said he likes to have his students read literature aloud as often as possible. This often limits them to shorter selections, like poems and short stories, but there is still much to choose from.

"Recently, we read Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, and I could tell from how quiet and attentive the students were that the words still had an impact more than a hundred years after they were written," he said. "At the end, we had that moment of silent reflection, and then somebody said 'Wow.' Once again, literature had demonstrated its potent effect on another generation of readers."

Nicolai and his wife, Brenda, have a 14-year old son named Tim. He is a former president of the Noon Optimist Club and enjoys softball, racquetball and photography in his spare time.