Some of them had a rudimentary grasp of sentence structure, and could even write a compound sentence on demand. But it was likely to be something like one of her favorites, “Bill have him a coat, but I be cold.” It was a compound sentence. There was no way to get around it. Others had a better command of the proper use of verbs, but they couldn’t spell. Sally liked a sentence she’d gotten on one paper in which the student had talked about “bushing his tooths.” Even with all the problems that some students had, however, Sally liked teaching the class. She liked the students, and she liked helping them overcome their more obvious problems. But today she had trouble keeping her mind on the students’ problems because her sleep had been disturbed by dreams of some ragged woman, Sarah Good most likely, being dragged before a huge wooden structure upon which several men in dark robes sat, looking down on her accusingly and questioning her about things Sally couldn’t understand.
