Your memories: 'My teacher spoke like a film star'

'When I was at primary school they had an exchange system where a few of our teachers swapped with American teachers for a whole year," says Niddrie-raised Isa Duncan (nee Cassidy), 71, who now lives at Dumbiedykes.

"We had one of these teachers in my class, Miss Darge, and I loved her straight away. Her way of talking was just like the way film stars spoke when I went to the local picture house. Also, she was so gentle after the strict discipline I had grown accustomed to.

"She was the first lady I had ever seen with blue hair. I wondered about that hair and thought perhaps it grew that colour only in America. I remember once I had lost my hat and was very upset and crying. She asked what was wrong and I said my mother would kill me because I had lost my 'pixie'.

"She gave me some sweets and said, 'Don't worry, your pixie is away back to sit on a toadstool'. I thought about this for a while, wondering why she would think my hat was sitting on a toadstool, but to get off lightly from the lost hat I asked her to write a note to my mother so that I wouldn't get my bottom smacked. She did, but it didn't work - no pixie so no tea for me that night.

"While my American teacher was there, we were overjoyed one day to receive boxes of lovely red apples. All the children were given four apples to take home, some were given more if they had bigger families.

"Our headmaster handed them to us from the boxes that were stacked on top of each other in the playground. This was a gift from the academy where my teacher taught in Boston before she came to us for those three terms.

"She left her mark on me because in that short time I came to respect and love her dearly. That lady taught me never to be afraid to express myself through words, to which spelling and grammar came second best. I learned to relate with writing what was in my heart without fear of ridicule."