I feel imprisoned in my school. There is so much commotion, so much movement, so many voices, loud, trying to be heard. I have to struggle and strain my voice just to get a word in with my seventh graders. It makes me want to fall to my knees in tears, and the thought of doing it again in the next period or the next day breaks my heart right in the middle of class.
Sometimes, one can just tell that it will be a bad day. Take today, for example. I forgot my lunch, a rock dinged my windshield on the Beltway, the copy machine needed lots of coaxing and TLC before it would work, the custodial staff had completely rearranged my desks, the school was sweltering, and I basically decided it would be a bad day before the children even arrived. And so it was a bad day, or at least not a good day, and certainly not the day I had hoped would begin my final push of the year.
Those days for me can only be remedied by taking the time to appreciate natural sources of happiness. I spent a good portion of this evening ruminating on my perfectly happy life outside of the classroom. I went outside and let the unseasonably warm air wrap me up like a cozy blanket; it actually felt as though it were physically comforting me. I also chose to think about the tiny things that show me how lucky and loved I am, like the pictures of me displayed in all of my aunts’ homes, my entire family’s unfaltering interest in my life, my mom telling me that my daddy - gasp - had already picked out a birthday gift for me, and so on and so forth. Lots of times I do not even realize how much these small gestures mean to me until I allow myself to consider them. I feel a sudden urge to deliver handwritten thank you letters for some of these things that have become so customary in my life that I do not even think of them as special.
Allowing myself to get lost in my own world of thoughts at my earliest convenience each and every day, and especially on the bad ones, is one of the things that has been the most helpful in preserving my sanity as I crawl though my first year of teaching. Over the summer, my mentor teacher gave me a mug that had the following, probably sadly cliched quote emblazoned on its surface:
“Peace. It does not mean to be in a place where there is no noise, trouble or hard work. It means to be in the midst of those things and still be calm in your heart.”
I am working on being calm in my heart, because I am certainly in the midst of all of those daily at my school.
And tomorrow is a new day.
(via audreyhepburncomplex)
Treasure the teachers in your life. Part of my wife’s gift is the joy she takes in her work. She works incredibly hard - if you break it down into hours spent on job-related activities, she’s probably only making a few bucks an hour, overall - and it is clear that many of her students respond. It is clear from correspondence she’s received that Dana has made a difference in her students’ lives and their later education.
But I also responded to an e-mail from one of my 8-year-old daughter’s teachers this morning and it got me to thinking about this. The teacher realized that Maggie was trying to figure her out and just wanted to share it with me.
Maggie really likes this teacher, but she’s confounded by the fact that the teacher is tough. She sets limits and makes it clear to Maggie that there are consequences, when necessary. So Maggie asked me the other day if I ever had a teacher who seemed kind of mean, but wasn’t. And I told her about my high school chorus teacher, who also ended up being my private voice teacher. Mr. Binkley was gruff, sarcastic to a withering degree and absolutely beloved by every student who ever had him for anything. As mean as he could seem - he could be temperamental to an almost chair-throwing degree - students knew one thing about Bob Binkley: he gave a damn. He gave a damn about you. Under his toughness was a kind and generous heart. It was a rare student who didn’t feel at least a little devotion to Bob years after we left that school.
I told Maggie about Mr. Binkley in simple terms, though - just that he seemed mean in class, but that he actually cared more about you and how you were doing than most of the other teachers in school.
Maggie shared what she understood from our talk with her teacher, Ms. S. Ms. S. wrote the following in her e-mail to me (I’ve edited a bit for clarity): “I have to tell you what she told me… ‘cause I think she was applying this to me. She said when my dad was in school he had a teacher he didn’t think was nice but when he talked to [him… he] was really nice so and [dad] actually liked [the teacher]. I said, ‘Maggie do you think I am not nice?’ She said no, you are nice sometimes.”
I told the teacher a fuller version of what I’d said to Maggie. And I thanked her - because I can tell she’s making a difference in my daughter’s life.
Lots of teachers are coasting, picking up a check, doing the bare minimum. Too often, they and the ones who do much worse make the news, get all the press.
But the ones who give a shit? They are GOLD. Treasure them. If you ever had one like that and are in a position to tell them thank you, DO IT. For the best teachers, the ones for whom it is a calling, a word of thanks from an old student, saying “I had no idea what you were doing, but I do now, and thank you,” means more than they could probably express. Teachers like that - the ones I’ve treasured, my own wife, my daughter’s Ms. S. - want to make a difference in someone’s life.
If that’s not a higher calling, I don’t know what is.
Thank you for sharing this.
(I think I want to teach for real, y’all, but it scares the shit out of me. So much responsibility.)
I think this is lovely in a lot of ways, and I am so happy this person has been surrounded by excellent teachers like the ones mentioned.I know from having had great teachers that the effects they have on you can be lifelong. I still remember a poem from a plaque my first-grade teacher, Mrs. Altemose, gave to me, word for word. I had the same reading teacher, Mrs. Johnson, in fourth and sixth grade, and that woman instilled a love of reading and writing in me that I will never, ever forget. My seventh grade writing teacher, Miss Denicoula, did the same thing with writing. Looking back, many of the writing skills I took with me to college and that brought me to where I am now were learned from seventh grade writing with Miss D.
Reading this is stressful for me as a teacher, though. In fact, it makes me want to cry because I know I am not living up to these “excellent teacher” standards about which so many people have such strong opinions. I long to be the type of teacher who is positively affecting kids, but I feel like I am constantly treading water — just trying to stay afloat — and am not having that life-changing impact I wish I could. Maybe I am one of the teachers who is doing the bare minimum; I think people might perceive me that way. But I surely feel like I am constantly working. My students are the only thing I think about. I think about them as soon as I wake up in the morning, I think about them before I go to bed at night. I think about what they say about me and wonder if I should take it personally. I agonize over what they don’t know, I feel sick to my stomach over what I haven’t yet covered.I don’t know what my students think or how they feel about the impact I’m having on their lives. They probably think I am constantly cranky, they probably think I’m mean, and I wonder if they realize that that just comes out because I so badly want them to learn something their behaviors are preventing me from teaching. I am doing the best I can, and that very well may not be enough.
I will tell you one thing: just doing the bare minimum is still a hell of a lot of work.
Quotes from yesterday:
“Miss, I found you on Facebook!”
“You did? I thought I made myself unsearchable….”
“Oh, we can’t see your page but we can see your picture. I didn’t want to friend request you, but my dad did.”
“I thought I made it so you couldn’t see my picture…”
“Did you do that because of us?”
“Wait — how many of you have stalked me on the internet?”
75% of the class raises their hands.
—-
“But you’re OLD”
“I am sure I am the youngest teacher you have ever had.”
“Nuh uh, I had a teacher who was like 21 or 22. She JUST got out of college.”
“And when do you think I got out of college? Oh wait, you thought I grew up in the 60s or 70s, nevermind”
“You still remember that? I only said that because…ya know..your facial structure looks…older…you know, like your wrinkles and stuff”
“WRINKLES?!”
“Yeah, like on your forehead”
Another student — “OH THAT’S FROM FROWNING SO MUCH, MISS! YOU CAN GET STUFF FOR THAT!”
—-
[completely different from the above conversation]
“I FOUND YOU ON MYSPACE, MISS!”
“I don’t have myspace, so that would be impossible”
“Well, whoever I found looked just like you”
“What a coincidence”
“Yeah, and it had to be you, you know what the headline said?”
“The what?”
“IT SAID MR. R” [teacher they are all convinced I’m dating]
My spelling bee took five minutes because my kids cannot spell.
Ice skating with my seventh graders: A+ - they loved teaching their teacher how to skate. Also, I did not fall once, which made me feel quite smug considering the fact that at least one student confessed her burning desire to watch me “break [my] butt.”
Teaching a group of 29 students to play mafia after a field trip: D (Only because I was able to find some humor in the disaster that occurred as a result of my effort) - I happen to think mafia is one of the most fun and addictive group games ever. They were horrible at it and kept yelling “MISS!!! MY TICKET IS BLANK!!!!” immediately following my explanation of the fact that a) you must not tell anyone what your ticket says and b) a blank ticket means you are merely a villager. The kids who were in the mafia kept talking while they were supposed to be choosing the village-person to off. While they were deliberating who the killer might be, they all either screamed someone’s name at random simply because they had some sort of grudge with that person, or the mafioso had made it so obvious that it was pointless to even deliberate. Then they told me they hated the game and did not want to play anymore. I can’t imagine why.
When I conceded and went behind my desk to enter grades, they complained that they were bored and wanted to play a game. What is the mind of a seventh grader? How does it work?
you guys. all moved in. still have nowhere for my clothes.
Your bedspread is so pretty! Is it old?
Student: Miss, you need to get a pair of heels.
After mentioning something about my roommate…
Student: Whaaa? A ROOMMATE?! Where do you live?!
Me: In an apartment
Student: You have a ROOMMATE?
[Girls scream shut up to this kid]
Me: Yes
Student: WHY?
[Girls continue to scream at the kid to shut up]
Me: Guess I just can’t afford to live alone.
Student: but a ROOMMATE?
Me: What is wrong with that?
Student: There’s nothing wrong with it, but I mean…isn’t it time that you get engaged or married or something?
[Girls scream shut up again, kid shuts up]
[After reading I Have a Dream]
Student: Miss, what was it like when you were growing up? Do you remember people being treated this way?
Me: What?
Student: Well, didn’t you grow up in, like, the ’60s or ’70s?
Me: Um. I grew up in the 90s.