I looked at the date of my last post—September 16; it has been
a while since I last wrote, but it feels like no time at all. The last few weeks
have been a whirlwind. As always, there have been peaks and valleys, but a
routine is starting to build such that the swing of emotions has settled down.
It’s an interesting feeling—each day is tiresome and challenging, but time
passes with incredible pace. I am already done with my first quarter! I made it
to my first real vacation, where I get to travel home for the first time in
nearly a year and spend at least a little bit of time sitting around doing
absolutely nothing. But more importantly, these nine days off give me a chance
to reflect on the last few months without the daily stress of waking up too
early, going to bed too late, and lesson planning during nearly every free
moment. Much has happened during this time, and I believe that in terms of
personal transformation, my experiences as a teacher have changed me more than
during any other time in my life.
My first few weeks as a real teacher were, quite honestly,
miserable. No amount of training can fully prepare you for this work, but with
only a few weeks of summer school teaching (where I only taught an hour a day)
under my belt, I honestly had no idea what I was doing on day one. I had poorly
planned lessons, inconsistent and ineffective classroom procedures, and no
relationships with students. Days ranged from decent—where I felt like I could
make it through the end of the year—to terrible—where I wanted to quit on the
spot. At the end of my first quarter, things have greatly improved. I still
have some poorly planned lessons; I still have many inconsistent and
ineffective classroom procedures. However, my relationships with students have
deepened. During those first few weeks, I remember lamenting to my friends and
co-workers how my students were so far behind. “They don’t know how to sit
still. They don’t know how to take notes. They don’t even know how to write
their name on a paper.” I fixated on their shortcomings because that was all I
could see. In retrospect, I blamed them because I could not blame myself. I am
not sure I could have done it differently. As unfair as it was to cast my
students in such an unfavorable light, if I would have dwelled on my own
failures I am not sure I could have made it through those first few weeks. What
allowed me to move past this pessimism was getting to know my students—understanding
their interests, how they think, what challenges they face. They have also
learned more about me—where I am from, why I am here, what kind of person I am.
Even after two months, these relationships are still relatively shallow. From
their perspective, I am still an outsider—White, privileged, not from their
neighborhood. Not enough time has passed for me to break away from that
characterization. However, one thing that has helped me tremendously is my age.
As I was explaining to some of my students this week, I am closer to them in
age than I am to most of my colleagues! Often, I feel I have more in common
with my students than I do with the other adults at my school. I think this has
helped my students (and me) feel more comfortable in my classroom. This has
made all of the difference in the last few weeks. Over summer training, we talked
frequently about “asset-based thinking”, which is a fancy way of describing how
to focus on a person’s strengths instead of their weaknesses. We were
constantly reminded to “see the best in our students” and to build our lessons
around leveraging their strengths to transcend their struggles. This mode of
thinking is absolutely correct and must be implemented to be a successful
teacher, but what I failed to understand is that without building the emotional
connection with your students, asset-based thinking is impossible or, at best,
hopelessly shallow. It takes an exceptional level of compassion to fully
embrace others without building any sort of relationship with them. I am the
first to admit that I do not possess that level of compassion at this time.
Thus, to truly see my students as wonderful, unique individuals requires time to
connect with them on a personal level. That process began the first day they
walked through my door and will continue throughout the entire year, but I am
happy to say that I have started to see those relationships blossom.
One of the important changes over the last few weeks has
been that I have started to have fun with my students. I arrived at my school
with a strong sense of my mission—to achieve transformational change for my
students and help them reach their personal vision of success. Looking back at
my earlier posts, that mission has been constant in my mind. It is what allowed
me to get up each morning and make it through the day. A strong mission can
drive individuals and groups to reach incredible heights, endure immense pain,
and overcome unthinkable adversity. A common thread unites the entire span of
human history—great accomplishments derive from a great sense of purpose.
Without purpose, we are nothing. However, life is not purely defined by
purpose. I do not believe that I exist solely to make the world a better place.
I am not a martyr. More importantly, I cannot survive in this profession purely
fueled by a mission, no matter how firmly I believe in it. I cannot be an
effective teacher solely from a sense of purpose. Thus, my most important
takeaway from my first months in the classroom is that I must enjoy my work to
be successful. Further, to truly achieve transformational change in my
classroom requires not just that students work diligently to reach their goals,
but that they enjoy doing so. Not every single waking second needs to be
enjoyable (though some of my students think it should be that way), but for
students and teachers there must be moments of mutual joy—times where the distinction
of “adult vs. child” falls away, if even just for an instant. For many of my students
there are so many reasons for stress and despair in their lives that even those
few minutes of pristine happiness make them want to come to school. For me, so
much extra (for lack of a better word) crap goes along with being a teacher in
an under-resourced school that the moments where I can simply enjoy interacting
with my students are invaluable.
As I mentioned, the last few weeks of teaching have been
much more enjoyable because of the relationships I have started to form with my
students. These relationships are what create the moments of joy, which makes
it easier to get up every morning. In an earlier post, I wrote about a pretty
awful day—a day that I completely lost control of a class. I will never forget
that day; it is a reminder of how challenging and depressing this work can be.
In part two of my post, I want to share a different day. Ironically, it is also
a day I will never forget—another day that I completely lost control of a class.
This time, however, losing control didn’t turn out to be such a bad thing.
To be continued…
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