Life is grand and I'm starting to get a hang of this teaching thing. The reason I haven't written in 4 MONTHS is because it took a lot of time to get to this point. What point? The point in my career where I feel comfortable not spending half of my week in my classroom and the other half doing work for my classroom at home. I hadn't quite figured out how to mix play and work together. I still haven't, but I feel less guilty when I just have fun.
Let me run down a list of events that have occurred in my classroom since my last post from November.
- Saw the production of "White Christmas" at the high school
- Took a few kids to a performance of "The Nutcracker"
- Had a school Christmas concert
- Took some kids to "The Music Man" at the Ellen Eccles Theater
- Went and saw Scrap Arts perform at the Ellen Eccles Theater
- Celebrated Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Valentines with some pretty awesome parties
- We learned some...stuff...as well
I feel like being a teacher is like being trapped in a time vortex where the time seems to pass really fast around you, but inside the classroom it tends to stand still. It seems like just yesterday I had walked in and greeted my students the first day of school. Only when I leave the worm hole of time, which is my classroom door, do I realize that I've actually been there for almost 8 MONTHS! I only hope that my kids have learned something from me.
I've changed routines, teaching methods, ideologies, and philosophies so many times that my mind is just a big jumbled mess of matter. I'm trying to wrap my head around the things that I've seen work and (more commonly) those that haven't. I hope I'm a better teacher than I was when I started. I hope I'm still as excited to walk into my classroom 120 days into the school year as I was on day 1. I PRAY my kids are smarter on day 180 than they were on day -1. I get really scared that they will have digressed instead of progressed.
This is my greatest fear as a teacher. I never realized how hard it is to reach EVERY SINGLE STUDENT! I've really tried, but no one has ever told me that it's not possible (insert "gasp" here). We've always been taught that we HAVE to reach everyone and that if we don't then we are to blame for their failure. My real job as a teacher should be what my mentor and life hero Rafe Esquith has once said. "Kids do not have an equal opportunity in our schools, but once given that equal opportunity; the students must produce." Once I realized that all I need to do is at least PROVIDE a chance for them to succeed, the students must then be the ones responsible for their overall success. You can lead a horse to water...
Here is a clip of my hero talking about a book he wrote a while ago. I would highly recommend his books to every teacher and parent. you can also visit his class website http://hobartshakespeareans.org/
Wow. I'm impressed you've gotten to this point. TEACH ME HOW TO GET THERE! I'm finally getting to the point where I'm accepting the fact that 70 hour work weeks are just my reality! But, you understand. :) I love the holiday parties that you have. I realize that our classrooms are very different places, but I think I should try to implement a few more "parties" into my class. I am taking one of my classes to a production of Macbeth in a couple of weeks. I'm pretty excited about that one!
ReplyDeleteOh Chelle, don't read to much into my statement of BEING THERE. I definitely spend too much time preparing lessons, but I'm able to plan a lot more in one day for the whole week instead of planning each day. It's so nice to have a couple of days that I'm not FULLY stressed. Also, Macbeth sounds awesome and I wish there was something coming up in Logan that would be cool to take my students to. Congrats on the last play you just did as well.
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