Take A Number and Get in the Crazy Line

Sunday morning.  10:05 am.
Mom and three handsome, smiling boys sitting nicely in the church pew, filled with the love of God and basking in the presence of the Holy Spirit.
"The Lord be with you."
"And also with you."

Rewind 10 minutes.

Sunday morning.  9:55 am.  
Mom and three disagreeable boys driving to church.
(Dad is conveniently home sick:)

Stop touching your brother!
No you may not take your iPod to church.
Joe!  That is not a church word!
Did you even brush your hair?
I said no name calling! God does not appreciate you calling your brother a butt face on the way to church!
Leave him alone!
Oh. My. God!  Stop that crap!  We are about to enter the House of the LORD!!

It's like driving around a circus full of monkeys.

But we leave the crazy in the car and when we get to that church door - we take a deep breath, put on a smile, and enter ready for what we came here for in the first place.  And at the end of the service, we are renewed and ready for the next battle.

Which will probably happen in the car on the way home.

I know you've been there.  It may not have been church - it may have been a trip to Grandma's or to the supermarket or cub scouts or whatever.  Inside the car, all the crazy in the universe descends upon your family and you start to wonder if the jail time would be worth duct taping them to the hood.

Then, you arrive, shout out the last threat of violence or loss of the xBox, leave the crazy in  the car and everyone pulls it together.
Ready to go.

As I reflected on all of this today, I realized two things.

1.  I do this everyday on the way to work.
I let go of my crazy.  (At least I try.)
My son's last minute 7a.m. panic "I have to print my homework right now and the printer won't work!"
Did I actually put food in Joe's lunchbox.
I hope that insane administrator leaves me alone today.
I swear if I have to fill out one more data sheet, I'm going to...

I need to leave it in the car, take a deep breath, put a smile on my face, and enter that classroom ready.
My crazy will still be sitting there in the car waiting for me when I leave school.

2.  My students can't always do this.

Emotion rides in with my students every day - fear, worry, anger, hunger, aggravation, anxiety, excitement, silliness, confusion...
Only they don't leave it in the car.  They bring it in with them.
In all it's glory and splendor.

I feel pressured by the pace of the day, the pace of the curriculum, the drive to meet assessment scores, the urgency to move on.
Pressured to ignore all that emotion spilling out all over the place and get ready for that danged test!

I need to stop.

Stop. Take a deep breath.

Take the time to acknowledge the feelings, to help them work through it, to be ready.

Breathe.

And all you legislators and administrators and educational  "experts" need to take a number and get in the crazy line.
Your cut scores and NCLB and rigor will have to wait until I sweep these emotions up off the floor and help some kids deal with some stuff.
My kids can't learn until they're ready.

And I am going to help them get ready.

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First Year Flashback

I am linking up with my friend Laurah from The ESOL Odyssey to take a look back at my very first year of teaching 20 years ago, and possibly pass along a few words of wisdom.

What age group and subject were you teaching?
I was teaching third grade at an inner city school right in the middle of the public housing projects. The kids were street wise, living in poverty, and immersed in a very violent and scary world. Driving to work, I would watch numerous drug deals in the neighborhood as the children walked to school. Shootings were so frequent, many children slept on the floor for safety, and I would have to put duct tape over the holes in the Plexiglas windows on some mornings. If we heard gunfire during the day, we would step away from the windows and keep on teaching. There were drugs, knives, used condoms, and all sorts of other fun things found on the playground. Parents sometimes would have physical fights in the school or on the sidewalk outside of school. The swat team was in my school on more than one occasion. When I started, I was the only white person in the entire building including students and staff. I was in absolute culture shock. But the community came to trust me and accept me (every single parent came to parent conferences that year!) and those teachers were wonderful to me – the young, fresh out of college, blonde haired white girl who had no business there. They took me under their wings and taught me to be the tough old bird I am today.

I am forever grateful for the five years of invaluable experience I received in that place and I carry those children in my prayers to this day.

What was your first classroom like?
My first classroom was not very big since the school was built in the 60’s – your basic cinderblock rectangle. The real story was under the classroom. The school was built on an old landfill so there was an issue with methane gas being released. There were vents outside the building but we also had methane detectors all over the building. We also had high levels of carbon dioxide. The school system’s grand solution to this problem? Open the windows.


Were you given supplies or materials?
I remember having most of what we needed. We had a computer lab which was a pretty big deal back then.  In the classroom, I had an overhead projector, a dot matrix printer and an Apple IIc that had a big 'ol floppy disc drive.  There were some textbooks and I made lots of games.  I think I was in complete survival mode and managed with what we had. The children brought nothing and every student in the school received free lunch.


What was the hardest part of your first year of teaching?
The children. Their lives were absolutely dreadful. They knew about things they shouldn’t know about. They lived in fear and hunger and want. I remember buying dozens of mittens and hats when it got cold and even a few pairs of shoes for some kids. It was heartbreaking.

What was the best part of your first year of teaching?
Survival. For some reason, probably ignorant youth, I had no fear. I was determined to make it work in that place and that is what I did.

What do you know now that you wish you knew that first year?
I am glad I did not know then what I know now. At this stage in the game, I have come to know the ugly truth behind the power and politics of education. Even though I have the ever-present optimism of a teacher, I also have a twinge of cynicism that comes with age and experience.
My teaching may not have been top of the line, but my younger self had only optimism and fearlessness. Hope and possibility. Not such a bad way to start out in this profession.

I just realized that I really have no magical words of wisdom to share with a new teacher. There is no right answer. Be grateful for the journey and lift up the children who are along for the ride.

If you would like to link up and share your first year memories, please click here!!

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