I had a real teacher moment today

Today I had one of my two high school classes, wherein we read The Fellowship of the Ring. Tolkien is an author that is near and dear to my heart because he was a medievalist like I aspire to be and I love finding those connections to medieval literature in his works. Last week, this particular section didn't go so well; my kids were really resistant to reading and didn't think it was relevant to their lives, etc., etc.... basic high school excuses.

All week long, I've been thinking about this class and agonizing over it. Part of me wanted to come in defensive today, ready to defend my beloved author and familiar world of Middle Earth; the other, more practical, part of me knew that that was the best way to drive these kids away. I decided that the best option was to go in with an open mind and let them surprise me. And boy did they ever surprise me.

At first, they were reticent to speak, no matter how much I simplified the questions. Then one girl raised her hand and said "Can I be real honest here?"

"Yes," I replied, "as long as you can be nice about it."

"I don't know who nobody [sic] in this danged book is! I read and could probably answer your questions, but I don't know who you're asking about!"

The lightbulb went on in my own head.

"Oh! Is anyone else having the same trouble as A-----?" I asked.

A chorus of "yes!" rose from my students.

So I adjusted. We made a chart on the board with the various characters and who they were and then I sat on the edge of my desk, just like my dear teacher Dr. J did and talked with them. We had a very adult-level conversation about the ethics of Bilbo not killing Gollum when Bilbo got the Ring, as well as Frodo's choice to take on the burden. We talked about why Gandalf could not take the Ring himself, because of the corrupting influence of the dark power and how fraught with peril Frodo's journey would be. It was a truly excellent conversation and I was proud of them because just about every kid got really vocally involved.

After this, we took a break for the bathroom and as I was following my students back to our room, I hung back because a couple of my students (girls with whom I had had some attitude problems last week) were eating. They saw me and promised that they were "almost done," and I told them that when I was in high school, I used to bring food in my purse and sneak eating all the time. They look shocked, so I continued, telling them that I had texted in class before and had conversations behind the teacher's back... that's how I knew that they were doing that behind mine. One of them high-fived me and said she thought I would have been one of those "goody goody little perfect students" and she was shocked. Her shock came, I think, at finding that I was not as superhuman as they thought. After that conversation, though, I had no more trouble with them; it was as if they needed me to come down to their level, just a little, which I did, and we got a lot accomplished when we were on the same page.

This, my friends, is why I do what I do. Even though they frustrate me sometimes (or a lot), I truly do care for every one of my students, from the toughest to the sweetest, and small breakthroughs like this are what let me know that I'm doing my job effectively. And that's worth more than anything.

I went shopping today with a gift card that I received for my graduation. With it, I bought 4 skirts and a sweater; all grownup clothes. To go with those clothes, I needed a new pair of shoes because I had no navy shoes. I ended up with a rather flat pair of loafers: teacher shoes. My camera cord is a bit lost at the moment, so I can't post a picture, but they're pretty basic navy blue loafers. You know, the kind I said I'd never wear until I was a mom.

But... when I'm teaching 3 two and a half hour classes in a day where I'm on my feet the whole time, comfort trumps fashion. So here I am, owning teacher shoes. And not really sure how to feel about that.

Third grade is my favorite

I have 7 third grade boys on Thursday afternoons and I really think it's my favorite class to teach. Today, we were working on punctuation marks as a part of the fluency training we do. We talked about several different kinds of punctuation and what that meant for reading out loud. They had some trouble, so I put some of the marks up on the board for them to identify. Our exchange went like this:

Me: (writes a comma on the board)

Boy 1: Ooo! A pause!

Me: Yep, that's what it does, but we call it a comma.

(writes quotation marks on the board)

Boy 2: Ooo! Ooo! Me me me! Those are... concentration marks!

Me: (stifling a giggle) Actually we call them quotation marks.

(writes an exclamation point on the board)

Boy 3: Hey! An excitement mark!

Earlier in that same class, we'd been reading a book about a dog and the discussion turned to pets. One of my students said he had a new dog.

Me: Oh, wow! What kind of dog?

Boy: A Pomeranian mixed with something else

Me: Is it a boy dog or a girl dog?

Boy: Girl dog

Me: What's her name?

Boy: Lola Ballerina. My sister named it. It's a stupid name. And I'm pretty sure my Papaw hates the dog. Stupid dog.

I love my boys.

I love my job, but...

Today was hard. As my supervisor put it, I had some very human mistakes. I also had situations that I had no control over that I had to deal with; by the time I left school, they were all worked out, but it still made for a long day. When I got back, I was exhausted, but I still had several hours of work to do. I have, however, come up with a good plan for dealing with days like this.

1. Get in bed and wallow for at least 30 minutes in the fact that I had a bad day.

2. Call my mommy and explain what happened.

3. Have a piece of dark chocolate.

4. Sit back and look at each situation analytically to figure out how that can be avoided in the future.

5. Get out of bed.

6. Leave the room and decide that when I come back, all negativity towards the day is gone.

Surprisingly enough, that worked! I left for dinner and came back about an hour and a half later with a pillbox, toothpaste, a copy of Real Simple and some post-it notes with an "M" on them and I was ready to settle back into work. And suddenly, it's easier for me to remember, in the words of Robert Browning, that "God's in his heaven; all's right with the world."