The Terrors of Teaching: Part I

The Terrors of Teaching: Part I

First and foremost, I love being an educator. I decided when I was in elementary school that teaching was what I wanted to do with my life. I also wanted to be a fashion designer, a singer, and an actress; teaching was always on the top of my list, though.

I have taught for 7 years. I returned to the school from which I graduated many years ago. Walking down the halls during my first couple of years, I was fill with a variety of emotions. There is one stop that alumni refer to as The Indian Tile. Each time I would cross that section, an area where many of us would meet up between classes, I felt like I was being transported to the past.

I was an academically advanced student and I was raise with very high morals. Yet, I became a state ward who did not have any regard for my future. 

Despite the best attempts by my parents, I had serious behavior and mood disturbances throughout junior high and high school. After trying every intervention possible, I had come to a place of potential legal trouble and/or serious physical injury. By 10th grade, there was nothing anyone could do to stop me from "going 100 miles per hour towards a concrete wall," as my mother would say. She mostly likely suffered the most because she could not save me from myself.

I wasn't a drug user, I wasn't a thief, and I wasn't promiscuous (although, all those rumors followed me throughout high school). I was angry and very defiant; it sounds so simple and easy to handle, but it certainly was not for those that tried to help me. I couldn't control my rage and anyone was a potential victim of a blow-up or a fight. I lived for picking fights during those days for the slightest offense, even if I knew that I wasn't going to "win." With what we as a society now know, one could say that I was a bully. It can also be argued that I was teenager with long-standing post-traumatic stress, anxiety, and clinical depression. Anger and depression was all that I felt for many years; the only way that I knew how to cope with my "diagnoses" was to lash out with vicious verbal and physical attacks.

I can never apologize enough to the people who I unjustly hurt.

As a teacher, I have seen children who truly know what trauma and suffering is in their young lives. While most parents seem to do the best that they can, there are always those that abuse and/or neglect the needs of their children. 

My school has many problems, but the lack of security at home and the amplified rate of "fight or flight" is a major factor. In fact, school serves as a safe haven for many kids. 

The fact is that our schools are not going to have great change until the community rallies together to bring about change in our neighborhoods.

Sadly, the socioeconomic struggles have bled over to the schools. The two schools in this video are within walking distance from another. It was said that the "lesser school" mentioned was said to be transformed into a similiar school to the "nicer one." There have been changes that have occured within our district since that was stated and I am holding faith that all students will recieve a "fair and equitable" education regardless of any behavioral or socioeconomical struggles.


Until Next Time,

LEARN LOUDLY

Blogging is for the Bats

I love to write. 

I am in no way a novelist or a poet; in fact, my writing is full of grammatical errors like comma splices and pronoun-antecedent agreement problems. I know this about myself. As an English teacher, it is a source of great shame; as an English major, I am content with my extreme love of literature being enough. I am not one for quality rhetoric.

Nonetheless, I like to write and share my ideas.

I have been writing all of my life, aside from traditional academics. I used to create little picture book stories. My second grade teacher was very impressed. I created a story for her called “Ms. June Bug.” She said that I would be an author one day and a part of me always clung to that idea.

My next venture in book making was in third grade when I wrote “Frosty the Ax Murderer”, a tale of a snowman who vowed revenge for the children allowing him to melt away. Needless to say, this deeply disturbed my mother.

This idea is apparently not unique, even though it was to my mom in 1986. 

There was a time in college when I was told that I was a good poet. Upon reflection and maturity, I realized that I am a horrendous poet.  Most teenagers are, in my opinion. I have only known three people who were capable of writing poetry worth reading as teens and young adults: Sarah, Brad, and Neal. Everyone else was/is producing the same trite couplets that all forlorn and angst-ridden teens has written over the decades.

They were really wanna-be Beatniks, which turned into Hipsters. 

I love reading, analyzing, and discussing poetry. It is one of my strengths. Despite my knowledge of the technical aspects of poetry, it is far from my gift. In my early twenties, I realized that the wanna-be beat-niks who gave my poetry any ounce of admiration were actually only trying to advance their access to a (probably not-so-poetic) encounter with me. It never worked.

I had one glimmering moment of success with a short story and it is an idea that I play with to this day. I needed a scholarship and the prompt was so easily manipulated for the audience that within a few hours, I produced a piece that tugged at their heartstrings. It served a purpose and met the needs of the intended audience to get the scholarship. Although the piece had my voice all through it, it was underdeveloped and it was my sad attempt to be the next Flannery O’Connor. They say that you write what you know and what I know is Southern culture and the complexities of crazy, Southern women and the odd dynamics that are shared between them.

Still, I am no writer.

I eventually found my best form of creating when I became a teacher. I took great pride in myself for writing some of the best lesson plans out there. Maybe I am simply full of a false bravado in this department, but I own it for now.  

I have to give all the credit for this ability to the influence of my professors (Dr. Y, Dr. V, and Dr. L) and my 1^st year mentor because they all challenged me to go with “thinking outside of the box” while meeting the requirements that are set for educators. It could be that I came in at a time when many people in my profession were suffering from burn-out and had resorted to not “recreating the wheel” by utilizing online-resources. Some call that “working smarter and not harder.” I don’t have an opinion on it, either way. I wanted to create lesson plans that were true to my identity as a teacher and that I felt would be most effective for my students. I could find great ideas in other resources and through collaboration, but I still had to create what was me and was good for my students.

Yet, with the impending threat of a state-takeover and the ever-present, profiting-making corporate educational programs in our nation’s public schools, my ability to write an amazing and innovative lesson has been trampled and degraded because it did not fit the format of the corporations that is infiltrating schools across this country. I have been tied down to becoming a “YES” woman and have had all creativity stripped from me, as deviating one bit is taken as an act of insubordination instead of an act of trying to reach my particular set of students. There seemed to be no value in the success that I was producing in the classroom, or so I felt in that time and space. I, with my very vocal determination to do what is best for students, became a sitting duck that was quickly used as an “example.” With each defense that I provided, each attempt to not be bullied or wrongly accused, each attempt to keep the instruction true to the needs of the students, I became more and more of a target. I had not mastered handling these situations with grace and professionalism. I resigned myself to what I viewed as submission, but may make me a stronger educator.

I have spent my entire summer reconciling myself to the fact that I am not to be a “trailblazer” in education, but rather a “puppet.” Does this mean that I will give my students less? Absolutely not. I will continue to walk into my classroom everyday and teach each child as much as a I can with what I am told to do. I do this for me and my students – no one else. It does mean that I, like so many teachers across this country, have to face the fact that we are now merely a part of the political and corporate game that has become education.

I was very close to leaving the field, yet this was not fathomable to me. Teaching has been my dream profession since I was very young. God calls me to teach. In fact, I feel called to teach at a school that many people locally judge rather unfairly and harshly, despite the fact that we have a great amount of wonderful students who achieve great things in life and a large amount of staff with the heart and knowledge that surpasses most. I teach every child that walks through my door with all that I have because that is what every student deserves. That is the level that I choose to challenge myself to achieve every day.

Per usual, I digress.

                   

I wanted an outlet for my thoughts and opinions. I would get into these social media rants and debates. I have opinions that I want to share and discuss. The limited character space on social media makes it difficult to express it all and the unchecked emotions that come from an immediate type and click often detract from the validity of any point that is being made.

A secondary draw to blogging is that I like to talk about a wide-range of things: Pinterest fails, the crazy situations that I get into, life as a reformed hooligan, being a mom, a wife, an ex-wife, and so forth. It isn’t that I think the world cares, but, like with teaching, it is worth the work to reach just one person.

I very stupidly believed that blogging would come easily to me. I type exceptionally fast and I run my mouth constantly (hence, the title of my page).

Yet, it didn't. 

I went stale right out of the gate. I continued to make lists of things that I wanted to discuss, but did not find the time or momentum to put it down on paper.

I have two friends that are actual authors (Check them out because they are both amazingly gifted people Celia Anderson and Brad Carter). They are very different writers, but both are passionate about what they create and dedicate themselves to their craft. In fact, they have had that drive since high school.

I have lacked the dedication to even write my little rants and raves about life. Anyone who is invested in a venture professionally or personally has to create a certain amount of time and effort for their projects and goals. I spent the first half of summer moping over the last school year. After reflecting about what I needed to do to remain a teacher (which felt like a ritualistic sacrifice akin to a scene of out Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom), I began working on improving my outlook on my personal and professional life. I had to cut out a lot of negativity with myself, my environment, and my associates.

I am still more misanthropic than Polly-Anna, so don’t let any positive spin confuse you.

Yet, being able to have dreams and to survive suffering the bumps and bruises of recognizing my shortcomings, being shoved into metaphorical boxes, and learning that my spur-of-the-moment efforts are not going to cut it in life is freeing.

Being transparent and raw, is not good for the ego, but it does seem to soothe the soul and provide hope that I can still be me without all of the battles that I either create or in which I willingly engage.

Until next time,

LIVE LOUDLY!!!