day of rest

Poised between thought and

execution, Sunday is

suspended in time

Visitors= Love

The wheelchair ramp that leads to my classroom affords me an early view of former students coming to visit, smiles wide, heads bobbing with purpose, pushing up the ramp. My heart swells a bit, acknowledging the effort and planning it took for these adolescents to put aside other endeavors to come visit my bungalow way at the back of the school. Generally it's delightful to get caught up, to hear tales of high school and rites of passage.

Generally.

Today is FRIDAY. It was a billion degrees in the classroom. My brain is mush. My emotional giving tank is on empty, and I am officially off the clock. I know it's the highest compliment, but my heart sank as three sets of kids came by today to say hello, a junior and some freshmen. I just couldn't stay in that nasty box a moment more. "Guys, I'm leaving as fast as I can, sorry," I call out. One freshie queries, "Why?" and is truly surprised at my alacrity to leave.

I suppose that's part of the compliment: that I love teaching so much that I reluctantly go home every night. Or perhaps it's a mild putdown, that anyone who pours so much into teaching must have no personal life.

All I know is that when it's a billion degrees, peace out and catch you later. 

Friday Afternoon Visitors

Your eyes open wide

when I say I'm leaving as 

soon as I can. 

"Why?"

First Week: the naming of names

I'd like to sound stirred and passionate, but I really am just tired.

The kids are overwhelmingly wonderful.  They happen to come with all these names, though.  I generally delight in names that are unusual, but navigating them the first week can be tricky. Kids can be very touchy if you pronounce their names--part of their identity!--incorrectly, charging you with the responsibility to get it right even though their parents were the ones who gave them unpronounceable, highly unusual, totally made up names.  This year I have Wuences who goes by David. Wonder why. I have Desteniey, pronounced destiny, but all weirdly spelled. In the past I had an Antione, but not pronounced "Ant-y-on" as it looks, but as it should be if it were spelled correctly: "Antoine." That same year I had an Antwan. At least it was phonetically easy. One year I had a girl whose full name was Mi Y. Yep, a one letter last name. Care to pronounce that? 

It also would help if people didn't all name their kids Austin and Justin and Taylor and Alexis and Alexandra and Alex and Tyler and Caitlin and Katelyn and Kaitlynne. Last year we had a set of identical twins whose names were Jonatan and Jonatas. (Yes, you read that correctly). So far I have almost every one remembered, ahead of the learning curve, but stumble over which girl is Katrina and which is Katarina in the same class. Of course. 

first day

they came in new clothes,

sat in old chairs, and they were

utterly precious

The Beatles and Big Tuesday

Almost there.

The desks are ready, books neatly covered and placed at right angles, each covered by a worn atlas. The whiteboard has the day's agenda (well, the history agenda, anyway).  Copies of the first week's work are in trays, awaiting distribution (well, the history work, anyway).  Almost everything is in place--only the reading books remain, and that is easy. 

Most of the kind and fabulous women in the English department met with me and helped me figure out the first week, and the other kind and fabulous woman lent me a complete unit for the second week. I still have a bajillion questions about how not to teach what they already know, how to find out what they don't, how to use the diagnostics that are supposed to answer those two questions, how to make sure I hit it all, how to really give these kids what they deserve. I can't live up to that, though, because. Because I won't be very good my first year.  I try to reconcile myself to that. I won't be terrible, far from it. I will get better. But it's the law of the rookie, the greenie, the beginner. I bring energy and drive and willingness, but they aren't substitutes for know-how! 

The task here is twofold. 

1) Do my best

2) Don't beat myself up for falling short of how effective I want to be

Unlike my classroom, my teaching is not almost there. But because of the kind and the fabulous, with the support of all the resources I graciously have been given, by following in the surer footsteps of others--like the Beatles sang, it's gonna be all right.

Windex? Ha!

We attack brown dust 

that, phoenix-like, despite all,

reappears somehow...