Thursday, March 31, 2005

Everything I Know, I Learned from Horses

There are two quotes that come to mind when people ask me what teaching is like. These are also the same quotes I say to myself to make myself feel better when I feel like I'm a lousy teacher.

The first quote: "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink." No matter how well I try to teach and teach to the best of my capabilities, I still can't make a student want to learn. I can teach them to read, but that doesn't mean they'll understand. I can teach them to write, but that doesn't mean they'll think and have ideas on their own. I can teach them compassion, but that doesn't mean they'll practice it.

The second quote: "... like beating a dead horse." I can pound these lessons over and over and over again... and I'll still get nowhere.

It's depresssing, but at times it can be uplifting. I know it's not my fault if these kids fail. I know that I've done every little thing I possibly can. I've reached my limits. The kids still need to reach theirs.

Wednesday, March 30, 2005

Go Home!

I had tutorial after school today from 3-4pm. At 4pm, it was actually nice and quiet and peaceful. I locked my door and got down to work. I was working as a busy bee when at 5:15pm, Needy comes knocking on my door. Luckily, it was locked and I was working at my desk where I can't be seen from the windows. A few moments later, he went away.

Only nerds stay at school past 5pm, and Needy is not one of those kids. Oh, he irks me!

Tuesday, March 29, 2005

Highs and Lows: Two Boys

No, this is not one of those pedophile stories.

This story is about the highs and lows of teaching.

I have two boys in two different classes. One has been with me since the school year started, and the other just transferred in at the beginning of the second semester. The first boy shall be called Needy and the other one shall be called Indie (for Independent).

Needy was generally a good kid until his grades started slipping. Since that time, he didn't feel the need to try anymore. But at the last part of the first semester, he wanted to work again--much to my joy and dismay because that meant more work for me (grading all that late work?). It's now halfway through the second semester, and he's slipping again. I've seriously tried to help in the past, but I'm at the point where my own patience is wearing thin with him, and it's not even for academic reasons. I'm beginning to see that he's so needy. He hangs around my classroom when the school is almost empty, save for administrators, custodial staff, and other students participating in school events past 6pm. The thing that irks me most: he comes into my classroom just when I need to be alone for myself. I hold tutorial sessions after school for one hour, and he never shows up for those. But when I'm ready to lock the door and work to catch up for my organizational sanity, he comes in and just... lingers there. Unfortunately, he doesn't understand the concept of a locked door either. He kept knocking on the door and the windows until I relented.

That's when I noticed that he just wants attention. When I give him attention, he stays longer. When I give him attention, he'll sometimes open up to me and sometimes he won't, but I think he just likes the fact that I ask; like one of those, "No, I can't talk about it... Okay, I will--No, I'm not ready to talk about it just yet... well, maybe I am..." That's what my conversations feel like when I'm with him.

I hate to say it, but I'm almost sick of him. I'm not his mother. I'm not going to give him whatever he wants (he keeps asking me to change his grade), I'm not going to give him any more attention, I've stopped being sympathetic, I've stopped giving him advice because he doesn't listen anyway. Bottom line: I'm done being nice with him. I've come to the point that whenever he'll ask me a question, I'll only help him as far as his question takes me. If he jokes around with me, I don't laugh. The only thing that matters to me now is his grade, which only means I'm getting tougher with him. It's a tough love--not that I love him because he drives me crazy. But I stopped caring about his personal problems because I know he just uses that to get attention from me. And it's not just me, two other teachers noticed how needy he is with them also. We're all sick of it.

The low part of this job is is that even kids can drain the energy and life out of you. Not to sound callous, but even I need my solitude after school just so I can recuperate. Five and half hours straight of instruction and being a disciplinarian, and 165 students later-- I am fucking tired, mentally drained, and I just want to be alone and enjoy the silence of an empty classroom. I know that my job means being involved with kids, but you know what else? I'm not their parents. AndI may sound unapologetic, but you cannot pay me enough money just to be a surrogate parent for someone else's messed up child. At 6:30pm, Needy should be at home with his parents, not hanging out in my classroom because he wants attention.

I noticed that when I don't talk to him or give him attention, he will go away. Sometimes I feel like a bad person for doing that, but I am seriously tired of spoiling him with attention. I am done.

On a good note, there's Indie. Indie's been with me only for two months, but he's such a great student. He does all his work, he participates in class, he gets along with everyone... I could go on about him. He transferred in from another school and he adapted so quickly to this school. He's humorous at the right moments-- appropriate humor for the classroom while I'm teaching and just funny with friends and peers.

When Indie heard about the special junior college program that our high school offered with the local community college, he asked so many questions to the counselor, and he was the first one to give me a rough draft of the college entrance essay because he wanted me to check it. I made him rewrite it three times. Most students would have given up if I told them to just do it again after I made corrections on their first draft. Not Indie. He would give me the next draft the very next day. We kept working on it until the deadline. After the deadline, he kept nagging me, asking me if I had heard anything about acceptance letters. He got upset when he still hadn't heard anything after a month.

Finally, the acceptance letters were being handed out this week. He kept nagging me again. I kept telling him that I never got anything. He was in suspense this whole time. Today, after school, he came into my class and gave me a hug.

"What's up?" I asked him.

He showed me his acceptance letter. "I just wanted to thank you for helping me with my essay. I'm in the college program."

I smiled and gave him my congratulations. That's the high part of my job.

Most people think that it must feel great to be a teacher because--and I quote the most common thing people say to me--"you're always helping people; you know you did something good at the end of the day;" like I'm doing it because I like feeling good and proud about myself. That never really crosses my mind. Yes, I feel great, but only because the student wanted to share his happiness with me. It's like when someone you care about wants to share personal things with you because he/she wants you to be part of their life. That's the feeling I get. It's only when a student says "thank you" does it hit me: "Oh, yeah, I helped you with that." That's when my pride overfloweth.

In this job, there are more lows than there are highs. Every little high is priceless.

Friday, March 18, 2005

I'm Not That Young

Many people like it when others assume that they are younger than they really look. I used to like it, too, until now--especially when I work in a high school.

Two days ago, the cafeteria women thought I was a student. While most people would find that flattering, I found it really upsetting. Why? Because they scolded me like I was a student. One woman kept telling me to slide my lunch chard through the scanner when I gave her a five-dollar bill. Another woman angrily told me to get back in the original line where I came from.

I hate being treated like a child, and I especially don't like being mistaken for a teenager. It really sucks.

Monday, March 07, 2005

Driving Hellhole

Potholes are bad, drivers are bad, too much construction on the roads, roads are too narrow from all the construction, too many dead dogs, traffic sucks... and the thing that irks me most: expired registration tags. I see at least one car a day with tags from 2004. And there aren't enough cops to monitor the roads.

When friends warned me saying that Riverside has the worst of driving, including the smog and accidents, I'd say it's pretty accurate.