30 December, 2009
28 December, 2009
What's a vacation?
A break in work for a teacher is like a break between two championship series for a baseball team. You know you should rest, you also know the next battle will be even harder. Except for the teacher there will be no rings and no world-astounding end. The books will close, students will pack up and go home. And then a longer or shorter break, etc. Do business people feel this way? The one friend I used to have in business used to truly enjoy her vacations. She stayed out of contact with her office and she shopped and hopped around the globe. I can't imagine having the concentration to do this. There are so many other things to think about and so many to avoid.
I turned on the radio in time to catch Leonard Lopate interviewing a Yale professor about a book called, It Can Happen Here. Lopate was doing his best to dismiss the possibility that the "it" could be terrorism or violence, but was less able to quash the possibility of total economic disaster, though he did argue the usual "we've been through this before...." It was right for him to play such a strong devil's advocate, both as a good host/journalist and someone who knows that an audience that literate and free at noon is either over-educated and underpaid or unemployed. As someone who now tries VERY HARD not to listen to rumor, not to predict what is going to happen next, but just focus on immediate tasks, I was especially grateful. I called a former colleague who proceded to give me the latest news of what was "on the table" for our upcoming contract. We all see those tables so vividly and we argue for our deaths better than our lives because we accept both that we are powerless and that we were smart enough to have been given more power. So what? I know that "It" of various kinds can happen here and am less dismissive of the possibility of total economic collapse. But, I can't think about that either. It won't profit me. Panicking has caused me enough trouble.
Still, what do I do with this bountiful time? I've bought a test prep book. Bookmarked some textbooks to buy when I have more money. I'm going to surf for some more test prep and lesson plan materials I need and look for reduced-priced middle school readers. That, clean the cat box, eat and maybe look at a movie on Netflix (which I keep largely as it might be useful to my classroom) seems about as much as I can handle. In between, I do bits of massive cleaning around the apartment. What I don't do is talk with anyone. I don't know if this has happened to anyone else, but my friends have all reduced themselves to texting or to the kinds of conversations which don't last beyond a minute. "What else is there to say?" No one is going out much. Even on the rare moments when I think, "I would like to see that," I never pursue the thought. First, I'm broke. Second, everything seems indulgent. Everything. Except what I need right in front of me. There is no reason to get away. It will be there when I get back and there will be less time, less energy and even more fear. More fear. I never knew how much fear I could feel.
When I was a kid, they would show us pictures of the holocaust so we would be aware of how badly Jews had been and could be treated. That fear was nothing like this. This is not to minimize genocide. Thinking about its possibility and looking at miserable sites makes me bilious. Being in a position in which thinking ahead is frightening is living in a conscious slow motion. Stultifying.
I turned on the radio in time to catch Leonard Lopate interviewing a Yale professor about a book called, It Can Happen Here. Lopate was doing his best to dismiss the possibility that the "it" could be terrorism or violence, but was less able to quash the possibility of total economic disaster, though he did argue the usual "we've been through this before...." It was right for him to play such a strong devil's advocate, both as a good host/journalist and someone who knows that an audience that literate and free at noon is either over-educated and underpaid or unemployed. As someone who now tries VERY HARD not to listen to rumor, not to predict what is going to happen next, but just focus on immediate tasks, I was especially grateful. I called a former colleague who proceded to give me the latest news of what was "on the table" for our upcoming contract. We all see those tables so vividly and we argue for our deaths better than our lives because we accept both that we are powerless and that we were smart enough to have been given more power. So what? I know that "It" of various kinds can happen here and am less dismissive of the possibility of total economic collapse. But, I can't think about that either. It won't profit me. Panicking has caused me enough trouble.
Still, what do I do with this bountiful time? I've bought a test prep book. Bookmarked some textbooks to buy when I have more money. I'm going to surf for some more test prep and lesson plan materials I need and look for reduced-priced middle school readers. That, clean the cat box, eat and maybe look at a movie on Netflix (which I keep largely as it might be useful to my classroom) seems about as much as I can handle. In between, I do bits of massive cleaning around the apartment. What I don't do is talk with anyone. I don't know if this has happened to anyone else, but my friends have all reduced themselves to texting or to the kinds of conversations which don't last beyond a minute. "What else is there to say?" No one is going out much. Even on the rare moments when I think, "I would like to see that," I never pursue the thought. First, I'm broke. Second, everything seems indulgent. Everything. Except what I need right in front of me. There is no reason to get away. It will be there when I get back and there will be less time, less energy and even more fear. More fear. I never knew how much fear I could feel.
When I was a kid, they would show us pictures of the holocaust so we would be aware of how badly Jews had been and could be treated. That fear was nothing like this. This is not to minimize genocide. Thinking about its possibility and looking at miserable sites makes me bilious. Being in a position in which thinking ahead is frightening is living in a conscious slow motion. Stultifying.
27 December, 2009
How should schools handle the holiday season?
It's impossible, in your first year as a school, not to respond to the irrepressible enthusiasms of ten year olds for everything from secret Santas to decorating the classroom, etc. in honor of the two holidays which dominate the December shopping season, Christmas and Hannukah.
But, if you have a chance to think about this for the future, what is the right position for a school to take in this throng of powdered-sugar inspired sentiment?
Mine this year was to do as little as possible to acknowledge it. Both the popular mythology of Christmas and Hannukah figured into World History this term, so I got to talk about the connections between the two holidays and cultures in an academic sense. Since the fact that Jesus was a Jew was a brand-new shocking detail to one of my smartest students, the entire contextualization of the famous crucifixion among the murder of over 30,000 Jews during the Roman occupation of Judea may have fallen by the wayside. And that's okay. It isn't important to me that the religious stories attached to periods of history be the highlights of my units. It just seemed like a way to get studets to visualize the events in occupied Judea at the time. Overall, my students knew more about that event than they had before, so I was fairly satisfied at the end of the unit.
Still, it irked me that what followed was a thunderstorm of requests for parties and pleasantries attached to Christmas. Having thoroughly established that several students and myself didn't celebrate the holiday, you'd've thought there would have been more discussion of what, if anything, we should do as a class. Instead there was this onslaught of presumptions which caused the muscles in my back to tighten like hubcaps on a wheel. To keep my back attached to me, I insisted as firmly as possible that nothing was to be done. I reminded my studets of "Separation of Church and State." I told the story of a student of mine early in my career who came to school on a day before the holiday to find my class was watching partying and listening to poetry who said, "I walked here for an hour through the snow, to find you are doing nothing!" Still, no one was moved. A colleague begged me not to do force her to "do any work" 8th period and, by this time, my jaw was so tight, I wasn't opened to making things easy. As it turned out my lesson moved at the pace of molasses, but we got through most of it. We were obliged to clean the classroom to prepare for an upcoming move so we started on that when the pulse and the point had basically become leaden. As we did so, streams of children came down the halls with food to give away, which, at first I prohibited, then gave into as we were closer to the end of the day. Sadly, I saw a colleague feasting on the snacks being offered when I had asked her to check on why these students were outside. Of course, I was making a big deal of nothing -- in the last five minutes before we were to leave, these studets obviously wanted to get rid of extra food from their parties. It was no big deal. Everyone around me had taught real lessons but had perhaps allowed for a little more festivity around them.
Students presented me with presents which I politely refused. I had told one that I could not accept presents -- that would be like accepting a bribe. What I told them were my presents were the questions they asked during class and their good work. They didn't need to thank me in any other way.
The week left me tense and I felt scrooge-like. It wasn't that I hadn't been generous, but I'd been pushed into a corner I didn't like and my views only solidified my exclusion. But, it was all right.
Given that we left off in the middle of a discussion of urban sprawl, I should have done more to talk about organizations who discouraged consumerism and who encouraged helping the less fortunate during the season. I know my students would've liked to hear about this. So, somewhere, next year, I will do just that. And more.
World peace won't be solved by one more Wii machine and one less meal.
But, if you have a chance to think about this for the future, what is the right position for a school to take in this throng of powdered-sugar inspired sentiment?
Mine this year was to do as little as possible to acknowledge it. Both the popular mythology of Christmas and Hannukah figured into World History this term, so I got to talk about the connections between the two holidays and cultures in an academic sense. Since the fact that Jesus was a Jew was a brand-new shocking detail to one of my smartest students, the entire contextualization of the famous crucifixion among the murder of over 30,000 Jews during the Roman occupation of Judea may have fallen by the wayside. And that's okay. It isn't important to me that the religious stories attached to periods of history be the highlights of my units. It just seemed like a way to get studets to visualize the events in occupied Judea at the time. Overall, my students knew more about that event than they had before, so I was fairly satisfied at the end of the unit.
Still, it irked me that what followed was a thunderstorm of requests for parties and pleasantries attached to Christmas. Having thoroughly established that several students and myself didn't celebrate the holiday, you'd've thought there would have been more discussion of what, if anything, we should do as a class. Instead there was this onslaught of presumptions which caused the muscles in my back to tighten like hubcaps on a wheel. To keep my back attached to me, I insisted as firmly as possible that nothing was to be done. I reminded my studets of "Separation of Church and State." I told the story of a student of mine early in my career who came to school on a day before the holiday to find my class was watching partying and listening to poetry who said, "I walked here for an hour through the snow, to find you are doing nothing!" Still, no one was moved. A colleague begged me not to do force her to "do any work" 8th period and, by this time, my jaw was so tight, I wasn't opened to making things easy. As it turned out my lesson moved at the pace of molasses, but we got through most of it. We were obliged to clean the classroom to prepare for an upcoming move so we started on that when the pulse and the point had basically become leaden. As we did so, streams of children came down the halls with food to give away, which, at first I prohibited, then gave into as we were closer to the end of the day. Sadly, I saw a colleague feasting on the snacks being offered when I had asked her to check on why these students were outside. Of course, I was making a big deal of nothing -- in the last five minutes before we were to leave, these studets obviously wanted to get rid of extra food from their parties. It was no big deal. Everyone around me had taught real lessons but had perhaps allowed for a little more festivity around them.
Students presented me with presents which I politely refused. I had told one that I could not accept presents -- that would be like accepting a bribe. What I told them were my presents were the questions they asked during class and their good work. They didn't need to thank me in any other way.
The week left me tense and I felt scrooge-like. It wasn't that I hadn't been generous, but I'd been pushed into a corner I didn't like and my views only solidified my exclusion. But, it was all right.
Given that we left off in the middle of a discussion of urban sprawl, I should have done more to talk about organizations who discouraged consumerism and who encouraged helping the less fortunate during the season. I know my students would've liked to hear about this. So, somewhere, next year, I will do just that. And more.
World peace won't be solved by one more Wii machine and one less meal.
20 December, 2009
Shut up! I can't handle your pain. Take a tranquilizer!
The above quote came from my mother, five minutes into my describing my teaching life. It occurred to me that she has probably NEVER been able to to handle any of my pain -- why I learned to tranquilize myself with everything from ice cream to spaghetti as a child.
And I wonder how many of my students use other drugs, violence and just the extension of rage for the same reason.
We must have more psychologists in schools. I got regular counseling in HS and College which is how I survived.
And I wonder how many of my students use other drugs, violence and just the extension of rage for the same reason.
We must have more psychologists in schools. I got regular counseling in HS and College which is how I survived.
05 December, 2009
One time only
Two days ago, a student who had not done one ounce of work in my class and who talks continuously regardless of all punishments, worked. I knew he might because we were playing a jeopardy-style game about early civilizations and he likes competition.
And then nothing. I had even called his mom to tell her he worked that day. I did tell her I would call her again if this seemed to have been a "one-time-deal."
Not looking forward to that call.
And then nothing. I had even called his mom to tell her he worked that day. I did tell her I would call her again if this seemed to have been a "one-time-deal."
Not looking forward to that call.
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