Where I've Been, Content vs. Encouragement

Looking back at my blog this year I realize that I've done very little writing of consequence.  Even more strangely, I've realized that I wrote a heck of a lot more during the worst part of my year than I did when things actually started going well.  Some of that may be because while I have had a wealth (a wealth) of things to write about, I haven't felt quite ready to.  Or the parties involved other than myself deserve more courtesy than my writing about "the things" in a forum even as semi-(barely) public as this one is.

So I'll confess to being at a bit of a strange crossroads where I find myself with plenty of things I could write about but debating one what to pick and how to go about it.  Some ideas (writing about the quilt my grandma made me, for example) are safe and standard and will probably happen when I feel up to it.  Some are topics that feel already beaten to death in this venue even if there have been new developments in recent months (re: I started taking anti-depressants).  I could write about (and probably will) the saga of my new home-ownership life.  And then there are the things I would desperately like to write about but don't really feel like I should.  What's a girl to do?!

I'll start with something more journalistic, then.  My life, for the time being, needs to settle a bit before I can pick it apart again.

I recently finished teaching The Great Gatsby to one of my classes.  It's a book I'm still learning how to teach - it's a tricky one in part because of the molasses-in-winter writing chewiness but even more so because there are so few people in the story that you don't want to throw out a window by the time all the damage is done.  I persist in teaching it because it fits so well with the curriculum, but also because I'm a bit sadistic and think it's important to expose my coddled, conservative little crew to find value in things that aren't sugar coated.  Gatsby is a book I have to dare my students to love.  Every year I teach it I seem to catch a few more people with it.

One of the reasons I continue teaching the book even though it isn't universally popular is because, without fail, it brings about strong emotion.  I love books that spur passionate response - either positive or negative.  Usually I do my best to step back and allow students to feel those emotions with whatever strength they want.  I tell them, and I mean it, that I really don't care if they like something, but if they learn from it.  (With a book like Gatsby I add that if they leave the book wanting to be like any of the characters, that's when I'm a bit worried.)

Every once in a while I do feel like I need to step in - particularly when that passion is misguided in one way or another.  This time around it's a handful of students appalled with me for assigning such a book because of the way it "condones adultery and alcoholism" and a number of other vices presented in Gatsby.  I nearly grabbed the copies of the books these students had been reading to see if they'd managed to find some strange copy that ended differently than mine had.  Considering that characters involved in said bad behavior end up either dead or thoroughly disgusted by what's happened, I decided it was time to intervene.

There's this phenomenon in conservative culture that often suggests where media is concerned that including "content" (re: immoral behavior in one form or another) means an automatic condoning of said "content".  For example, I recently stumbled on a Facebook post a friend had commented on where the original writer went on a tirade about the recent release of Into the Woods and warned parents everywhere about how sin-filled it is because of adultery and suicide and other things that the writer found objectionable for children to be exposed to.  The writer didn't feel the need to include any information about how the moment of adultery in the story is almost immediately regretted (and some would interpret rather thoroughly punished as well), and that the "suicide" in question is non-existent in the movie and really more of an accident induced by mental illness than anything.  The writer also leaves out the lessons Into the Woods offers about overcoming challenges and being careful about what you wish for and the power of story.  No no - including the content was the same as condoning it, even though anyone who has seen Into the Woods should know otherwise.

That in mind, Into the Woods is more moral than other shows that no one complains about.  Say, Hello Dolly!, which is all about guys seducing and lying to girls just to get a kiss.  And the guys get that kiss and never (so far as we know) get punished for their deception.  They actually get rewarded for it (they get promoted!)  Or what about Aladdin?  Boy lies to get a girl and even after the girl finds out the truth, he gets her.  The lie is rewarded.  Don't get me started on Phantom of the Opera.

The point, then, is that we've got to stop teaching what Dumbledore would call "fear of a name".  The world adultery or sex or violence or slander or whatever other word you want to pick taken out of context means nothing - just some squiggles on a page or screen.  When we teach or encourage fear of something without understanding what it is, we risk lying about what something really promotes or encourages.  Imagine, for example, how easy it would be to list all the awful "content" options in Les Miserables - prostitution and deception, thievery and suicide - it's full of any number of sins.  It's not until you take into context the reason behind each action that you realize that the actions aren't necessarily condoned, but they do need to be understood.

So, dear students, feel free to hate me for giving you Lord of the Flies, or Animal Farm, or The Great Gatsby.  I'm #sorrynotsorry if they make you uncomfortable, mainly because they should make you uncomfortable.  But don't think they're making you uncomfortable because they are condoning what's going on.  Far from it.  You can learn from tragedy.  (The vast majority of you do so every time you read The Book of Mormon, after all, which skips over all the years of happiness.)

Why I (still) teach.

I always knew I wanted to be a teacher.  Maybe it was my love of school.  Maybe it was my love of performance.  Maybe it was the fact that so many of the people in my family worked in schools, so it just seemed like what adults did.  Whatever the reason, it was always a part of my game plan.  So I paid attention.  I watched what teachers did that I liked and what teachers did that I didn't.  I saved assignments and projects that mattered to me.  I kept in touch with a handful of the best teachers I had in junior high and high school well after I left home.  I wanted to be prepared.

I think every new teacher goes into the job a bit starry eyed.  Some people fixate on their favorite Hollywood version of a teacher or an idealized view of their own past teachers, or, in my case, a combination of the above with the addition of some literary examples I admired.  I knew that I never wanted to be the kind of teacher that was just there for the job.  I didn't want my students to just leave with better factual knowledge of English.  I wanted to make them better.

As I started working with other teachers and prospective teachers, I learned that I was not alone in that desire.  Nearly everyone I talked to spoke with frankness about how they knew that they would deal with large classes, with frustrating hoops to jump through, with long hours and the endless thumping of music from school dances and assemblies; but none of it mattered.  We shared a common dream: we wanted to be the kind of teacher that would change brains but would also change lives.  No one goes into teaching for the money or for the so-called summers off, or for the "easy" hours or "easy" job description.  No.  Teachers enter the field with gusto and with the desire to work.  Some are more or less prepared for exactly how much work it is, but no one goes in with the idea that they're in for something cushy.

I understood in theory (and now understand in practice) that teaching is far from a glamorous profession.  It is a job where the cards are increasingly stacked against you.  From No Child Left Behind to state testing and the implementation of Common Core, to endless meetings and stacks of papers to grade with as much equal attention and fairness as you can possibly muster no matter how many times you have to read about the symbolism of The Great Gatsby; it is a job only for someone who has an absolute love of what they do that overshadows the fact that the government (and many of the people you serve) no longer care about your opinion at all.

The very thing that makes teaching wonderful (that heart) is also a threat.  Teaching is a complete labor of love.  So much of what you do is because you care to.  The job description requires you to be in the building and in your classes for certain hours.  Requires you to get your students through their state testing intelligently.  Requires you to update grades on a regular basis and to take attendance.  Requires your adult body to tell students where they can and can't eat their lunch or when they can be in the halls.  But the art of teaching?  The decorating of your room or the creativity of your assignments or the way you communicate with students and their parents - that is where teaching really becomes something special, and it's also where you get the most grief.  For not communicating the same way as another teacher.  For not giving assignments the same way as their teacher last year.  For any number of things that are more or less legitimate to whine about.

I know many people who have left the job.  Capable, brilliant teachers who have not so much as burned out but stormed out.  The hours are long.  The job too thankless.  The art of teaching and the craft of it is too misunderstood and not so much under appreciated as not acknowledged at all to be worth staying in for many.  After all - everyone went to school, right?  So everyone knows exactly what good teachers do.  No amount of education about education can immunize a teacher from a person who is certain they know better.

In my time as a teacher, I have started to understand why people leave.  I have had parents harass me for every reason under the sun.  I've been praised for the same skills I've been bashed over - in one night of conferences I'll have parents thank me for entering grades regularly and parents state that I don't update grades quickly enough.  I've had parents accuse me of purposefully losing student work, and others praise my organizational skills.  I've had angry emails at all hours of the day and night, parents blaming me for their kid plagiarizing assignments, blaming me for being too hard on their children, for being elitist, for thinking I'm better than everyone else, for being unavailable.  I've had parents coming into my room without appointments to chew me out for extended periods of time (once even in the middle of class) and demonstrated behavior that, if I had worked in a normal office, would have probably led to security removing them from the room until they were ready to resolve conflict appropriately.

And that's just the parents.  I also lived through an abusive boss whose behavior still has me trying to find my feet.  Still trying to get that courage and feeling of safety and not of paranoia.  Nearly two years later and the depression of those months is still finding its way out the door.  And what about the government and politics of teaching?  The government (and parents) expect me to be the right teacher, the perfect teacher, for every kid in my room.  But I am imperfect, and my students are imperfect, and our personalities and habits will not always mesh.  What's a person to do?  Sometimes teaching feels like a no-win situation.  No matter what you do, you will do it wrong for someone.

Sitting in my classroom after a summer of preparation and goals for innovation today, I started thinking.  Why am I still here?  Why, when so many have left and with perfectly good reason, have I kept my job?  I am not without other ambitions or opportunities.  I would love to go back to school myself.  Wouldn't mind a job that leaves work at work.  I am a practical person - I do need the money - but heaven knows that if there is one thing everyone understands about teaching it is how underfunded my job is.  I could make more money elsewhere, probably doing a lot less and with a lot less bother.  So why do I stay?

I started to make a list.

I stay because although I used to work under an abusive boss, that is no longer the case.  I now work with an administrative team who supports me and lets me be myself.

I stay for the kid who came into my class after leaving a school where he was bullied.  For months he could hardly get up the nerve to say anything.  Every assignment was terrifying.  By the time he left me, he was able to give a presentation in class in front of everyone and make it through in one piece.

I stay because of the kid who came into my room as a socially awkward rather gangly teen who was not a natural academic but learned to be a natural workhorse.  I've never seen anyone work so hard for such great reward.

I stay for the kid who came in knowing that my class was too big for him, but also not knowing where else to go.  He stayed, we worked to find ways to make him comfortable, and he thrived.  The gratitude in his face when we found the right solution to a challenge for him was beautiful.

I stay for the kids who cared about me enough to go hunt down an adult in the school to substitute my class so that I can join them on a field trip.

I stay for my fellow teachers.  I am so fortunate to work with the staff I do.  They are vibrant, interesting, engaging, opinionated people who are so willing to work and develop and grow.  I love that when I give tours of the school, I can talk about the unique things that go on in each room.  I love that my school is not an androgynous mush of rooms differentiated only by subject - we have teachers that try to be their best selves.  It's marvelous.

I stay for the parents who kindly let me know what a difference they see in their child.  This is particularly amazing when I don't know the extent of the struggles in a child's life to see how far they've come.

I stay for the emails I get from students who have moved on thanking me for this lesson or that book that has changed them, or made their lives better.

I stay for the students who see me as a retreat from their problems.  Who will come and sit in my office let me know what they are thinking or feeling because they aren't sure how to safely share themselves with others yet.  I honor those connections and pray that the advice I give isn't damaging but uplifting and encouraging.

I stay for the days in class when discussion is awesome.  When people groan after the bell rings.  When people stay behind to chat because they're not done yet.  When students are passionate enough about what we are reading (either because they love it that much or hate it that much) that they can't even express themselves with words any more.  When students email me asking for book recommendations.

I stay because I too love to learn.  Because I love the opportunity I get a thousand times a day to try something new.

I stay for the office supplies.  It's true.  It's petty, but it's true.  I love new pens and post it notes and gradebooks organized into neat little rows like vegetables in a garden.

I stay because I love laughing with my students.  I love when they say or do things that are so interesting and unique and awesome that I can't even contain myself.

I stay because my students challenge me to see life in new ways and from new perspectives.

I stay because, for me, at least, it's the right thing to do.  I will not always be what people want me to be or need me to be.  How I run my classroom, how I grade papers, the papers I assign in the first place, the books I recommend - I will never please everyone.  I will never reach everyone.  There will be days ahead of me where I, again, listen to parents express how furious they are with me for not doing x or y to their satisfaction.  Who will refuse to believe, no matter the evidence, anything other than what they want to believe about me - that I am a truly awful person put on this earth to be the trial that must be overcome.  That I would do what I do for the sole purpose of hating their child and destroying their life.  Parents who will hear their children admit that they did x or didn't do y and look at reasonable evidence of sufficient effort on my part and still blame me for whatever they're upset about rather than try to come up with a good solution.  But I intend to keep working hard and to do the job I believe is right for me to do.

I stay because the world needs great teachers.  And while I will never claim the "great" for myself, I will proudly continue to claim the title of teacher, and continue each year to try and strive toward greatness, no matter the obstacles in my way.

The Suicide Survivor's Club

Teaching teenagers is a funny thing.  The longer I teach the more I realize that my perspectives and views when I was a teenager were not the norm.  For example, while many of my friends were in the throes of obsession over Baz Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet, I was in the throes of thinking that it was perhaps the weirdest and dumbest movie I'd ever seen.  (I still think it's moronic to introduce teens to Shakespeare via. the two "greatest lovers" in his canon.  I didn't/don't understand the draw to obsession over two characters who make stupid and reckless and extreme decisions.)

Now I think that obsession over dramatic death may be something of a hormone related rite of passage for many of my older teens.  Every generation seems to have its romantic death story.  They're all pushed through Romeo and Juliet, and they couple it with cancer stories galore (my generation had A Walk to Remember.  Now we have The Fault in Our Stars.)

I don't fault them for this fascination with death.  Most of them have experienced it at some level by the time they are in junior high and high school, but may not have been old enough to be included in many adult conversations about what happened, why, how. . .etc.  There is an allure of mystery about the entire process for many of them, and that mystery often has its blanks filled in with fiction.  I'm not entirely opposed to this either.  Our imagination is a powerful tool to help us understand what we have not personally seen or experienced.

What concerns me is, like all great romances that end with the engagement, most of these stories of death end with the death.  From a writing standpoint, it makes sense.  Writing about grief is tedious and reading about it perhaps worse, because, from a plot standpoint, it's a disaster.  It's not linear, grief.  It's all over the place.  It's the Picasso of emotion.  And because of this omission, the romance of death remains in most of these stories.  The stories, perhaps rightly, focus on the tragedy of an early death and use the remaining space to pay tribute to a life so short lived.

I bring this up because of a Facebook thread a teacher friend of mine commented on that got posted on my feed as a result a few times over the weekend.  The thread was started by a student asking how anyone can tell another person that they can handle every trial they are given when things such as suicide exist.  The comments in response to the post, on the whole, made me feel rather sick.  They ranged from quick responses of trivial to more heartfelt encouragement, but included several responses from fellow teens agreeing that suicide was "not an easy out" and, in fact, a complicated and - although not overtly said, certainly implied - a brave thing to do.

So as a card carrying member of the Suicide Survivor's Club, I have a few words of my own on the subject:

First - I don't know and will never judge the mental state that someone is in when they turn to suicide as an answer.  In the months and years after my uncle killed himself, I sat through dozens of lessons in school and church and heard conversations from friends where jokes were made about killing yourself, or comments made about how people who kill themselves will go to hell - dozens of things that just hurt.  My uncle was not a perfect person.  He made a lot of bad choices, and the older I get the more aware of them I am.  But he was my uncle.  He was my father's brother.  And he loved me.  And he was sick.  Mentally he was really, really sick.  It isn't my job to judge what made him do what he did as right or wrong.  It's my job to love him.

Furthermore, I have never been in a position where I felt that suicide was an answer to my problems.  I struggle with depression - there have been many times where I felt like it was better for everyone if I disappeared for a while - but seeing the impact of my uncle's death on my family has ruled out suicide for me forever.  So while I can't speak from personal experience on the side of wanting to kill myself, I can speak from three times over experience in people I know killing themselves, and in feeling and watching that grief that suicide is literally the worst.  It is not romantic.  It is not beautiful.  It is not the "only way out of this hell hole" as one commenter put it.  There are thousands of other and better ways out of hell than with a gun.

I can't speak for the so-called bravery or courage of ending your own life, but I can tell you that there is no romance when it is over.  You may cease existing but the rest of the world continues because that's the job of the world, and what is left is an incredible, immense, indescribable pain that never, ever leaves.  It's earth shattering, that grief.  It wrecks an entire body, and yanks the fabric of friendships and families hard.  What's left behind is a different world and that world requires a very patient form of detoxing that is different than other sudden forms of death.  Horrible accidents, for example - are horrible, but they are accidents.  With suicide you have an endless string of guilt and blame over what you could have or should have or might have done differently.  Wondering if it would have made any difference.

I don't want to start some kind of pain or "my grief is stronger than your grief" war over this.  Grief is grief and pain is pain and no matter the source, those emotions deserve to be treated with care and understanding and kindness.  Grief and pain, whatever they are, are not a competition.  We all have moments, or weeks, or months, or years, where we feel alone or misunderstood or abandoned - and those times suck.

What I can tell you is that suicide, however justified or helpful or perhaps even needed for the individual involved is still a very selfish thing to do.  That there is always always a better option than ending your life.

What I can tell you is that being a member of the Suicide Survivor's Club is not something I would wish on anyone.  It's a horrible club.  It's a club you are forced into before you've even really understood what it means.  No membership dues to ignore that will get you kicked out.  No playful initiation.  It's all out hazing - not by fellow members, but by your own guilt, and by those who tell you that you could have changed your membership by doing X or Y. (X and Y are both lies, by the way.  No matter what anyone tells you - X or Y would not have changed anything.)  It's not a club you're ever happy to be a part of, but it is a club that, after a while, you can learn to wear as a badge because speaking out is better than staying silent.  My way of speaking out is to hopefully call maybe a bit of attention back to the fact that approximately two million teens will attempt suicide each year in the US alone.  According to the last census, if that information is correct, then it means approximately one in every ten teenagers attempt suicide yearly - and many of those can be prevented with more open, more frank, and more honest discussion, and more earnest attention to understanding each other.

No Room to Contain It

Last year was the year from Hades.

It was the year of non-stop work. It was the year of the illness of death. It was the year of no travel, no theater, no sunlight. It was a year for questioning everything I hold dear, wondering if the path I was taking really, truly was the right path (it was). It was a year of hard won recovery after some rather emotionally abusive relationships. It was a year. of. trial.

(There were some good things too. But, not going to lie, I wouldn't relive it.)

In the back of my mind, the storyteller part of my mind, I knew that if I survived the year with faith and hard work and determination, then sometime it would all pay off. The dearth of theater. The lack of travel. The frustration in feeling so lost with who I was and my place in the universe. So I kept going. Worked hard. Bit the bullet of endless responsibility. Fought for what I believed in and came to new understandings about myself and others. Overcame weaknesses. I left 2011 battle scarred and exhausted, but triumphant.

I knew it would pay off, I just didn't expect it to pay off quite this much.

I don't just have one potential show to be a part of this year - I have at least three. And I know for sure that two of them are going to work out.

I won't be going to England like I wanted to, but I will be going on a fantastic trip to the Southeast - Williamsburg, Charleston, Savannah, and Orlando. It's a part of the country I've always wanted to see but never had the chance. Now's my chance.

I am still busy with school and business running, but business running is paying off (literally and metaphorically) in fantastic ways. Plus, as an added bonus, I get to stay at the same school next year instead of moving schools (again), and I'm ecstatic. I love my school and my coworkers and (nearly all) of my students. And, what's also nice, is they seem to like me too.

I am not perfect, but I am learning to be more accepting of where I am in the world and the path I am on. I am striving to do the right thing. Even if my "right" seems strange compared to the "traditional" path people take, I am confident that the Lord knows what He's doing. I feel, for the first time in a long time, peace with myself.

And, best of all, I will be able to go to the temple. I have dreamed and prayed and begged for that chance for so long, and finally the Lord agreed that now is a good time. As a person who generally prides herself on her skills in hiding emotion, at least when it's of the sappy and personal variety, I am quite sure that every time I think of this particular blessing, my cup overflows again and I feel more gratitude than my eyes can contain. 50 days. 50 days and I will be there. With friends and family that I love.

Life is good, friends. I feel as though I understand just a little bit of what the Lord talks about when he says he will bless us and there will not be room enough to receive it. I find myself so full of gratitude that I almost feel guilty, knowing that there are so many other people in the world to bless who have overcome so much more than just working hard, or people who are still struggling with no end in sight - but I'll take it. I'll take it and enjoy it with every ounce of my soul I can spare so that when another 2011 comes around, I'll be ready to tackle it too.

Fill in the Blank

I'm starting a new writing assignment next week with my English classes. I've taught the project before which is wonderful - it means a little more security in knowing what I'm doing each day in class. The project is a research paper where they will research words. To get them excited, I wanted to get them playing around with language so that it didn't sound quite so boring. I found a worksheet I was given by another teacher a few years ago that she had used in her junior high classes in a project similar to this one. The paper involves sentences with blanks in them. Students are instructed to find the best word they can to fill in the blank - the most descriptive word is preferable.

Of course, I made the mistake of not reading over the page before I handed it out to my older students, who can sniff a euphemism from a mile away.

It started off normally enough. . .

"When his parachute failed to open, John (precipitated) to earth." (Like Voldemort at the end of the last Harry Potter movie?)

"Mary (flailed) over the cat which was in the middle of the hallway."

But then I started reading the sentences with the blanks and seeing that things just were not going to go anywhere good when you get sentences with awkwardly placed blanks such as. . .

"The class (molested) the teacher onto the bus." (Whoops.)

"The reporters (licked) the celebrity until she gave them a statement."

"The hunters (slapped) their prey until they could get a clear shot."

"The servant (fondled) the lady of the house; she seemed like a goddess to him."

They all left begging for more worksheets like this one. I left thinking that I would make sure to read over papers I used for junior high students a little more carefully before I used them on high school students again. Oh man.

Do What I Know

I have recently decided that I am too talented for my own good.

(I'm mostly being sarcastic.)

((But seriously, though.))

Talented, I suppose, isn't quite the right word for the mess I've found myself in. Interested in far too many things and not trusting enough of other people to do the job the right way (re: my way) is probably a bit closer to the truth, at least some of the time. As a result, I've found myself teaching a full schedule in school (I have one official hour off a week. Most teachers have one of those a day.) I am assistant-director for the school musical. I am helping to set up a new "honors" program for my school and am responsible for looking after the academic requirements/support for said program. I was recently given a calling in church in which I was told by my supervisor "the last person who had this calling was so relieved to be released so that she can spend more time with her family. We're all so excited that you're single so you will have time to help us more!"

Oh, and did I mention that I am co-owner of a company that writes and grades curriculum for home-schooling families? And that I have two shows I intend to audition for before the school year is over? And that I am currently making my way through several books in the hopes of going to the temple this year (finally)?

(Oh, and that I want to keep my sanity?)

So yes. My life is legitimately busy.

Though, of course, I really shouldn't complain at all because a good number of the things listed above are things I volunteered for in the first place.

You'd think that in the middle of all that scheduling madness I wouldn't have time to think about goal setting or adding any more to what I'm already doing, but I did think about it. I thought about setting goals on getting more sleep, for example. On reading a book I want to read but don't have to teach once a month. But I know that putting myself on some kind of schedule for these things will just add stress instead of take it away, so instead I am doing what this woman suggests and am going to put my focus on doing what I know.

For instance, I know that when I make time for the Lord in my life, I find time I need for everything else.

I know that when I am stressed and I make a to-do list and a calendar, then the stress is more manageable and I function better than when I stew in my stress pot.

I know that I'm on the Lord's timing and shouldn't waste (too much) of my time stressing over things I can't control.

I know that I feel better when my day is filled with fruits and veggies and (probably too much) bread.

I know that things are hard for me right now, but that I can do hard things.

I know that no amount of grading and planning for and obsessing about my job will cover for time not spent with people. (Especially adult-like ones after a day of teenagers.)

I know lots of things. And this year (since it is the end of the world and all), I intend to dedicate myself to doing what I know.

It's not a secret, right?

I had a chance to go to Disneyland recently on a whirlwind weekend trip that involved two glorious days away from school, approximately twenty eight hours in the parks themselves, less sleep than I have had in a long time and the best food ever. Given the novelty aspect of this trip and the summer of hard work it represented, I decided that I ought to get some kind of souvenir. Only. . . I don't collect pins. Or wear hats. Or need any more t-shirts. And if I want a Disney movie, I'm not going to buy one in the park, I'm going to buy one used online for half the price or less. So I found a cute ornament for my Christmas tree and. . . being me. . . a book. (That's right. Some people buy all kinds of assorted Disney memorabilia, and I buy a book.)

The book, Brain Storm, is written by Don Hahn, one of the executive producers on many of Disney's most successful films (including Beauty and the Beast.) I've not finished it yet, but it's broken into easily digested sections so odds are I will. His goal is to talk about the creative process and offers some practical advice towards gaining a greater understanding of creativity itself. Coupled with my reading of Ken Robinson's Out of Our Minds, my brain has been working overtime on this idea of creation over the last few months. Not just the idea of creation, but the common misconceptions of it.

For example, I had a parent request of me recently that I send home an example of a "perfect" essay. To be honest, I didn't really know how to respond. As an essayist myself, a "perfect" essay is something of a joke. No essayist that I know of (or have read) would ever admit that such a thing exists, at least not in their own writing. Writing isn't an art that is perfected, it is explored. But this parent didn't see writing as an art form - it was a checklist. Eventually I mailed home an essay from the internet that I didn't even read all the way through.

I give this example because it is a nice symbol of a common problem I see (and others see) cropping up more and more often in the way parents and students (and people in general) talk to me about the way they approach learning. It is a series of things to check off a list. Skills are things that you used to not know and then, after a lesson, you have mastered, and you can move on with "real" life. The "art" of gaining an education in any field, whether it be math, science, English or the arts, are being sacrificed in favor of fake rewards that don't mean much and "skills" that are forgotten within days. Teachers don't assign homework because students won't do it and parents won't make them. (This is, incidentally, one reason why the arts are so valuable in schools - you can't fake your way through the arts. If you can't sing well, everyone knows it.)

In Hahn's book he points out how easy it is to be intimidated by the great thinkers of the past - men like Edison or Disney himself - men like Steve Jobs and DaVinci who seem to have that creativity thing down in spades. But, Hahn argues, the great thinkers of history (with the possible exceptions of Disney and Jobs) didn't have access to the same tools we do. We have the world of information available for free to us so long as we have a computer with the internet on it. In under ten seconds, I can find out nearly any fact I want to know.

But that's part of the problem. It used to be that having knowledge of a subject guaranteed you a job, because having that knowledge alone was rare. But not in this world. To enter any field that involves creative thinking - everything ranging from engineering to graphic designer and back again - employers want people who can come up with ideas and follow through on them. The world is moving too fast for any business to stop evolving, and it takes people to make that happen.

This is good news, really. What it means is that anyone with the right set of skills can find success, college education or no. The tools you need to be successful are pretty simple: it takes hard work, and a passion for what you do that is not swayed by setbacks.

But somehow in our "Occupy ______" nation, those skills are drowning in a sea of excuses and people lazing around from one task to another. Here in the valley, I'm not sure how this functions elsewhere, "stress" has taken on the label of "overwhelmed", which means that parents are now requesting students be excused from assignments or late work (and then wonder why their kid doesn't know how to do basic tasks at the end of the year.) If a student doesn't know how to do something, or has a learning disability, or has problems at home, then all of these things (sometimes combined) become the barrier that keeps a person from even attempting to try. Which is fine. Everyone's got problems. But it's no secret that if you don't do the work you don't get the reward.

Unless, of course, you whine about it long enough that someone gives you a gold star or a cookie or an "everyone wins" trophy to make you feel better about it.

Pay Day Part the Second

Remember all those blog posts I've done recently demanding that teenagers are better than we give them credit for?

I was right.

I've been frustrated for a while by the way one of my classes has been going. The students in the class are great, but something just wasn't registering. Part of the problem was quite clearly in my obsession with organization and inability to just relax and enjoy what I was doing. But that wasn't the entire solution.

Then, today, my wonderful class council did exactly what I've been hoping they would do all year by taking class into their own hands. They were as aware as I was that something wasn't right. And they've presented a perfectly reasonable and well thought out solution that is exactly what the class needs. They were right. And they presented themselves in a way that was very clearly with the intent of working as a team - the whole class, me included. This isn't students against evil teachers who won't see reason or teachers against lazy students just trying to get out of work- this is good, rational human thought from two sides of a problem both trying to reach the same goal: a class that is both fun and challenging and not a waste of time (or a burden of time either.) This is trust on both sides that we can address problems instead of ignoring them. This is maturity.

Class today went better. Students left feeling understood and I'm leaving today feeling a huge weight lifted. I am so very proud and impressed of the way they have handled this. We're pointing in a good direction. We're going to be better because of this. And I'm teaching the best students ever.

Teacher Pay-Day

The universe must know I'm about to go on vacation, because today was rough. Opposition in all things, right?

Today was rough. A particular parent who has been making my life a kind of hell for a while sent (yet another) personal attack email that left me shaking, angry, and thoroughly discouraged. A million angry retorts came into my mind in one boiling flood that I had to stem rather quickly to preserve the professionalism for the class I had to teach. (Side note: I, apparently, need to stop responding to emails in the middle of the day.)

So today it was time for the Teacher Pay-Day folder. Now that I teach mostly high school classes, this folder hasn't been added to quite as often, but I taught junior high English my first year of teaching and the folder got lots of use. This is a hanging file folder where I keep particularly nice notes or artwork or other (paper) trinkets students drop by my desk. I pulled it out today and rifled through a few years worth of letters and cards. The notes - some funny (the girl who wants to be an actress and was inspired by me? She used her acting skills to promote her hypochondria. I kept that note for a laugh), some sincere (the boy who told me that he never liked to read until he came to my class), to heartfelt (the few who told me that I made them feel important and loved.) It was exactly what I needed today. I love that folder.

So it's time to put the frustrations aside and start actively loving what I do, not just saying that I do in an attempt to convince myself. I'll let the school handle this abusive parent, and turn my attentions instead to the things that matter. Like relaxing. Taking some time in the day to enjoy what I do and not worry about the paperwork. To compliment students more often and have fun with them regularly. I'm a better teacher when I do, and they're better students. All the baggage and frustrations and accusations are what they are - but none of them should be allowed to take away from the satisfaction of a room full of teenagers who actually listen to you, trust you, and want to be better because of the time spent with you.

How-To Guide

Sometimes I feel like all I do on this blog is gripe and complain about my career. I swear, I love what I do. 97.4% of the time, my job is wonderful. Part of that 2.6% of annoyance comes in the morning when my alarm goes off too early. Some of it comes in the form of students who are just draining in their pestering. The largest portion comes in the form of parents who seem to misunderstand their role in the relationship of teacher to parent and what the goal of that relationship actually is.

One day I'll write about how much I love what I do.

(Today isn't quite that day.)

What I have for you today is a "How-To" guide of sorts on Parent-Teacher relations:

1) Most important: parents and teachers are on the same team. Both want for the student to succeed. The problem comes when parents and teachers have different ideas of "success". These problems, if they do come up, should not be handled in front of the student.

2) If a parent feels as though the teacher is not a good one, they should either move the student to another class or, if that isn't possible, find ways to compensate for the teacher's deficiencies at home. One of the things that baffles me most about a parent is when they seem to find something I do inadequate or unfair (usually when their student doesn't get a good grade), but they still keep the student in my class. If you don't like the teacher, then find other options. We're not offended. We're actually relieved, usually, to get us off our backs so we can focus on students (and parents) who are doing well with us.

3) That in mind, just because a student doesn't respond to a teacher does not mean that the teacher himself/herself is incompetent. Teachers are human. Students are human. Neither of us are required to get along with everybody.

4) When dealing with a teacher, please remember that we are professionals. Whatever your beliefs about education or educational degrees, the majority of teachers I know do their job because they care about what they do. We have our different personalities and strengths and weaknesses, but we are not ignorant or naive about what our job entails. Please do not treat us like you know better. (If you believe you know better, then refer to rule number two.)

5) While we're talking about professionalism, please keep in mind that a teacher has the right to tell you "no" if your requests are unreasonable or being resolved in other ways. Most teachers are willing to help you, but telling teachers how that help will be given is rarely the best way to get the job done. We respect that you know your student at home, but we see them as students and know that side of them quite well. You may request something of a teacher that is already being done only in a different form. You may also request something of a teacher that doesn't really solve the problem or would make our lives much more difficult than they are already, which brings us to. . .

6) Most teachers are teaching at least two different classes (or preps) these days, often more, depending on the school. At a charter school, I am currently teaching six different classes, four of which involve creating curriculums that I have not taught before. I see around 100 different students a day. (In a public school, this number is likely to triple for your teacher.) Whether your teacher is working with a large number of students or a large number of different classes - we have a lot to remember. We have individual needs of students to keep in mind (particularly those with IEPs.) We have lessons to plan and prepare for and grading to do. I answer dozens of emails a day, and I answer them efficiently. But the strength of our organizational balance often comes from routine and a good deal of practice. This means that if you ask for a teacher to go out of their way to do something - it is no small request. The task itself (sending another email, printing an extra copy, etc.) may seem small to you - but adding it to a lengthy list of things to do is not as easy as it seems for us. Please be patient and reasonable in your requests. If possible, find out what the teacher is already doing, and see if you can come up with a solution that works within the system already in place.

7) Remember that the goal of school is, on its most practical level, to prepare your student for independence, whether in college or in a job. Individual subject matters are secondary to this goal. (We know that not every student will love our subject. We don't love every student - it's only fair.) But this means that every time you turn in an assignment for your student, and every time you request notes from class, and every time you argue a grade on behalf of your student - you are enabling that child to be weak. Teachers know that students need to be led to responsibility occasionally. For some students it does not come naturally. But as a parent, please find ways to make your student accountable for the work that they do and encourage them to take care of problems themselves. If you have to walk them into the room, that's fine, but they should turn in the assignment. If you need to bring them to my room to talk with me about needing more time on something, that's fine - but let them do the talking. Unless you want your student living with you forever - you need to get them used to functioning in the adult world. Doing all this work for them is crippling. (And usually results in requests to me to describe everything we do in class already - I'm not going to re-teach the class to you.)

8) Finally - and this last one may be a bit selfish - but if you appreciate what your teacher is doing for your student, tell them. Silly gifts at Christmas that we can't possibly eat all of are nice and we appreciate them, but not nearly so much as an email during the week that lets us know specifically what we have done that was well received. It helps us to be better teachers, and it encourages us to do more when we know that our efforts are working.

The Perfect Storm

Once upon a time the perfect storm came and tried to ruin everything.

It involved about forty hours of grading essays in a week, doing everything possible to have them done before a trip home.

It involved putting off projects and readings that needed to be done in favor of pushing forward with every last inch of sanity to finish those essays and get them back to students before their next essay test.

It involved death bed repenters and desperate parents wanting to put bandaids on gaping wounds.

It involved a frantic Friday after school rushing to get things done and make it to the airport without falling asleep at the wheel. Boarding a plane and feeling like - finally - I'd have an excuse to relax.

It involved a delayed - and then cancelled flight. Followed by a missed airport shuttle. Followed by a sleepless night in a cold and kitschy hotel room. Followed by a way too early morning. Followed by a flight in the world's smallest airplane. Followed by a two hour ride home instead of a fifteen minute home.

It involved a not nearly as relaxing and enjoyable trip for me or for others in my family as it should have been. Long week + long weekend = an unfortunate conglomeration of out of control events (translation: I was not in the world's most enthusiastic mood. Further translation: I think the weekend was a disappointment for those, including myself, who like me slightly better rested and fed.)

It then involved returning home to an individual blaming me for purposefully grading hard to prove a point and more or less claiming that I am not intelligent enough to do the job I have.

It involved me wanting very much to throw up the proverbial white BANNER of surrender. To yell to the world that I cannot possibly be everything for everyone, or do all the right things, or please anyone, and that I may as well not try any more, because what was the point? My imperfections felt so very close to the surface and frustrating for me and inconvenient for other people, and it was beyond my mental and physical stamina to handle it any more.

But then. . .

I drove home and saw a sight that looked almost identical to this.

I took a little time to visit . . .

(She's been missing me lately. It's been mutual.)

And suddenly life doesn't seem so unconquerable any more.

I'm still imperfect. I'm still overworked. And stubborn. And maybe a little delusional sometimes. But mostly, I think, I'm like the majority of people in the world trying to get by the best they can - sometimes meeting success and sometimes not. Rough weeks happen. Sometimes weeks are more overwhelming than others. But they end. And we move onward and upward and, with any luck, gain more than just some sore muscles by the time we reach the top of the peak.

Dear Students. . .

You may not believe this when you get your first set of essays back, but I believe in you.

I mean it. I see your potential. I see the good that you are doing and the good you have within you to do. I'm not making things up when I tell you you're great. I'm not making things up when I tell you that you should care about your life and do something about it. I wouldn't lie to you about that. It would be cruel.

The world is content with you being substandard, lazy, and self-obsessed. They'll encourage it, actually. It'll be on every magazine and in every teenage drama that focuses only on cheap jokes and "self discovery" that doesn't end up leading to a place of value at all. In fact, the world expects you to be rebellious, lecherous lumps of flesh that only ever look for ways out. Now. . . some of you are. Some of you seem to spend most of your time working to get out of work. You do it magnificently. But most of you - and you know who you are - actually care about who you are and who you are becoming. You have dreams and ambitions and goals that are more important to you than any party you might go to, for example. You have direction and purpose.

I think the thing that amazes me the most as your teacher is the way that, every so often, I see more of your potential than your parents do. I don't mean to suggest that I know you better. Your parents, after all, have lived with you for upwards of thirteen years. They've cleaned up your vomit and taught you how to spell your name and instructed you on how to be a good, functioning human being. But sometimes I think they might love you so much that they're afraid to let you fail. It's why I tell you not to take your writing to them for advice. Most of the time they tell you it's wonderful and you don't learn anything from it.

That's where I come in. See, I love you too. In my own way. Not in the "please add me on Facebook" way, because I won't let you. But in the "I want you to succeed in life, but if you fail you aren't my financial responsibility" way. It's the separation between us that allows me to critique you honestly. That allows me to fight for you to have the opportunity to learn what it is to make a mistake and pay for it. That wants to tear you down a little every now and then because there's no other way you can learn.

Your parents are wonderful people. They care about you and want you to succeed. But they will, every so often, want you to find success in excuses. Excuses don't solve the problem. Knowing you're not good at something doesn't make you good at that something. Relying on weakness to get by will never make you stronger.

(To be honest, I wonder sometimes if this is why God set up the universe the way He did. Giving us parents here that love us and care for us to a fault at times where He - in His wisdom - is able to teach us more honestly because of a slight separation.)

So please - tell your parents that we're all on the same "cheering for you" section. But remind them I'm not in the stands like they are. I'm on the front lines. I'm your coach. And it's my job to fight for you to have the chance to be wrong every now and then, or being right won't mean anything to you.

Love -

Me

Some of Someday

The last few days have been mentally and physically taxing ones for me. I'm drowning in approximately 175 essays to read (in addition to the rest of the homework I need to grade.) I have an online class I need to film for and grade. I have friends who want to spend time with me. I have a bed who dearly misses me. I have a handful of very needy parents to deal with. I have a somewhat neglected spiritual life that I have been making strides to enhance again. I have personal insecurities and outside pressures to somehow conquer or, at least, learn to put up with. My life, at least right now, feels a bit like the trash compactor in Star Wars and I'm doing everything I can to try and stop it, or at least get the trash out, but I've been fighting to stay on top while I do all this and it. is. hard.

Then I read this.

It's written by a good family friend that I knew growing up. I've been a long-time reader of hers because she has such a way with words that I can't help myself. Today she said exactly what I needed to.

Because - the thing is - in the middle of all this cultural pressure, I find myself looking at my own "someday" and feeling, on the whole, quite satisfied with what I have.

It used to be that someday I would graduate and have a job and teach and be financially independent and be married and have a family and do everything well. Now a good portion of that is here. I did graduate. I have a fantastic job. I teach. I am completely financially independent. I'm not married and I don't have a family and I certainly don't do everything well, but I am happy.

And, if I were being perfectly honest, I think I would be absolutely suffocated if I were home right now with children who couldn't speak yet. I'm not ready for that. I'm content with my room full of noisy teenagers who can mostly take care of their own body fluids. (Though, to be fair, this is likely the partial result of a stomach flu going around school that resulted in a hallway mishap recently. I don't hate small children. I'm just glad I don't have any right this second.)

So much of what I've written about in the last several years of having this blog has been about my convictions on love or dating or social lives in general that, for all my trying to escape the pressure, I've only ever been stuck in a world where I have felt inadequate and unappreciated as a single woman. As though my marital status has been a deterrent in my value or worth, or, if not a deterrent, then not as important. It has left me feeling torn and pressured into doing things for the entirely wrong reasons, just to attempt to relieve that pressure. It's no wonder I can't have fun when I go out on dates: I'm not dating to please myself, I'm dating to please others or to meet some cultural standard.

It sounds selfish, but I don't mean it to. I only mean that my mind has always been in the wrong place. It hasn't ever been: "someday I'll find someone that helps me be happy" - it's always been, "someday I'll find someone and that will make _____ happier with me." Or, "someday I will find someone and then I can have a life like ______."

What I'm trying to say is. . . I can wait. I'm ready to shed the pressure and just be for a while. I like where I am. I'm happy where I am. I don't want to live someone else's life. And I think, for a little while, before I dive back into the fray, I need to take a bit of time to appreciate the life that I have. I do look forward to my "someday" when I am not single and have all it entails in my life, but I am, for now, content with the "some" of "someday" I have.

Broom Cupboards and Ballrooms

I've been thinking a lot this week about an article by Hugh Nibley called "Goods of First and Second Intent." It was from an address given to a group of retired teachers more than twenty years ago, but it is still true. The article discusses the different desires that we can have - goods of first intent that are what make life worth living and you can never get enough of, and goods of second intent that are good for you, but only if you use them to obtain goods of first intent. If they are not used properly, you can become addicted and harmed by them. (Money, for example, is a good of second intent.)

At one point in the article, Nibley points out that most people spend far too much of their time pursuing goods of second intent and neglect the things of eternity - he refers to Arthur Clarke's description of a man who had inherited a magnificent palace but instead preferred to spend all of his time in a broom cupboard.

I've been thinking about this because of an experience I had this week with a parent who, to save you all the frustrating and ridiculous details, pulled her child from my class because I was being too effective. I hold an optional mentoring/study session once a week for students in this class that her son would not be able to attend because of other commitments. After a very interesting conversation the result was pulling the child from the class entirely because she didn't want the child to miss a single breath of what went on in class. (I believe the phrase "I am having difficulty with this 'students are to be responsible' concept" was used.)

This is such a typical attitude in certain circles of my community. They imagine things they way they think it should be, and then one thing shifts or changes or moves the cheese, and the solution is not to adapt, but to throw out everything. The baby, the bathwater, the bathroom, the whole house or neighborhood if necessary - but it all goes.

It baffled me. It still baffles me. It baffles me that this woman would, presumably, have been happier of the study period was a waste of everyone's time instead of a valuable asset. It baffles me that her solution to missing part is to miss all, when her child - as far as I've been able to tell - would be perfectly capable in this class with or without the extra reminders on assignments. It reminds me of an experience I had last year when a student was pulled from my class in the first few weeks of school because the student was stressed about doing well - but mostly because the parent just wanted the kid at home more often. (The kid wanted to stay in class, and would have done well.)

These examples are of parents - who should be the greatest advocates of their children learning and growing in independence and skill - secluding their children away into broom cupboards by force. That makes me feel sick enough as it is. But how often do the rest of us voluntarily turn away from new opportunities or places for growth and stay in symbolic broom cupboards for the rest of our lives? Seems downright claustrophobic to me. There is a world of truth and light out there just waiting to be explored, and I, for one, look better and feel better in a ball gown than I do in rags.

Be Ye Therefore Perfect

I was up this morning listening to the news when one particular story caught my ear. Today is the first official back to school day for most people across the state, so they had a brief news story on not overbooking your student. Fair enough. There are lots of opportunities in schools and it's a good idea for a student to balance themselves so that they have time to take care of all their responsibilities. I get that.

But then the person they were interviewing said one thing that made me a bit chagrined. She said that it is a myth that every student is exceptionally talented. "Exceptionally talented students are the exception," she said. Instead of trying to expect or encourage exceptional things, we should expose students to a wide variety of activities, she says.

Huh.

First of all - isn't exposing people to a wide variety of activities what often leads to overbooking?

Second: I hate that many parents will listen to this and use it as an excuse for not having their students commit to the tasks they agree to do. I've seen this at every school I've taught at in the last three years - parents model a kind of behavior in their students that encourages partial commitment to any task and end up using church activities as an excuse for that partial commitment.

Third: If said woman belongs to the same church that I do, then a phrase that says "Be ye therefore perfect, even as I (and your Father and Heaven - depending on the location of the quote) am perfect." I'm fairly certain that the idea of perfection could more or less be acquainted with the idea of excellence. In fact, I think they're probably pretty good friends. I seem to remember LDS Prophet Gordon B. Hinckley saying, "Mediocrity will never do, I am capable of something better." But this woman seems to be encouraging parents to expect their son or daughter to be only normal.

Well, that's a load of junk.

I'm not a parent, but I am a teacher. I agree that "exceptionally talented" students are rare, but "exceptionally capable" students are not. So often people use lack of talent as an excuse for mediocrity. But this is not good enough. The LDS church teaches that we are, through following Christ, capable of becoming like God. This life is not a time for us to accept our own mediocrity but for us to learn how "to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield" ("Ulysses", Tennyson.) So why are we encouraging this in our youth? Why are we satisfied with letting them - or ourselves - be given symbolic trophies for little or no real accomplishment? Gold stars and stickers are all well and good - but if we are to become truly great, then we need to seek for a better world - and that takes focus, hard work, and determination.

I am. . .

. . . a teacher.

And I am not ashamed of this. Nor do I regret it. In fact, I think I have the greatest job in the world, because I get to work with the greatest people in the world.

When I tell people I'm a teacher I get very mixed reactions, usually leaning on the "oooh. . . well, that sucks. . . " side. I get the "you're so young to teach high school!" and the "Oh, I'm sorry - I'd never be able to teach teenagers, they're so awful," and the "Well, SOMEONE has to do it." Every time I wish I could let these naysayers see what I see.

I remember being a teenager. I got sick to death of hearing people saying that I would understand when I was in the "real" world. (What about my life wasn' t "real"?) That I was part of a selfish/entitled generation. (I had a job, turned in assignments on time, and helped make sure my house stayed clean, among other things.) That teenagers were rowdy, rebellious and underdressed. (I was none of these things.) I didn't like the stigma of irresponsibility, and nothing got up my gander more than people ignoring my opinions or patronizing me. I see the way people look at teenagers this way still.

But it isn't what I see. It never was.

I see a group of people who are full of possibilities. Who don't need to be pitied or pandered to or appeased - but a group of people who, even in their most disillusioned and jaded attitudes, don't want to be in a class that is boring. I see a group of people who want to learn and take on real-world problems. I see a group of people who are fun and smart and capable of so much more than people think. They come with limitations and baggage and inexperience, but when they come - and their time is not wasted - most of the time they will grow and excel beyond what any awful bureaucratic system would be able to measure with a scantron sheet.

Today I greeted a variety of students and parents at back to school night. Some of them I knew from past classes. Many I did not know. Several people from both groups - the known and the unknown - have come to this school because of the class that I team teach. People who are coming from as far as 30 minutes away, every day, because they believe in this class. It is humbling, a huge honor, and further proof to me that I have picked the right career. I love it. I love being a force for good. I love the reassurance I get from students and parents that what I do is valuable. It is an absolute honor to have been blessed with the chance to work with so many who believe so much of me, instead of so little (as seems to be common in schools any more.)

So, new school year? I'm ready for you. Not with all the materials I need and units prepared, perhaps - but with enthusiasm and determination to do great things.

Literary Elitists: Updated

Recently I had a friend ask me to write an article about "reading and writing". This hugely vague and broad topic in mind, I scoured past blog posts for something I might be able to revise into something worth reading. I came across a post I wrote in April of 2009 and sent it off, thinking that if the bare bones of what I wrote two years ago was worth reading then I'd take the time to update it.

Apparently it was really well worth my time as about a day and a half later I had an email from Orson Scott Card in my inbox asking if he could reference my post in a few places. Being the slightly obsessive person I am, I said yes - and then desperately wished that my revised version was available, because it's better, not written out of frustration, and includes two more years' experience.

So I am including that version here. You will also be able to find this version on author Kristen Randle's Website.

A few years ago as an undergrad I took a literature class that very nearly sucked all the life out of me. The class included a plethora of post-modern literature. It meant a semester with authors like Cormac McCarthy and Toni Morrison - authors that other people (re: not me) found genius because of their innovative writing techniques and mystical storytelling. It also included spending a huge amount of time with a professor who, while certainly very qualified in her field, drove me absolutely batty with her elitist views on literature. The books that I was even tempted to enjoy were so destroyed by class discussion that I started a countdown to the end of class.

Now, for you to appreciate any of this, you must understand that my favorite thing in the entire world to do is to talk about what I’m reading. As a student I was an overactive participant in every class discussion (including this professor’s.) As a teacher in my own class, my primary method of inspiring life-long reading in my students revolves around discussion. I still believe that talking about books is a fun and productive way for people to enter into the world conversation. For a teacher to out-discuss a book to me takes a huge amount of work. Somehow, by her focusing more on commentaries on the book rather than the book itself, I managed to leave her class every day with the mad desire to never touch another book again.

But then, at the end of the semester, we were assigned the book Mr. Pip by Lloyd Jones. It was one of those “kindred spirit” reads that so resonated with me that I simply could not bring myself to write what I had been writing all term to please my professor. Before, I had played the game and written exactly what I knew she would like. It was the kind of high brow writing I could do well, but didn’t enjoy. This time, this one last time, I wanted to write for myself just as I had read for myself. So I presented a plan to my professor. I reminded her that I had done spectacularly on all her other assignments and suggested that perhaps I could try a different style this time? Specifically a personal essay instead? My professor nodded, said that would be a fine idea, and I tripped off home to write.

I wrote about how the story of Mr. Pip had resonated so closely with my dearest reading experiences. Those times when you read a book that takes you away to the point where, upon returning “home”, you feel as though you’ve left it and aren’t quite sure what to do with yourself. I wrote particularly of my time with Anne of Green Gables, the dearest and most personal of my reading experiences. I wrote about how, like the main character in Pip who had grown obsessed with Great Expectations, I felt closer to Anne than nearly any “real” person. The resulting essay was a fairly sentimental tribute, perhaps, but I meant it. Throughout my college experience I had enjoyed analyzing the symbolic and historical significance of great works of fiction very much, but this time I wanted to honor it.

Knowing that my professor was often rather forgetful and was likely to need some reminding that she had, in fact, approved my experiment, I included a cover page to my essay. I thanked her for assigning the book and let her know how much I enjoyed it. Then, feeling more than a little cheeky and daring and fed-up after a long semester, I included the following quote:

The elitists are such boneheads they think literature exists to be admired. Wrong. Literature exists to create memories so true and important that we allow them to become part of ourselves, shaping our future actions because we remember that once someone we admired did this, and someone we hated and feared did that.

Literature matters only to the degree that it shapes and changes human behavior by making the audience wish to be better because they read it.

It becomes importantly bad only to the degree that it entices the audience to revel in actions and memories that debase the culture that embraces it.

Next to that, questions of how one literary work influences other literary works, or how the manner of writing measures up to the tastes of some elite group are so trivial that you marvel that someone who went to college could ever think they mattered more.

(Orson Scott Card, July 29, 2007, “Uncle Orson Reviews Everything”)

This was, admittedly, a very foolish and risky thing to do. My professor, after all, was a bonehead literary elitist. But given the subject matter of Mr. Pip I figured that, in spite of the jab, she had to be fair enough to see that the quote was actually supporting the lesson taught by the book she’d assigned me to read. If she had a soul at all - she had to see reason, right?

Wrong.

On the last day of class when my portfolio was returned, I pulled out my essay to see that it didn’t appear to even have been touched. There was no crease by the staple, at least. Only the cover page had any response to it. Next to the quote by Orson Scott Card was written, “Not true. This is a very silly remark. See if you can figure out why?”

I left class that day absolutely fuming. Even now, two years later and well out of this woman’s grasp, I still get frustrated thinking about it. I hated her for being such an elitist that she’d forgotten why people should read to begin with.

If you ask people why they read, I would imagine that very few people would tell you that they enjoy reading because they enjoy high faluting literary commentaries. That may be part of the reason. This essay, after all, is a commentary on literature. I don’t think literary analysis is bad at all - I think it’s what helps to keep a book alive and relevant. But if you talk to most readers about their favorite books, the analysis will only matter to them if they have connected to the book individually as well. If that book, as Card says, “shapes and changes human behavior by making the audience wish to be better because they read it.”

I’ve realized this even more now that I’m on the other side as a teacher myself. For the past two years I have been the one to present students with books they will be forced to read and then graded on. I’ve fought to make sure that I find books and plays that I love and have tried to pass that on to my students. Because I teach a combined English and History class, I also try to find books that will make particular connections that can link to their immediate reality. Studying To Kill a Mockingbird and Asian philosophy together, for example, provides a nice discussion on how to live your life in a way that is at peace with difficult decisions. It is rewarding to have class discussions where students do what the state educational system wants them to do - demonstrate understanding of important themes and symbols in literature. But the greatest compliment I receive as a teacher is something that could never be measured - it’s when I hear a student say they love a book I’ve assigned them to read. To hear a class refer to Atticus Finch (To Kill a Mockingbird), Reuven Malter (The Chosen), Jonas (The Giver) or Napoleon (Animal Farm) as examples of people they do or don’t want to be like. And these are all people (and a pig) who never technically walked the earth.

I remember being in second grade and coming to class every day with a pile of books as tall as I could carry. I would read one chapter from the book on the top of the pile and then put that book on the bottom and take the next one down and so on to maximize the number of books I could read at a time. I remember falling asleep with my mother’s copy of Anne of Green Gables when I was young, flipping through the pages long before I could read the words on them, aching to be old enough to read it. I remember getting my drivers license and going to the library for my first drive alone. I remember staying up until way past my bedtime reading books by flashlight. I remember the first time I read Jane Eyre. I remember finishing Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and immediately starting the book again because I wasn’t ready to say good-bye yet. The first piece of furniture I ever bought for myself was - what else? - a bookshelf. I remember packing my emergency kit when I was young and agonizing over which book I loved most to save if I had no time to save them all.

That is why we read, isn’t it? Because we want to fall in love. Because stories matter. They take us away, they bring us back, they touch our souls and enlighten our minds. At their best, stories inspire us to be better than we could have been on our own steam.

I look across my bedroom and see Mr. Pip on one of my bookshelves now, situated in alphabetical order between The Turn of the Screw and Ella Enchanted, two completely different works of fiction. One I read to work out my brain and for the pleasure of words perfectly formed, one I read for the pleasure of a simple story well told. I wonder where Mr. Pip sits on the shelves of the office of this old professor of mine. I wonder - hope, really - that she has a book that she reads every year just because she wouldn’t feel complete if she didn’t. I hope, too, that she read a book this year not as a teacher preparing for students but as a human being that needs to be connected to other human beings - even if they are fictional.

Today. . .

I want to be here:

Or here:

Or here. . .

(Last two photos from Wikimedia Commons)

Or with this beautiful girl. . .

(Who turns twelve today, by the way.)

But instead I am here. . .

(The "Bat Cave")

Up to my ears in . . .

So that I can do this. . .

(Last three photos from Wikimedia Commons)

In the fall.

It's a really good thing I love my job.

Changing Education Paradigms

Over the summer, as mentioned before, I am mad at work taking over the world. Part of this plan involves working on how to better encourage students to get out of the box. The world is changing at a rate that it never has before - the last ten years have been particularly fast paced, and many of the systems that worked for many years are now either irrelevant or on their way there. Education in particular is caught in this trap.

The modern system of education is primarily designed on the factory model created at the turn of the 20th Century. With so many children in cities like New York in need of education, it was a practical choice for the time. Now, though, the system of factory-like education becomes a crippling force for creativity because everything is taught to standardized tests and imposed state (soon to be national) standards of what it means to be "educated". The system does not encourage students to think outside the box and there is rarely a mechanism for them to do so, and teachers who think outside the box have little motivation or reward. (And don't even get me started on the teachers union.)

This in mind, I've recently picked up the book Out of Our Minds by Ken Robinson. I'm sure there will be many essays in the making as I read more of the book, but for now, feast your eyes on this RSA Animate called "Changing Education Paradigms" that gives you a small piece of the informational pie Robinson has to offer. I find his points very interesting and thought provoking.

NOTE: The first clip has lots of cool animation and is nice and short but mostly discusses the problems without posing solutions. You can find the solutions he suggests in the book, or by watching the full version of the original speech.

It's (Almost) the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Do you remember that commercial that used to (maybe still is?) be on TV this time of year where there were images of kids running out of school, tossing papers into the air while the Christmas favorite "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" played? I thought about that commercial when I got up this morning, thinking to myself, "That is so true! I LOVE being a teacher!!"

And I do. Not just in June, July and August, but during my official working months as well.

Most of the time.

The last week of school belongs to a very special circle of hell for a teacher who actually intends to do anything related to school work. I suppose I was foolish enough to count myself in that group this year. But what choice did I have? Between state tests and field trips and assemblies, there were only about four available days for me to have projects due. Today was one of those days. It was supposed to be a field day for the younger students (my school covers K-12), but the field day was cancelled for weather, and wasn't supposed to impact my students until the last hour of the day anyway.

But then, somehow, magically - everyone started disappearing. Teachers started putting on movies in their rooms and playing games and it turned into a school-optional day. I had to corral students back into my room and coerce our very kind secretary to announce over the intercom to my next class that if they wanted a grade they had to show up. I had to not so very kindly inform my writing students that their portfolio, which we had been talking about EVERY day for the last month and a half, was still due today, and not the last day of school. I was met with very blank 'are you serious?!!' stares and panicked pleas to call home and requests to turn in assignments on the last day of school and suddenly the end of the school year (which is a mere two days away) could. not. come. soon. enough.

I've learned more than a little bit this year about the different cultures of education in our country. When I was in high school, I lived in a very comfortable 'you either go to a private school or a public school' mentality, and thought that if you had a good public school you were lucky and if you went to a bad one it was unfortunate but you couldn't do anything about it. Now I teach with schools that have many more options for students and families who want flexibility in how they educate their children. On the whole, I don't think this is a terrible thing. I think it is good for families to be involved in who and where their kids are taught.

But I do start having issues when the culture of school, then, carries out that mentality of 'optional'. When going to class or completing assignments or showing up on time is only done in the spirit of convenience and not out of duty or honor. What you decide to do, you commit to, and you do it well.

Ugh. I don't like using this as an opportunity to vent. I'd rather spout of random philosophical theories and talking points and write something actually worth reading. But you know what? Sometimes life is just frustrating and obnoxious and people are stupid (and they can't help it, especially when they're 13. . . ) and two days from now. . . it won't be my problem any more.

Summer? Thank you for (almost) being here today!