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on teaching

Supposedly, Monday was the most depressing day of the year, statistically. Christmas bills are due, the weather sucks, its a Monday, and most people have broken their New Years Resolutions by then. It has, in general, been a rather sucky week, though there have been bright spots.

Today capped it all off. I've been thinking recently about the way I talk about my school and the view of it that I present. While I try not to be negative about it on this blog, I've concluded that I am often very negative about it otherwise, and that what I say does little to encourage those who already have a negative view of public education. I want people to support it, but at the same time to be aware of its ugly side. Rarely am I able to strike a good balance.

A co-worker shared this op-ed from the NYTimes with me earlier this week. I have a lot of thoughts on this, but, pretty much, I've fallen into the trap of the Myth of the Great Teacher. I cannot shake my desire to save the world. This is what has led to my utter frustration.

We had a number of fights yesterday that spilled in today. I could feel the unrest among the students when I headed to my hall duty half an hour before school started. Shortly before the bell rang to start the school day, a herd of 50+ students rushed down the stairs to the cafeteria, tipping me off that there was a fight. In the chaos that ensued over the next 15-20 minutes, I noticed that a number of my generally upstanding, responsible, clear-headed students were among those rushing to see the fight.

To say the least, I was very disappointed in them. I could sense the continued unrest as they entered my class and decided to forego the lesson for a time and talk some things out. I started with having them list the reasons someone runs to a fight: entertainment, excitement, to see who's fighting, to have something to gossip about, boredom. Next I asked them to list the consequences of a fight or running to it: jail, suspension, damage to the school's reputation, injury, death. I asked them what they thought I thought about students running toward a fight: stupid, immature, irresponsible, no moral fiber, lacking self-control. Yes, I said, I did think all those things. I challenged them to think through it and decide whether or not the consequences they had listed were worth the reasons they ran to the fight, plus their damaged reputation in my eyes.

We had some real honesty and sharing. I know that my students respect me, every last one of them, and they know that I love them and respect them as well, every last one of them. They were able to voice their frustration with the administration and suggest real, viable suggestions for improving safety at school. We also discussed what they, as the leaders of the school, could do to help change the culture of the school.

In two classes out of three, I think that some mental cogs started turning, thinking seriously about their individual responsibility outside of merely the school environment and the impact of their words on others. I was impressed with their thoughtful remarks and candid assessment of our culture. The third class, after a food-fight in the cafeteria, only saddened and frustrated me. A number of students expressed their gloomy thought that there was little point in trying to change anything in our society because things have always been bad and always will be.
Students from different cultural backgrounds expressed diametrically opposed views on a matter and no one could get past how they just didn't understand where the other was coming from, with no attempt to understand the other position. Not a good note to end an already bad day on.

It was altogether harrowing and I climbed into my car empty and on the verge of tears, which I quickly succumbed to. Driving home, I got caught at the light at the corner of Freedom Parkway and Boulevard, staring at the giant metal outline of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I was overwhelmed again by the contrast between his ideals and sacrificial death and my students' lack of understanding of any of those concepts. Very few of them could even begin to fathom that someone would not fight back if hit, that there was any reason related to the greater good of society for which someone would submit to personal injury, even to the point of death.

Labels: teaching

posted by CP @ 6:48 PM 2 thoughts