To be frank, it's been a hell of a week. Things have been so terrible at work that Teaching Pal Jackie has started a one-woman-crusade to prevent me from leaving the teaching profession. I think it was the research papers that put me over the edge, and it's possible that some sort of seasonal affective thing is going on, but God. I thought for sure I would lose it when the mouse reappeared in my classroom and was scurrying around near my feet. I just don't get paid enough to deal with rodents on a daily basis. I'm not entirely convinced that I get paid enough to deal with sophomores on a daily basis, either, but at least they walk upright.
I'm happy the day, the week, and the semester are over.
I stayed late at school today (breaking Jackie's rule number 1 for Teaching Survival which is leaving the building when the sun is still out) to try to get a handle on semester grades. Here's the good thing that came out of that:
In the middle of a bunch of late work handed in from the pubic speakers, I found a rough draft of a speech from a girl in my first hour class. She moved to the United States from Kenya five years ago after her father died, and she is one of those genuinely sweet ESL students who you can't help but love and root for. The pubic speakers have to give a tribute speech as their final exam. Rest assured, none of the speakers delivered their tribute in honor of me, but Amina did write this:
"Because of these people I am able to love others, myself and believe in myself, push myself to do things that I don't want to do. I want to recognize them for all they have done for me and how they have helped me. The wonderful persons that I am talking about are my teachers. They made me believe that I have the ability to attain whatever I seek and I am truly humbled and blessed to have them in my life. God bless them all."
So sweet, right? So I started to think that maybe I didn't hate my job all THAT much, when I was interrupted by a kid barging into my classroom saying,
"Ms. Tholen, can a teacher call me a retard?"
"Yes. Who called you a retard?"
And that, friends, is how teaching goes. Just when you think you're getting somewhere, you come crashing back down to your rodent-infested reality.
Next week will be better.
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3 comments:
Oh, bless that girl's sweet heart. Bless the retard too. Things will be better next week.
At least no one was schweegin' it in your classroom.
At this point, there's no where to go but up, right?
Well, at least he didn't call YOU a retard -- that would've swung momentum back to the negative side. As it is, the ESL student's story keeps you on the positive side of the ledger.
Anyway, at least you didn't screen a student film for the class that included a character named "Jigaboo Jones" like I did -- naturally, that was one of the very few films that I didn't get a chance to preview before I showed it to the class. I await my letter from the NAACP.
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