Somewhere between teaching in Baltimore and getting ready to leave to find a teaching job in MN, I have come to care a great deal about what my coworkers and bosses think of me. For three years I taught untainted. I just operated on the principle that my energy was best spent trying to make the complicated landscape of an often troubled classroom fit together. I just tried to paint the picture of a healthy learning environment, shifting landmarks and roads and cliffs, until the entire view made sense and was amazing.
When work is over and my mind wanders back to it I realize that I'm no longer envisioning lessons, execution, squeezing joy into objectives. Nope. I think about stupid stuff that actually riles me up. Like how I haven't been asked to help out on Saturday tutoring sessions when there's a clear need for extra people. Who cares? Why do I care? It's stupid. Why the fuck should I care if I get asked to help to do something when I really need that Saturday to myself. There are other things my mind wanders to, like what does a certain administrator really think of me?
In fact, the only reason that last question has plagued me is because I'm now middle-management at my school. Albeit, I'm barely middle-management, but I am the team leader for my department. I run our department meetings, manage our grade submissions, serve as the first person they go to with general issues, and am responsible for recruiting a new set of students inside and outside our building for five different career pathways. I get to sit in meetings with department heads, and I hear the way they talk about their teachers. Since I'm not a seasoned professional yet, I can't help but to wonder what has been said about me.
Mostly, I want to know because if I'm a shitty teacher, I need to know this. I need to know what to do to be better, meet my kids' needs. It's not even about shitty. It's about excellent, one of the best. That's what I want. I don't want to be a rock, solid, dependable teacher. I want to be the kind of teacher that inspires independence and freedom in her students. I know that's not me yet, and I just want to know how to get there.
I leech. Off. Every. Single. Word. What are these other amazing teachers doing? I listen to this hoping that I will see myself in their descriptions, but I usually don't. I just see me, my personality, my own drive, my own perplexity over how to make what I teach, an ambiguous curriculum, relevant and interesting to a group of students filled with just enough who don't want to go into journalism or media or graphic design anything to throw me off my game on some days.
This all brings me back to the main point, that these tendencies to indirectly learn from people, are for naught. I think I need to get back inside my own head, my own classroom. and manage my department in the strictest of senses. When my mind wanders on to these words, distractions, dramatic musings, I need to stop myself and contemplate some aspect of my teaching instead.
This energy needs to be harnessed, focused, because this world of drama is exhausting and it leads nowhere.
Reads like you answered your own question. :) All I can say is that you are far more amazing than you think you are... Think of how many people never ask themselves these questions in the first place? Your awareness shows your love and dedication and drive to be the best that you are. And, you are. I know I haven't been with you for like, over a year, but that's okay I still know the sort of heart you have and it's HUGE! Your students take far more from you than they show. Not trying to be pep-talky so I hope this doesn't piss you off!
ReplyDeleteNot possible, pissing me off. I think this is why I love writing, it's thinking and leads you to answers.
ReplyDeleteI'm not going to kid you, Amy. You're not that amazing. You've got talent but you're no Walter Payton.
ReplyDeleteHave you thought about dog-sitting as a profession?
/sarcasm
Can't wait for you to come back to Minnesota. We're going to rock out with our cocks out.