I wonder if every student teacher is told that they’ll almost certainly collapse into tears at some point. I know that every time I turned around, someone was talking about Teacher Breakdowns as if they were just a fact of life. And of course, teaching is a draining and emotional experience – especially when you add on the stress of school, and applications, and the whole “year-long interview” process of the student teaching.
That said, I never once felt like crying, all the way through my student teaching. After that I taught summer school and never once felt like crying. Now I’m more than halfway through my first year of real-live teaching – and for the first time ever, this morning I thought it might happen.
This student – we’ll just call him Angel – is one of the ones whose name became familiar in our household within the first three days of school. He walked into my classroom and caught my attention instantaneously. Enormous green eyes, dark hair that he tried to spike but that preferred to lie, baby-fine, against his scalp. Nickel hoops through each earlobe. Black t-shirts. There was something about him that grabbed my heart. Being a naturally empathetic person, it didn’t take me long to figure out that this kid was hurting badly. He wasn’t a naughty kid, but he was a messed-up kid.
Fast-forward through months of trying to help Angel. We’re talking about a boy who had a suicide attempt at age 10, who had been on a wide array of antidepressants and anti-psychotics until his mom’s boyfriend “manned him up” and took him off the pills cold-turkey. This kid would sit in my classroom and pound the butt of his pen into his forehead until it was pockmarked with deep dents. (The forehead, not the pen; he broke more pens into tiny pieces than I cared to count.) He’d refuse to do any work, or refuse to try. He’d do the work and then throw it away instead of turning it in. My seating charts were crafted around giving Angel a place where he could rock his chair and desk, even shove the desk around, without hurting any of the other kids.
Meeting after meeting after meeting. The first meetings were my doing; everyone else saw a kid who was full of meanness, but I saw a kid who was full of pain. It bothered me and I fought for him. Then the other teachers saw what I saw, and we began the difficult process of trying to convince the parents.
Dad in prison. Older brother off in the Marines. Mom suffering from chronic illnesses and terminal toughness. Boyfriend determined that there was nothing wrong with Angel that a summer at a logging camp couldn’t cure.
I said, early and often, that one of two things was going to happen with Angel in the next five years. Either he was going to walk into my classroom in his shiny new Marine uniform and tell me that he’d graduated high school and had a new life – or I was going to be attending his funeral.
In late November, Angel started folding paper. He made me a jumping frog. It was about that time that I heard from a counselor that Angel liked me – quite remarkable, given that I taught Angel’s least favorite subjects and that he’d never admitted to liking a teacher since early grade school. Then I got an origami flower – a clover, he corrected me – and another, until I had a small bouquet of paper clovers erupting from my pencil mug.
We broke for two weeks of Christmas vacation. (They still call it that around here; in fact, we had Christmas trees in the building.) In the last days of December, I began digging through displays of 2009 calendars looking for what I needed. I knew that I might not be able to get Angel to write an essay, but I could give him a reason to come to class. Finally I found it: a daily desktop calendar, one origami project a day, printed on origami paper. On the first day of class, I told him that “someone got this for me, but I’m terrible at origami, so I was hoping you might be able to help me with them.”
For the last two months, Angel has come in and asked for his calendar page. I’ve got a little plastic bin on my desk overflowing with ducks, cranes, flowers, bug-catchers, and curious angular jumbles. And he’s been reading the books, and doing his homework. Not a miraculous turn-around, but something.
This morning he ran into me before school, with an armful of Grisham paperbacks – his favorite author. He told me that he had extra copies of these books, and that he wanted to give them to me. I took them, thanking him and wondering if there was ever a better gift than one of books from a kid like Angel.
Then I realized that his mom was standing there. “It’s Angel’s last day,” she told me. “We got the call last night. He’s going to be going to [Alternative Middle School].”
I know that the correct reaction would have been pleasure. The Alt school is a MUCH better fit for Angel, and it just might bring him actual success. There, he can get the one-on-one help he needs. He can be supervised, monitored, assisted. And let’s not forget how much work Angel had been for me. My case load just lessened a ton.
But I still feel like I’ve lost something precious. Perverse as it might be, I am going to miss Angel badly.
I sent him home with ten months of origami calendar and a note that I hope he’ll read. Me? I’m going home with a strangely sore heart.
Tagged: alternative schools, mental illness, middle school, seventh grade February 25, 2009
We have a new nurse at our school – not new to nursing, but new to our building. I really hit it off with the last gal, but this one… well, we just haven’t really clicked. Most of this is due to the fact that she keeps very much to herself (no fun health updates, etc.) and I haven’t spent much time in the nurse’s office.
My only real complaint with Nurse is that she doesn’t send sick kids home. Probably there’s some reason behind that, but all I know is that before, a puking kid didn’t get returned to my classroom.
A case in point:
Today, one of my kids – and granted, a chronic sicky – went to the restroom and vomited. ”Ralph” returned, looking visibly ill; I sent him to the nurse. Fifteen minutes he returned to get his things. From “visibly ill” he’d progressed to “actually green” punctuated with loud groans of pain. I asked him if his parents were coming to get him.
“No,” Ralph said. “She says I have to at least get through fifth period, and then if the medicine isn’t helping she’ll let me call home.”
Well, great. I’m sure Ralph’s fifth period teacher wants him in there breathing puke-germs all over her and her other students. It’s not bad enough that he leaned all over my desk and breathed on me, but now we want to take out as many teachers as possible?
Some of these kids – Ralph included – are fledgling hypochondriacs, no doubt. But he was not faking this discomfort, and I doubt very much he was faking the puke. And I’m sorry, but the last thing in the world I want is anyone throwing up in my classroom. That’s bad enough on its own, but when you’re in a room full of kids – all of whom are potentially sympathetic vomiters – you’re just asking for Awful.
Send ‘em home, Nurse!
February 17, 2009
I don’t, for whatever reason, dream about teaching. That’s bothered me a little bit. If you care about something as much as I care about teaching, shouldn’t it invade your dreams? My colleagues talk about their teaching dreams…
Last night was no exception, on the surface. I did, however, dream about some of my students.
I was at a football game, and one of the players was a boy named [C]. He was one of my very favorite students during my student teaching: a strong, sensitive, brilliant boy who could write poetry as well as he could find the end zone. You know, the sort of kid who only actually exists in cheesy movies – except he’s for real. In real life he’s still in high school, but in my dream he’d grown several inches and many pounds and was a star of the local college team.
I was sitting outside the stadium with a small group of people, feeling lonely and slightly irritated about something (I think it had to do with people over-imbibing, given a comment someone in my dream made, but that’s irrelevant) when up comes [C], fresh from a victory. He sat down and talked to me for a while, genuinely happy to see me. It was clear that we were friends, not just former student/teacher. It was a lovely feeling. We walked away together, talking.
From there, I walked into a very full room – a band room, I think, that was being used as a presentation room for some sort of meeting. The first person to meet me at the door was [J], one of my current students, only instead of being thirteen she was closer to 30. Also, instead of being one of my least favorite faces to see in the morning, she was someone near and dear to my heart. We greeted each other, so happy to see one another. Again, it was clear that our relationship was one between friends, not a teacher and a student.
I took my seat on the far side of the room, melancholy again because [C] had had to leave and [J] was working and couldn’t come hang out with me. And then, there I saw him: [T], my best friend from high school and much of college, the kid so much a part of me that I sometimes can’t distinguish whether he was a friend or a relative or what. Despite the fact that [T] and I parted ways, somewhat non-amicably, years ago, he still haunts my dreams. I miss him horribly.
In my dream he came over and sat by me, and it was the most wonderful thing ever. We hadn’t ever fought. We hadn’t ever grown apart. It was like our friendship had just continued on, and we were now at the natural point that a friendship would have reached after (counting…) thirteen years. If you’ve ever wrapped yourself up in a blanket fresh out of the dryer, you know how good that dream-segment felt.
Then I woke up, smiling – literally, which is unusual for me – and it took me a good three or four minutes before I realized that [T] was no longer a part of my life, and that [J] was still an unusually obnoxious seventh grader, and that [C] probably didn’t even know who I was anymore.
Why be visited by these three specters? [T], I get. I can even understand [C]. But [J]?? Weird.
February 17, 2009
Stimulus has passed. Hundreds of millions of dollars coming into education in our state. My future looks a tiny bit brighter – maybe I won’t be unemployed next fall after all. Maybe I’ll get to stay here in my school.
Here’s hoping. I like it here. I didn’t know if I would, but I do. I’ve built relationships that are, perhaps, becoming friendships. I’ve stuffed a classroom. I’ve started a program and began building another one.
Meanwhile, in more important news… job security = increased chances of family expansion.
For a fun explanation of the stimulus, watch this video.
Happy Valentine’s Day…
February 14, 2009
One of my seventh grade boys (who gets to be called Colt here, because I keep mentally describing him as “coltish”) has landed himself in deep poo.
He’s a nice boy with some problems. Unmedicated ADHD. Too smart for his own good, which leads to boredom in the classroom. Wants to be tough. Has (unfortunately for his wannabe toughness) auburn curls.
During first period, VP-7 came into my room and took Colt away. I didn’t think too much of it; Colt is one of those boys who gets pulled out of class. Later, it turns out that Colt never went back to any of his classes that day. Curious, his other teachers and I went to VP-7’s office for information.
Two days later, we finally got most of the story out of the administration (who were constrained by the ongoing investigation and privacy).
Colt brought a knife to school – bad enough, considering we have a zero-tolerance policy. That’s expulsion right there under most circumstances. Worse, he pulled it on a younger kid and pretended (or “pretended” – how would we know?) to threaten him. The kid reported Colt, and the rest was pretty clear-cut.
What bothers me is that I kind of think I know what Colt was thinking (inasmuch as a thirteen-year-old boy is ever thinking anything). See, we’re reading The Outsiders. He’s not in my reading class, but he would come in to my writing class and, given five minutes of spare time, grab one of my classroom copies and start reading it voraciously. If you don’t remember how the book goes, the relevant information is that it is full of tough, quasi-heroic young boys who carry switchblades.
Smart, bored boy gets hooked on a book filled with characters he’d love to resemble. He can’t teleport himself back to the 1960s, but he can walk with a swagger and a knife in his pocket.
Assuming it’s even the case, what’s the lesson? Don’t teach this book? I have to admit, I had my doubts about its appropriateness, but for the first time all year I think the kids are actually loving a book. What teacher in their right mind would take that away?
Meanwhile, Colt is suspended, almost certainly expelled, and quite possibly up on juvenile criminal charges. It’s a heart-breaker. We’d been trying really hard to help this kid… but I guess sometimes there’s no holding them back from the brink.
February 13, 2009
Today’s bad idea comes courtesy of an eighth grade girl who thought it would be great to open up a campus tavern at her lunch table. She acquired half a bottle of booze from her parents’ liquor cabinet and snuck it to school, then somehow managed to sneak it into the lunchroom despite the fact that we have a backpack-free campus. (Having snuck my fair share of sodas into basketball games, I’m guessing coat sleeve.) She then proceeded to open the bottle under the table and pour generous shots for all of her friends.
A student at an adjoining table realized what was going on and, rather than ask for her fair share of straight Everclear (or whatever lovely beverage the Daily Special was) informed one of the lunch duty teachers.
All of the kids who accepted contraband libations have been suspended. The bartender is in a lot of trouble; not only did she steal from her parents and bring alcohol to school, but she distributed it to a LOT of minors. At the very least, with our zero-tolerance policies, she’s looking at expulsion. She’ll be lucky not to come up with juvie charges.
My question: how in the world do a bunch of eighth grade girls drink any sort of alcohol straight and not just become immediately conspicuous? Most adults will pull a face, and many will holler or gag. I can only imagine what amount of sheer will power must have been exercised for those girls to keep their cool.
February 11, 2009
Me? I’m a first-year teacher.I’m on a one-year, non-renewing contract.
They tell me I’m doing a really good job. They told me that if I did a really good job, I’d have my job back next year. What happens is that they have to officially fire me at the end of the school year, but if they still need me and if I didn’t screw up, they’ll rehire me just as soon as the paperwork goes through.
Now, though, everything is different. We’re having bad budget problems. They’re talking about cutting 60-100 teaching jobs in our district alone. It’s not that big of a district. The first people to go will be the ones on those non-renewing contracts like mine.
Fun.
Now the scenario looks more like this: come June, I’m schoolless. Pack up all my things and hit the curb. Start from square one with resumes, applications, interviews. Maybe find a spot back here in the school where I’ve made my professional home. Maybe find a spot in a completely different grade, in a completely different school, in a completely different district. Maybe find no spot at all.
I feel like someone has kicked me right behind the knees.
February 10, 2009
