remembering who I'm here for

Looking over my last few posts, I realized something: I haven't been talking about my kids much lately. It's easy to get bogged down in the paperwork and bureaucracy and in your own teaching. But in the end, all of that is in place not to drive you crazy, though it may, but to help your kids.

So, before I go outside and enjoy the Saturday sun, a few words about my students.

1. They're making progress. Those who have stayed, and who do their work every day instead of sleeping, are really showing improvement. Are they all going to get A's? No - because they aren't all doing all their work, and even those who are are not all mastering everything, and in the ends, that's what grades should reflect. Are they all ready for the next grade? It's harsh, but most of them, by state standards and by my own, are not even ready for the grade they just finished. But that's what we're here for, and that's what they're working on. They're getting closer, and most important of all, they know that. They don't know it as well as they should, and that's something I need to work on as a teacher. Teenagers are a funny group. In a lot of ways they're still kids, but they definitely think they're too cool for learning. Yet show them that they're making progress, and watch how hard they have to fight to keep a smile off their ultra-cool faces. Then, the next day, watch how much harder they are willing to work.

2. They crack me up. Seriously. And they're angels. On a behavioral scale of 1-10, with 1 being a pod-child genetically engineered for behavioral perfection and 10 being Damien, spawn of the dark underlord, the worst I've seen in my classroom is probably about a 3. Our main problems are with talking out of turn, a bit of inappropriate language, and sleeping. That's another thing I need to work on: while I'm getting pretty good at managing the first two, I'm not so great at making sure everyone's paying attention at all times. I've caught myself, more than once, waking up a student twice, and then, seeing their head down a third time, thinking, "Fine. I tried." It's a terrible feeling, and I need to make sure that even if I have that thought, my actions don't reflect it.

3. They're amazing students. Not just in the sense that they're making progress, but in the sense that by and large, they care about their education. Now that they're more comfortable with me, they're starting to do things like pull me aside and have me explain things over again until they understand them. They approach us when they have jobs that prevent them from doing their homework and ask us for modified deadlines. They check to make sure they're doing things right. This is maybe the most heartening thing of all for me as a teacher. While it is my job to check that they are understanding, I'm trying to teach them that it's their job, too. They are adults, and they should care about these things and be actively involved in their own education. While it would theoretically feel great if 100% of my students told me that they all understood something the first time, it would probably mean they were lying to me or overestimating their own understanding, and it feels even better when one or two raise their hands, wait to be called on, and ask me a clarifying question.

4. I do not want to leave them. I know, this one's about me. But it's true. A lot of us are feeling this way, realizing that we have just five days left with this group of amazing human beings, and things are just starting to happen. What if we had just one more week with them? What if we had a whole year? What could we accomplish then? Would Claudia and Alma perfect their verb tenses? Would Vashawn's grammar start to catch up with his amazing talent for descriptive detail and rhetoric? Could Terry start to believe that he's not stupid, and feel confident enough to write more than three sentences at a stretch? Would Pebbles ever be comfortable enough in the classroom to even say hello to me, like she does in the hallways? Might Anthony start believing that he could go to college after all? We all know that we'll have an amazing new group of students to work with very shortly, and that we will have them for an entire year, long enough to move beyond this beginning, getting-to-know-you stage. But that doesn't make it any easier to walk away, when they ask you with either a pleading voice or an accusing stare, why you have to leave. It doesn't make it easier to walk away from the rest, either, the ones who never started to warm up to you, who still don't care about or don't believe in the possibility of their education. In a year, you wonder, could you start to change their minds?