The Danger of Comparing

Harder than I expected.

That is how I would describe the first half of this school year--year four of teaching. When I started the year, I was ready, physically and mentally, to hit the ground running, to have an extraordinary school year with my new group of extraordinary students. A good friend even told me that I sounded more passionate about teaching, and happier in my career, than I ever had before.

Instead, I found myself back at the drawing board, wondering what in the world I had learned in the past three years and why nothing seemed to be working this year.

Now in December, one week before we wrap of this semester and I head home for Christmas, I can look back and say that this is the nature of teaching. One moment I think I have everything figured out; the next moment I'm back at square one.

I've learned some lessons this year. The first is to ask more questions before saying yes. Last year, I agreed to attend a summer workshop. Little did I know that I was actually agreeing to help run a school-wide program. Yikes! The second lesson is that burnout is real. This fall was so busy that for the first two months of the school year, I completely neglected any kind of social life. Never before as a teacher have I been so irresponsible about taking care of myself.  It's as if I forgot I needed people around me, forgot I needed to pause and have fun--forgot that eating dinner in my car is never the best choice! I worked and worked and worked, until the month of November mercifully arrived and everything else was put on hold to celebrate three beautiful weddings.

Ironically, all of this extra work has not made me a better teacher. I have had more days than usual this year where I am just cranky (and unfortunately it's always the students who get the brunt of that). By the time I realized I was burning out, it was too late to recover in any way other than just stopping--letting the papers pile up and the to-call list lengthen. All I could do was grit my teeth and make it until Thanksgiving break.

Please don't misunderstand me. This school year has not been a total failure. The students are learning; many of them seem to enjoy coming to language arts class; I have a handful of them, as usual, who consistently brighten my day and remind me why I love this job. It's just been a harder road than I expected it to be when I set out with big dreams this August.

This past Friday afternoon as my third period class was "watching" Channel One News (but really whispering and passing notes behind my back as I erased the board), I thought about something I had not considered before, about a way that I could reframe this discouragement. Maybe instead of being upset that it's Christmas and I feel like my classes still haven't clicked into that place of learning community, I should be grateful that I can stand at the board and perceive exactly what is happening behind me. My past two school years--the standard against which this year is falling so miserably short--may be clouded in my memory. It is quite possible that last year and the year before were not as perfect as I seem to remember, and that a heightened awareness of the struggles of teaching doesn't necessarily mean I am slipping as a teacher. It may instead be a sign of growth. And isn't growth what I want?

Another lifetime, almost...!

My previous post was in 2009.  Two. thousand. NINE.  Happy 2013, everyone.

Since my last post, I have:

• Completed student teaching
• Earned my bachelor's degree
• Traveled for six weeks in Egypt
• Moved from Ohio to Texas
• Lived with extended family
• Moved into my first apartment
• Joined a Baptist church (I didn't see that one coming!)
• Survived three entire years of teaching 7th grade 
• Returned to Guatemala for another week of serving Colegio Juan Wesley
• Paid in full one of my student loans
• Successfully settled in a new city, with a thankful heart

                                         ...all while walking with a God who is SO incredibly faithful.

So, this blog is from another lifetime, really.

But I'm returning simply because of my students.  This past school year, I decided to try blogging with my smallest class.  After the standardized tests nearly sucked away all our energy, we devoted several class days to beginning our own blogs.  My students are thrilled any time we get to use computers, but it was the month of May, and as much as I hate to admit it, I wasn't expecting much from them.  Something happened, however, that was enough to sell me on blogging for the rest of my teaching career: In a computer lab full of twenty-some seventh graders, during the month of May, after the tests were over, with summer so tantalizingly close, all I could hear was the clack clack clack of keys--busy fingers, writing.

You have to understand--this was the class who whined when asked to write a paragraph.  They are bright, talented kids, but, for most of them, writing was just not their thing.  So even though their posts weren't necessarily mind-blowing, and even though we never really established the sense of blogging community I was hoping for, the silence in the computer lab those few days spoke volumes to me about the power of giving students the platform of a blog.

This coming school year, I want to start this from the beginning.  I want to teach my students how to add their voices to the global conversation.  So many of them do not know they have powerful voices.  

My return to this dusty old blog is my attempt to regain my own voice.

Greater things...

Earlier this summer, I had the opportunity to travel to San Cristobal Totonicapan, Guatemala with a group of fantastic people from Green, OH (and elsewhere!).  Below is a video slide show set to the song "God of this City" by Chris Tomlin.  Sometimes I feel like this song is overused, but I have yet to find another song with lyrics that so perfectly express both the reality of how God is working in the places we visited and the prayer of my heart for the people we met.  Greater things are still to be done in San Cristobal, in the surrounding communities, and among the Quiche people.  And these greater things will not be done by foreigners but by the native men and women working to keep schools and churches alive, by Quiche pastors currently being trained in their own language, and by students at Colegio Juan Wesley and other Christian schools as they grow in knowledge and in faith.  

Ohio Governor calls for a new focus on 21st Century skills in schools

This article, printed in the Herald-Dispatch on Feb. 23, describes a new approach to education proposed by Gov. Strickland. While Strickland's ideas certainly sound relevant, I am concerned this will not turn out to be the solution students need.

The problem, according to the article, is that American students are falling behind the rest of the world in problem solving skills. Here is one of my favorite parts of the news article:

"A growing body of research in cognitive psychology
suggests that minds learn best when memorization of facts is blended with
critical thinking exercises to use that knowledge..."

Really? Are we surprised by this? Anyways...

I agree that 21st Century skills are important for students. I agree that American schools do not focus nearly enough on problem solving skills. But will legislation fix that? The article concludes with this statement:

"Grading the new tests also introduces subjectivity into a realm
where uniformity and predictability are prized."

What should be cause for even more alarm is that legislating and standardizing methods for teaching problem solving introduces uniformity and predictability into a realm where subjectivity and flexibility are absolutely necessary.

Time To Resurrect the Blog

Originally, I told myself I would keep up with this blog once class was over. I didn't (obviously), but now I am in another class that requires a blog, so here we go...


My thoughts on the use of technology in the classroom...

As a student in middle and high school, I had experience with computers and smart boards, but these weren't used on a daily basis. We usually had technical difficulties with the laptops, and we were always having to reorient the smart board. These items were used as tools on occasion or as a way to project notes, but that was the extent of it. Aside from typing papers, we didn't do much with technology outside of the classroom.

Last semester, I was exposed for the first time to technology in the classroom from the teacher's perspective. The teacher I worked with once a week for my field experience used the smart board for every lesson. He also used a device with the students that let them log in and enter their answers to the daily focus questions. The students used the keypads at their desks, and the information they entered was calculated and displayed on the screen in the form of a graph so he could quickly see how many students answered each question correctly or how many students had done their homework the night before. In addition to using technology during class, he also utilized the internet as a tool for communication with parents. He had a website for students and parents with a homework calendar, information on class policies and events, and additional math challenge problems for families to work on together. He also communicated with parents primarily by email. He used the internet to his advantage in terms of professional development as well, and when I needed to search for lesson ideas, he introduced me to the members section of the NCTM website where I found valuable resources.

This experience gave me a taste of just how valuable technology in the classroom can be when it is used well. I believe technology should never be used for its own sake but only when it aids the sutdents in the learning process. It should be the mean by which student and teachers achieve their goals; it should never be the goal in and of itself.

i have blogger's block...

which is unfortunate, considering i have about an hour before the deadline.

Let's see...

I guess I'll write about the Film Festival--get my bonus points...

In the first film, Still Roommates, I noticed a few things that I would have missed, had I not taken this class. First of all, I noticed the use of the 180 degree plane in the dialogue between the two actors. The filmmaker also made good use of close up shots to emphasize the characters' feelings of disappointment, frustration, etc.

The film She is Sister also made use of close up shots. I think these shots had a different effect than the close ups in Still Roommates. Instead of revealing the emotion of the character, I think the close ups of Sister evoked emotion from the viewer. I'm not sure why, or what the difference was... hmm.

Also, on a more personal note, I noticed that I found more enjoyment in the films that were purely entertaining than I did in the ones that were trying to communicate some deeper message. I think that's partially due to a misconception I have that movies=entertainment. I don't explicitly believe this, but I think it is an underlying expectation that I have. When I sit down to watch a movie, I expect to enjoy it--not to be challenged by it. Not that I can't enjoy something AND be challenged by it. I don't know... I just found myself wondering if the films I liked more were actually better, or if they were just more entertaining. And of course, an important aspect of any film is that it captures the attention of the viewer. So maybe the films that I didn't enjoy as much were lacking in some way artistically, despite their good message?

wow. Did that make any sense? I'll stop rambling now.

One of the biggest things I've learned as a result of this course is that everything is so much more complex than I even realize!

The Holiday

The book Eyes Wide Open challenges us to respond as Christians to the popular art that forms our society. Last night, I watched the movie The Holiday. I thought it might be good to share my thoughts on this particular movie, as a Christian...

I'm really becoming a sucker for chick-flicks and sappy love stories. I used to watch and roll my eyes. Now I ooh and awe and giggle and cry (well, not quite!) like the girly-girl I am. It's disgusting. Anyways...

...that being said, I thoroughly enjoyed the movie. It was great--two feel-good love stories for the pirce of one! But--one of the things that bothered me was that one relationship started with friendship, the other one started with sex (literally--they knew each other for about 5 minutes first), and they all lived happily ever after regardless. God created sex for marriage, so it seems to me that there would be consequences when it's taken outside of the way it was created. While this movie makes their relationship look close to perfect, in the light of the way God wants us to live, I can see that this is not an honest picture of life.

Now, I'm NOT saying that they should change the storyline of the movie, or that Christians shouldn't watch this movie. That attitude is what Bill Romanowski is criticizing.

As a Christian, what I can take from this movie is the understanding that our culture views sex as a natural and acceptable part of any relationship, and that it expects people to act like they're married without actually getting married. This can point me to look at the bigger issues of our culture's idea of the value of marriage in general, the rising divorce rate, and the need that everyone has for love. Instead of watching a movie and saying, "That's bad--how can they do that?" I should try to understand the characters and see what their lives can tell me about the world I live in--the one I'm trying to be in and not of and point to Jesus all at the same time.