No, Baby, It’s Not Your Fault

I’ve had a lot of conversations with the kids lately about teaching as a career.  I’m not just going in and complaining about it, I promise.  (Although there was that one day I asked if anyone’s parent’s construction crew would hire me on.)  The kids keep bringing up articles they read, or asking if I’d want my son to be a teacher, or telling me they’re thinking about teaching when they grow up.  I love teaching.  I’d never do anything else.  But, I admitted to the kids, I’m not sure I’d want my boy to be a teacher someday.  

Why not? they ask.  Kids are too annoying?

At that point - and I suspect they know this - class is derailed for the period.  Because I can’t let an idea like that stand.

No, baby, I tell them.  No no no no no.  You are not the problem.  You are never the problem.  Well, yesterday, when you kept standing on the computer table and you almost broke the monitor?  Then you were the problem.  But usually, no.  It’s not you.

Sometimes administrators are the problem, when they undermine or humiliate me in front of you guys.  It doesn’t happen often, but when it does, I want to walk straight out the front door.  I hold it together because I know you’re watching me, to see how I’ll handle the situation.  That’s the only thing that enables e to show a modicum of grace.

Sometimes it’s the county office that’s the problem, when they order us to differentiate while requiring us to standardize.  They make me feel like you guys come at the bottom of a miles-long to-do list, topped by meetings and paperwork and red tape.  Some days I find myself thinking, If these kids weren’t here, I could get so much done!  Those are the days I don’t want to be a teacher.

Usually it’s the tests that are the problem.  It’s seeing your reactions to your scores - you haven’t even gotten last year’s scores back yet, but they are low, and you’e going to be crushed - on tests that were never fair in the first place.  It’s trying to balance teaching what you need in order to pass the test with teaching what you need in order to be successful and love learning.  Those things are almost always two completely different skill sets.  It’s when you complain about missing a day of reading To Kill a Mockingbird because the school says we have to take another practice test all morning.  That’s what breaks my heart.

But it’s almost never you.  You are one of the greatest joys in my life.  You make it worth coming here every day and wading through the bullshit; I do it for the privilege of getting to know you.  Every single day you bring me joy and laughter and frustration and wonder.  Teaching you is an honor, and you are not the problem.