frustration alley

Advice is easy to come by. The majority of my students frustrate me. They won't shut up, and they turn in crappy work and expect decent grades. On the whole, my seventh graders churn out decent 5th grade work. It's hard to teach when they will not be quiet. I'm limited in my consequences. Putting their name on the board is fun for them. They're nonchalant about silent lunch and break detention. I can't keep them after school. "Redirect" doesn't live up to its name. They simply don't care, and their parents don't care as long as there's no inconvenience.

I have great lesson plans (this week: some of Eliot's cat poetry and Ancient India), and they get stymied by middle schoolers being absolute idiots. It's too easy to say that I don't have the temperment to work with seventh graders; it's more complex than that. I feel that I'm set up to fail because I want them to think and learn language and culture. Whereas, my school is focused on scores, and my students are focused on social life.

I like to think that this year is not completely for naught. But, this afternoon when I sent for a custodian to clean up a puddle of urine under a student's desk during a class change, I realized this job is so much more than teaching. And, really, how can I be prepared for a seventh graders wetting her pants two days in a row. The best I can do is play it low key.

I'm praying (and if you're the praying type who prays for me...) for a lit path. I don't see this 7th grade gig as permanent. I say, no more than a total of three years if the economy is as tanked as it seems to be. Two if I'm very lucky. One if I find out I'm the recepient of a large, insulated trust fund. But, I need to learn how to teach these hummers. How to get them to be quiet. I'm figuring out a lot. I need to learn how to insert myself completely into a moment: how to be completely present.


I have a lot to journal about due to reading Outliers, Scripture and some musings. You know ideas about determinism, loving neighbor, what are the perimeters of a good job and when does it become workaholicism. I stick to the basics. After all, the unexamined life isn't worth living.

I took this photo in a cave in a Japanese temple. Apparently the little Buddhas represent prayers (in other cases they represent fetuses) before a representation of the prayer (I'm thinking this one is love). This photo reminds me how utterly ridiculous we are. We're silly, and God loves us even when he knows us more fully than we know ourselves.