March

After resolving myself to do some asskicking, I've reached March unsure of how much ass I've kicked.  Part of  me feels like I haven't done much teaching since before Martin Luther King Jr. day.  We've had the Inauguration, 2 x 2 day school wide assessments, snowday, sick day, parent conferences day, and other random chunks of days that were just lopped off of my teaching schedule.  I entered the beginning of 2009 with many of these obstacles in mind, and unfortuantely more were added along the way.  Despite making fun of my housemate for lamenting the 'lack of instructional time' earlier in the year, I've strated doing the same thing.  

This lost time adds up to teaching that isn't quite as good as it could be, or learning that isn't quite as extensive as it should be.  Coping with this shortened teaching time, among other things, has been difficult for me.  TFA instills mindsets that have really taken hold.  Right now, those mindsets are doing battle with what I see in the classroom.  TFA says that everything that happens in your classroom is up to you.  Student failures - your fault.  Student successes - your fault.  TFA says that deep down, all students/parents want what is best for the students - namely a high quality education.  What TFA says, though, isn't always what happens.

Confronting real situations has put a hurting on my confidence and made me constantly question my own work ethic.  Schedules have made my teaching periods erratic; my curriculum is out of synch and jumbled around.  Directives from my administration pull me in different directions than I want to go.  After 1.75 yeras with one student, our relationship has finally gotten to the point physical escalation, near expulsion, and him being moved to the other ESL class.  Unfortunately, for him, this class is nowhere near as rigorous as mine.  What frustrates me is that he's getting exactly what he wants, which is a less challenging education.  Instead of forcing him to deal with me get an education, everyone is fine with rewarding his awful behavior and giving up on him.  

Are the failures in behavior and academic achievement really my sole responsibility?  Were the failures avoidable?  What should I have done differently along the way?  If students really want what's best for them, why did I fail to get my difficult students to see that?  

To reassure me that I've produced some difference in my students, people say 'just being there makes a difference', or 'you can't save everyone'.  To some extent, these sentiments are true, and pragmatically this is probably the way I should look at my situation.  Unfortuantely, TFA has made me obsessed with evaluating my performance and my efforts.  I end up always wondering what more I could have done, and what more could I do in the future if I just worked a little smarter, or messed around on the internet a little less, or thought about teaching a particular lesson with more exciting different strategy (this ring...this watch...these earrings).  I know, realistically, that I can't be a TFA and teaching robot, and I feel a bit guilty about that.  As awful as being a TFA robot would be, it might make my teaching self esteem a big higher.  

Perhaps, like Boyce, I need a little distance to reflect on what I've done in Memphis and what Memphis has done to me.

I've applied to work at Institute in Atlanta.  Hopefully my TFA spirit rebounds at the end of the year.