SimonSays TEACHERtalk

My class recently embarked on a secret mission—Operation Little Buddies. We adopted a third-grade class at our school as our “secret little buddies.” We sent them notes, wrote a letter to the whole class, delivered clues, and—the most important part—developed our own code names. Blue6, Lissa, Twilight-lover, and the rest of the class sent off their letters (delivered top-secretly, of course), and then we waited. My students were a little upset when their identity was finally uncovered (it’s okay, I told them, there are only so many teachers with S-P-E-I-G-L- in their last names), but were happy when our buddies responded by bringing us doughnuts. Before winter break, we invited our little buddies to a party where they received the final “E” clue—Easter eggs with notes revealing each student’s identity. Students met their little buddies and competed in a game where I called out two body parts (”head-to-shoulder,” or “knee-to-back”) and the students raced in their pairs to match body parts to each other. It was entertaining, especially when the game was narrowed down to a small third-grader and his 5-foot-7 fifth-grade counterpart. “Forehead-to-toe” was a pretty intense round.

But don’t be fooled—I’m not a fun teacher. I recently had one of the worst days of my (albeit not very huge) teaching career. I was unprepared and mean all day—I felt like a failure. The next day was better. And the next day was . . . today.

Teaching is one big cognitive-dissonance roller coaster for me. I had all these ideas and hopes of what my class would be like—a safe learning environment where everyone shares and is kind, an elaborate library nook, children working all the time (and loving it), lots of laughter . . .You get the idea. But—surprise—we’re just a normal class. With students who get bored and are mean sometimes, a teacher who can’t keep her own desk organized, and a library where books fall and embed themselves behind a broken shelf. Reality bites. And as important as perfection isn’t, I would still like to feel like I’m good at this. But I don’t. It just hit me that I’m half-way through the school year, and I still haven’t hit the “tomorrow” I keep hoping for. (You know, the tomorrow when I finally figure things out and get caught up and have my centers well organized, grades updated, and desk clean.)

So in the meantime, I worry about today. Today we experimented with melting rock-hard marshmallows—physical or chemical change?—because my initial plans for science were thwarted by sugar that refused to burn in the microwave. Today students located ordered pairs on the floor with an overhead-projected coordinate plane and halfway completed a math assignment before realizing I had messed up the instructions. Oops. Today we silent read, conducted classroom job inspections, and wrote letters to authors and celebrities. Today I still felt like a failure. But every day, somewhere among all the worrying and failing and hoping, teaching happens.

I’m embarking on a mission of my own—called “Living through each day and not giving up hope.” It’s going pretty well; I’m learning lots. Today I learned that it takes more than 7 minutes in a microwave for sugar to burn and that I love these students even when I don’t love my teaching. I’m learning that hope isn’t wishing for a class with perpetually happy students and clean desks, but believing that there will be enough marshmallows to cover for sugar that won’t burn. I believe—hope—that I am getting better at this. I’m learning to ride this roller coaster, and I’m getting ready for another tomorrow.

. . . One where I get up really early and try again.

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For more school stories and teaching tips, consider these books:

• Little Mouse’s Big Book of Fears by Emily Gravett:
• The Odd Egg by Emily Gravett
• The Underneath by Kathi Appelt, drawings by David Small
• The Mother-Daughter Book Club: Much Ado About Anne by Heather Vogel Frederick
• The Beacon Street Girls: Lake Rescue by Annie Bryant
• Jay McGraw’s Life Strategies for Dealing with Bullies by Jay McGraw
• The Book of Virtues for Boys and Girls: A Treasury of Great Moral Stories edited by William J. Bennett
• The 7 Habits of Happy Kids by Sean Covey, illustrated by Stacy Curtis
• The Leader in Me: How Schools and Parents Around the World Are Inspiring Greatness, One Child At a Time by Stephen R. Covey
• Wonderful Words: Poems About Reading, Writing, Speaking, and Listening selected by Lee Bennett Hopkins, illustrated by Karen Barbour
• You Have to Write by Janet S. Wong, illustrated by Teresa Flavin