I had spent the first hour of the morning - tiredheaded from no sleep the previous night - arguing stubbornly but reasonably with the only other two future English teachers in our cohort of 15 AUSL secondary residents. (The other students in the class include several History/Social Studies and Science, one Math, and one Foreign Language future high school teacher.) I found myself arguing in surprise. I had come to class with work in hand and reading done (and an unsolicited handout to share) but sleepless and prepared to spend the day learning in as quiet and disengaged a manner as possible. Plus, the article we'd read for this discussion was written by our instructor and within the generally progressive philosophy of our program, so I hadn't expected this degree of dissent. I also felt this dissent was really based in part on a misinterpretation (the teacher and grad student in me said poor close reading) of the essay, and felt compelled to clarify it as I had read it, even when it became clear that I was not being understood. How strange it is when one is confronted with surprise by disagreement over an idea that seems to us only natural and right!
The essay described a perceived failing of traditional English pedagogy to teach language and grammar in a way that engages, respects, and truly educates high school students. It recommended the following strategical reform in language code/grammar instruction: 1. Support the language each student brings to school. 2. Provide them with input from an additional code. 3. Give them the opportunity to use the new code in a non-threatening, real communicative context.* I found the article engaging and reasonable and came to class prepared to discuss the connection I noticed between the tenets of the essay and the language teaching methodology I had experienced and practiced. I also came with a few anecdotal allusions from my precocious childhood with a father for whom English was a second language.
But my tentative forays into these experiences as related to the text drew an unexpected backlash from my English cohort in small group discussion. There was a general outcry about the importance of charts and rules and redmarked grammar exercises. As a former English language teacher, I should perhaps be ashamed to admit that I was not even quite sure what they meant by split infinitives and dangling participles, but that is simply not the way I taught language! I felt they were getting both the essay and my point wrong and kept responding and rearticulating even though my head ached and even after one girl said like a rude and monotone lash, yrgonnahaftastarttalkinglouder.
It's true I have a tendency to "trail off," a tendency born of innate shyness and bred in insecurity. I didn't swallow thickly and shut up like I usually do or even apologize excessively. I just kept eye contact with her and said okay in equal monotone and kept talking. I guess being forced to defend positions you feel are true, even unpreparedly, is good for the brain. Possibly even the spirit, if I can keep it up. I admit my skin isn't the thickest. (Well, red alarms are going off in some of my readers' heads about needing a thick ol' skin to teach city kids. But I'm beginning to think truly good teachers need a special science fiction multiform transversal skin that can switch with grace and ease between thick and thin skins all day.)
Well, so I'm learning to do all this, aren't I? I remember standing in a wonderful bookstore in beautiful grayed Belgrade, Serbia, with my dear friend Shasta and her saying, well OF COURSE you're going to be a teacher (this was in 2002 and I was standing there holding a thin Derrida volume on refugees and political memory so she may have actually said "professor") and I said but shasta if I was standing in front of a class right now I don't know what I would SAY and her looking at me like blinking an eye you know in books when they say, she blinked at me. well, you haven't even gone to school yet silly.
And what I was going to say was this: metacognitive. that is, I am a student in an education program and as such am learning on three distinct and cognisant levels: 1. I am learning about teaching. 2. I am learning what it is like to be a teacher. 3. I am learning what it is like to be a student.
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*Refers to "Watch Your Language: Teaching Standard Usage to Resistant and Reluctant Learners," by Mark Larson.
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My apologies for the divergence, which was intended to show you the state of mind (defensive, assured, and tired) I was in, a state of mind which vanished when LeAlan Jones walked into the room.
3 comments:
Margeaux,
I'm loving your thinking through this, and am committed to reading along beside you and commenting when possible. In your educational manifesto, I especially appreciate the "learning to learn" bit, a vitally important aspect most often ignored.
Re: shyness. In Marseille I had the opportunity to teach English in an inner city junior high school. The ability to create authority - to speak loudly and clearly, to be present to the multifarious challenges to your authority and to answer them aikido-style - is VITAL. I can't emphasize this point too much. The only way kids disenchanted by an educational system that treats them like so many stupid cattle will learn from you is if you create yourself at every moment as a strong, responsive, no-nonsense adult. Having my own authority issues, I failed to create that for my students - and failed, thereby, to create an atmosphere in which my lofty teaching theories could flower in practice. Like Lewis Carroll's Red Queen, I had to run constantly to stay in one place: obviously, I made no progress. Taking on this definition you made for yourself - that you are "shy" - is therefore extremely important to your becoming a good urban educator.
With much love and respect,
remain in light,
Sha
The importance of being earnest and diplomatic, yet calling one on bullshit when you see it are qualities you possess. You're learning and growing, but without your beliefs which are the basis of your personality you wouldn't've gotten as far as you did.
So now you're learning to go to a place you are willing to boldly go to. I can't defend that sentence as an eloquent one, let alone grammatically correct, but I can tell you where it's emphasis lies.
Keep your chin and your heart up, and keep up the good work!
" and that I wanted to teach not in the rarefied air of academia but in the living realm of urban high schools, teaching students whose innocence (like mine) is belied by their lives, whose hopes (like mine) are fragile but fierce. "
I think your honesty and realness in regards to your identity are the things that will make you a powerful educator. I often find it difficult to verbalize why it is I want to be a high school teacher. I think you have highlighted something here (above) that touches me as a person and as a secondary educator.
I can relate to your sleep schedule, the madness, the chaos, the brief freak outs...but I like how you pint out that these feelings dont find you lost in the end...that being a certified teacher is going to be your the ground from which you will blossom...it is refreshing to hear someone else say, hey, this is all worth it.
Jenna
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