November Dedications

Wednesday, 1 
Today is dedicated to having enough.

Thursday, 2
Today is dedicated to Thor and the refugee Asgardians.

Friday, 3
Today is dedicated to that group of women who prays for me and laughs at my jokes. I thank my God every time I remember you.

Saturday, 4
Today is dedicated to the Enneagram.

Sunday, 5
Today is dedicated to Hay Hassani's thrift clothes. You are so reasonably priced. Thank you.

Monday, 6
Today is dedicated to Monica, who sees the Kingdom of God.

Tuesday, 7
Today is dedicated to the Apostle Paul, who preserved the Gospel from extra conditions.

Wednesday, 8
Today is dedicated to every bank everywhere that actually does their job. So, that would exclude my bank in Morocco, just to be clear.

Thursday, 9
Today is dedicated to Tyler, who sympathized with me at odd hours while I was grading instead of sleeping.

Friday, 10
Today is dedicated to "The Crucible" movie, which saved me from actually teaching.

Saturday, 11
Today is dedicated to the book Gilead, by Marilynne Robinson

Sunday, 12
Today is dedicated to the taxi driver who spoke beautiful French, and encouraged me to keep learning.

Monday, 13
Today is dedicated to this carpet next to me. It witnessed my attempts to create two unit plans in one hour, and it remained beautiful.

Tuesday, 14
Today is dedicated to the parents of my students. Thank you for trusting me so much.

Wednesday, 15
Today is dedicated to the English department. During high-grading weeks, I sometimes feel like we go through war together... separately.

Thursday, 16
Today is dedicated to the "Time Until" app. Five days.

Friday, 17
Today is dedicated to naps. Naps on the way to work. Naps on buses. Naps on couches. Naps that save first my life, and others by extension.

Saturday, 18
Today is dedicated to Amicitia American School, Fes, who knows how to host graciously.

Sunday, 19 
Today is dedicated to Luke D., who made me laugh until I cried.

Monday, 20
Today is dedicated to the substitute who will have the joy or sorrow of my classes tomorrow.

Tuesday, 21
Today is dedicated to Tyler, who flew across an ocean to hang out for a few days.

Wednesday, 22 
Today is dedicated to couches, windows, and sunshine, and anywhere the three meet.

Thursday, 23 
Today is dedicated to you, Lord, who graciously gives us good things.

Friday, 24
Today is dedicated to a pair of cat earrings; to my brother and sister-in-law; to Tyler; and to the little girl selling tissues next to the train station.

Saturday, 25
Today is dedicated to "Stranger Things" and leftovers.

Sunday, 26
Today is dedicated to comings and goings; may God watch over them all.

Monday, 27
Today is dedicated to the working printers.

Tuesday, 28
Today is dedicated to sentence diagramming; I wish I had known how fun you were when I was in seventh grade, myself!

Wednesday, 29
Today is dedicated to G period. I look older because of you. But I love you, and will keep forgiving you right before class, at 1:40 PM every weekday, and right after class, at 2:30 PM every weekday.

Thursday, 30
Today is dedicated to Shanti and Nissa, who listened without judgment, and kept my phone through the night.

Thoughts on the End of a Quarter

Teaching for me is making a bunch of decisions while maintaining a steady stream of interaction on a certain topic. It's creating problems in the moment to be solved when the students leave the room.

Here's an example of this problem-making/problem-solving cycle. While grading papers, I realize that my students have serious issues with certain homophones. I decide to do a quick warm-up with homophones the next morning.

They ask if they should take notes.

I say, "Yeah... if you want to make sense in your writing." Oh no, here it comes...

"Will there be a test?" they ask.

I pause. Here's what's happening in my brain: Well, crap. Then I have to make a test, don't I? And do a review beforehand? Or maybe I assess them in some other way. One more column in their writing rubrics? Or maybe they make posters. There is literally no more room for posters on my walls. Or maybe I need to think of some new means of assessing that I've never thought of before. Time to research. Why didn't I think of assessment before I thought of this activity? Oh, right. Because I was grading their papers. Does every, little tiny minutia have to have a grade? Why isn't knowing the right thing enough of a gift? Why the grades why all the grades forever?

Here is what comes out. "I will tell you tomorrow how you'll be graded. But today, take notes."

The more you think ahead of time, the less stressful that moment has to be. But I can't plan ahead all the time. When? If I'm in a heavy grading cycle, then anything the students get to learn in class while I am spending evenings grading essays is a freebie. Learn it or don't. I can't grade everything.

That is problematic in my current setting, though, because if things aren't attached to a grade, students very often feel that they do not need to be attentive or even civil in class.

So what's the solution? What do you do when you can't grade everything?

Here's what I do: I lie about it.

Okay, it's not exactly a lie. It might be on the test. But it might not be. I might grade it after I collect it. But I just as easily might get to the end of the quarter and throw it away.

This week, my trash can was *full* of stacks of ungraded papers every afternoon.

Caesura

After the senior class graduated on Saturday, June 3, I finally turned my attention to my languishing ninth grade class. They were languishing in part because it was the curriculum I developed the least, and in part because they are fasting from water and food during daylight for Ramadan.

For the last two months, I have felt as though I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel when it comes to creativity. Though my stores of energy were bolstered by my love for my students and an obscene amount of caffeine, the year gets harder; that's all there is to it.

Today in the teacher's lounge, after the morning's finals, I found myself with two of my closest high school teachers, all of us grading. We commiserated a bit, but we all sensed that it wasn't helping anyone, and we were too tired to be angry or frustrated. Slowly, the conversation shifted, and that's why I'm telling you this. The complaints and the small talk were all the slow introduction to this miraculous moment where we started to talk about what we were going to change for next year.

We hadn't even finished grading our finals, and we were already on to the next batch of classes. We shared ways we would change our systems. We had new phrases, new activities, and new focuses. "That is just the very best part about teaching, guys," said Marie. "We get to change what doesn't work for the next year." (She teaches science, so I guess she knows all about variables and affecting outcomes.)

I know I would not have felt so hopeful if a few months' rest were not ahead of me. But when June 21 comes, and I close my classroom, full of boxes and empty walls, I'll know it's just temporary. Summer is not a full stop to my job, but a caesura. (I teach literature, so I know that caesuras are breaths in poetry; pregnant pauses between two phrases; time for the musician to arrange his lyre and form the next phrase; ... time to see his family and friends, and eat pork products, and sleep for days on end.)

Everyday Lesson Planning With Miss McKalips

7:15 AM

I walk into the classroom. Chairs are on desks; the cleaning lady has been through, and the room is ready. She has faith that what we do in here is important, and she works to make our space worth learning in every day.

I know we have to learn something today, but we need to start a new unit. What was our last unit about? Short stories. The test was yesterday. I stayed up late grading them, and I went to bed telling myself I would figure something out in the morning. Here I am. It is morning. What do I teach?

I go to the curriculum map. I'm not ready for any of these units. Okay, I'm good at teaching writing: I'll teach a paper. Whooaaaaa... Am I ready to grade 53 seventh-grade papers when it's so close to the end of the quarter? When is it ever convenient to teach writing?

I open up a book by one of my favorite (one of my only) writing pedagogy authors. I look at where he begins, and how much work he pours into every paper, every lesson. What? Every time he teaches Polonius' speech in Hamlet, he does this incredible amount of studying. At night. After he's left school, he reads the act again, reads his research again, listens to the play on his way to work. I want to kill him. I will never be able to do that. I can't do this.

7:40 AM.

What am I going to teach today?

7:45 AM.

Hall duty. Good thing I have first period planning to think through this.

8:05 AM.

What am I going to teach today? It's a really good thing I haven't been called to cover anyone's class.

8:10 AM.

Forget teaching writing today. Take that book home and read it, and do it all perfectly the first time; but the first time won't be today. Actually, no, just throw that book into one of these drawers with other people's perfect ideas.

8:20 AM.

Open the textbook and figure out what is next. Poetry. Oh my gosh. I love poetry.

8:30 AM.

We can't just read poems on day one! How are we going to read them!? What will this unit even be about?

8:40 AM.

The students come in ten minutes! FIGURE THIS OUT RIGHT NOW.

8:45 AM.

Okay. I'm going to make a decision. Decision made. We'll make a chart on the board of different kinds of art. And then we'll choose one kind of art, and talk about what the different tools are that that artist uses. I'm only barely qualified to talk about the art of painting... good enough: we'll talk about the tools a painter uses. Then we'll talk about how a poet is an artist, and list off the tools a poet can use. We'll create a vocabulary list that way, and we'll be sure to include rhythm, rhyme, allusion, form, stanza, assonance, alliteration...

8:50 AM. [Bell]

Guess that'll work. [Open the door. Kids come in.]

How to Dress Like a Teacher

1. Find a dress that has no discernible sexiness about it. It should be cut pretty high up the neck, and pretty low down the legs. If it's just one color, cool. Don't want to distract the kids with multiple colors.

2. Add a belt if you must. But nothing showy. Try black.

3. Let me guess, that dress has no sleeves? Wear a cardigan. A cardigan and leggings will make your summer dress suitable for the winter. You should have seven cardigans, all varying in their intensity of boredom.

4. Don't forget your ID badge. There you go.

Lesson #33: Don't Pretend to Know What You're Talking About

This blog contains many life lessons. I estimate that we're about to lesson 33. Either Twain or Lincoln said it well, "Better to be silent and be thought a fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt." Merely for the sake of illustration, I present to you a real-life story.

When I was student teaching, there were a few days when my mentor teacher was out for illness. As per the law, a substitute teacher came into the classroom for the whole day. But I was de facto teacher for the day. That was fun and all, but I wanna talk about the one substitute teacher. He was studying to become an acupuncturist. Ladies and gentlemen, even now I have no idea how acupuncture works. And for the purposes of this lesson, all you need to know is that when, we'll say, Kevin, explained it to me, he used the term "meridians," in a non-condescending, non-threatening way: "So, I'm not sure if you've heard of these, but acupuncturists believe the body has many meridians..."

In as sophisticated a manner as possible, I responded that yes, I had in fact heard of meridians, and in an unlikely place: Star Wars Episode I, ain't it just the darn'dest?

Midichlorians. No, Carolyn. No.

Crash or Soar

I have not heard good things about our ninth grade class as a whole. The other English teachers I've spoken with have had their hands full trying to make a go of their English 9 classes. Mrs. B said at the beginning of each new semester, you hope for your class to run and take off from the ground. That being off the ground is the learning experience, and it's thrilling. But her last class walked a bit, and—plunk—into the water they dropped and sank. They did not want to learn.

I approached my first ever English 9 class with a good deal of reservation as a result of this and other tragic stories. If we couldn't fly, at least we could stay away from the deep end for the plunk.

Today, my English 9 removed my fear of the plunk. Jay read his personal narrative aloud for our revision circle. It was about his being adopted. It was rife with spelling and grammatical errors. But the heart of it was not the less visible for them: he was glad to be in a safe, caring family that brought him closer to God. He read in a stilted way, not yet a confident reader aloud. But he persevered manfully through the piece. We applauded him, and slowly hands went in the air for commentary. Everyone appreciated his sharing his piece. One girl, Elena, thanked him for writing his story. She, too, had been adopted, but more recently. And she still remembered what it felt like not to be wanted by her father and mother. She told us of the relief and gratitude she felt toward her adoptive parents, the people she trusted so wholly. She ended with a sob. It may have taken all she had to talk about that. But she knew she had to, because Jay had the courage to write about this thing that had so moved her as well.

When she had finished, I, like an idiot, said something to try to draw the attention away from her... I think I was uncomfortable for her. I didn't want her to feel as though she had spoken to an empty room. But I think now that I would have rather just said, "thanks so much for sharing that," and left it.

So, there is a story of how my class lifted off of their own volition, and didn't wobble and crash. They soared.

Humility Born of Struggles: November

I have been holding my head above water. Although the coming of cold often chills my bones, even my heart, this November has left me no time to think of it. I feel more alive than ever. Sometimes, I have as much sunshine in my heart as mid-summer at Black Rock. It is a secret how the sun shines within me, when outwardly the world seems to have gone grey. I feel as though I have been called to rise to the occasion. I have a deep joy in doing so.

A few instances this month have crashed over my head, leaving me sputtering, speechless, and grateful for air. The biggest instance I don't feel free to write about, but here are a few much smaller ones.

• An email from a community member saying my floor's bathroom was not clean. It wasn't. Keeping the students accountable for cleaning has been one of my greatest struggles of the dorm. Many of the students have never been responsible for cleaning in their homes. Moms and maids take care of the cleaning. School is pressing; they don't think about the cleaning until I hound them. No wonder moms become known for nagging. Sure, you can give up the fight and clean it yourself. Total number of people that is helping: 0.

• A parent-teacher conference in which I had to acknowledge to the parents that I was not expecting enough of their son. I was making too many accommodations for his particular disabilities.

• A conversation with another teacher where I had to begin with an apology for being rude. She said she had just been on her way to see me. We sat down and she started by apologizing, telling me that she had been praying for me; she knew how difficult my job was, and the hardship of the first year of teaching. I set my part right, too. We prayed together.

• Many ungraded research papers. It's been three weeks.

Hand-written Comments

When I received a paper back from a teacher, the first thing I did was look at the grade. But I barely hesitated before reading the comments all over the piece. Indeed, I barely breathed as I read them. As I read those comments, I learned so much. My favorite teachers of writing were those who wrote a lot on my papers. That was where they proved themselves to me: I can still picture some of those comments. I took that advice and improved.

This is my second post about grading papers. Different ones today, of course. But my own experience leads me to believe there may be other writers just like me, hungry for the ability to communicate clearly and beautifully.

I say go ahead, use red pen!--make the paper bleed! I will try to resurrect it.

As a Teacher...

Ha! I am not used to the title, and I might as well be honest about it. It is mighty fun to be in the classroom, though, finally learning the details that escaped me as a student teacher. I am struggling now with myriad questions, the theme of which is how I am perceived by my students.

• How much of my life is appropriate to cast abroad? (Like this post, for instance... Do I need to de-personalize my writing? Am I even capable of such a thing?)
• Do all students notice when a teacher begins to repeat her wardrobe? (This has already begun, of course, since it's been over a week.)
• How much should I care about how I am perceived? (Not at all? I've seen that be really, really good, and I've seen that be sad and pathetic.)
• How do I "come off as strict" only in the beginning of the school year? Am I strict? (I sincerely hope so. I think that strictness provides structure for people to count on, and makes school a safer place. Even if my students don't like me, I hope they know they can trust me.)
• Do I talk too fast? (Usually. Why would the classroom be any different?)
• Do I know enough? (No. I don't even know what I don't know.)

As much as I struggle to find something useful to say as I stand up in front of a group of young people, I feel favor as I do so. I feel an energy come over me. So far, so good.

Letter to Student Teachers of English

Dear Student Teacher of English,

I'll start where we usually start: if you're nervous about student teaching, and tired of listening to the naysayers regarding “the economy and everything,” I feel for you. Whatever. Try hard not to listen to them. The thing about teaching is that we always need teachers. There is no lack of students in the world. Maybe there is a lack of funding. For now. But you are learning how to transmit a worthwhile area of knowledge. English is valuable and English teachers are valuable. Keep your head up.

I can't ever tell you how much I have to learn in teaching. Even if your cooperating teacher is a slacker or a jerk, you still have a lot to learn from him/her. My cooperating teacher was a model of professionalism. And, of course, all the areas of professionalism you've heard about are important. My co-op came in at 7:25 every morning, the last possible minute per her contract (but she was never, ever late). A few times this semester, I arrived a minute or two later than her. She noticed. I felt like a real idiot.

If you want to take professionalism to a whole new level, refuse to complain. A few times I was openly annoyed about having to cooperate with (what I thought was) an unjust IEP. I shouldn't have said anything about it. I noticed my cooperating teacher's silence when she had the opportunity of agreeing with me and complaining about the system. She didn't blame or mud-sling. She came to work. And she worked hard. You always have the opportunity to complain. But complaining is the lowest form of interaction. Why not analyze something? Or invent something new? Or laugh? Or friggin' grade something? You have a lot of that to do all the time. That is the kind of person you want to be in the classroom.

Do not let yourself be made afraid of anything or anyone. You're ready for this. Be fearless. Every afternoon when you get in the car, forgive yourself for what you did stupidly. If you're like me, you're going to do a whole lot of stupid crap. You will look in your rearview mirror, and catch your own eye, and scowl, and say to yourself, “seriously? Where did you escape from?” Forgive yourself. Before you go into the building the next morning, release yourself again from yesterday's mistakes. It's a new day, and it's going to be okay.

Write your cooperating teacher a letter of gratitude afterward, no matter what kind of person he/she was. You shared a classroom. You're bonded. Deal with it.

Alright, stop reading this and go do a great job!

Sincerely,

Carolyn

Consequences

What do you expect to happen because you didn't read the assignment?

Do you think that because you didn't read we will:

forgo the discussion and instead look out the window?

have a naptime?

create fingerprint art?

have impromptu comic book character comparison time? (Well, I'll consider it.)

I'll tell you what is going to happen. We will have something I will call discussion, but really:

I'll ask a question,

you'll avoid my gaze,

I'll call on you anyway,

you'll look sheepish, stunned, frightened, ashamed, angry, disappointed (or all of these in succession)

with either me or yourself,

then I will wait for you to mumble something,

and the discussion will drag on

until we all want to gouge our eyes out,

for a change of scenery.

I will then institute daily quizzes.

(Which will daily involve inventing, typing, copying, cutting, passing out, collecting, scoring, entering scores, re-passing out, discussing why you can't have half a point)

And when I ask Jim's daughter's name from chapter 23 in Huckleberry Finn, I will still get all the following:

Tory

Sally
Mary
Jima
Jameka
Grace
Ophelia
Emily

...except 'Lizabeth.

Dubious Origins

As we were going over vocabulary words last week, I was calling on students at random to give the answer for the exercise. Note here that I often employ phrases in Spanish while speaking normally. This day was no different, "James, would you read, por favor?"

The class snickered, and it didn't take me long to realize my mistake: James is the only Spanish speaker in this whole class. He speaks English perfectly well, without an accent, even. And I do not often think about the fact that he used to be an ESL student. I hadn't thought about it at all, actually. But I realized it now.

I thought quickly.

The best way to proceed? Act like nothing happened. Do damage control later? Maybe. After class, I decided that I might as well just let it drop. When I have been on the other side, I didn't always like people to acknowledge that I was not a native speaker.

But the next day when he came in for a library pass, I thought, "shoot. I'll just get that awkward moment out of the way and explain coolly how I hadn't meant any disrespect."

"James," I said, "I wanted to apologize for what may have looked like insensitivity yesterday. I wasn't thinking about your Spanish-speaking background when I switched into Spanish for that second. I wasn't thinking about anything at all, really."

His face was inscrutable, "uh... it's okay. I don't speak Spanish." I was a tad stunned.

"Really? Well, you should, it's a great language. Mmmkay, well. Good... But weren't you an ESL student until this year?"

"Yeah. I'm from Egypt."

As they say in the song, gentle audience, "Everyone's a little bit racist sometimes."

The Un-cooling Process

It's hard to say what student teaching has been like.

It's been so many things. Really fun, mostly.

One of the reasons I wanted to become a teacher was because I had such a wretched time in high school. I felt like my teachers were just overly... safe! It's like they really didn't know how much of an adult I was, or how much challenge I could handle. Sometimes I heard a short speech on how we need fire drills, just in case; or a teacher would explain that no, we couldn't __________ (fill in blank) because someone might feel uncomfortable, a parent might not appreciate that, we hadn't cleared it with the principal, etc.

Now I'm on their end. Here and there, I can tell that it's growing me up. I plan and think with so much more in mind than what would be fun. Fire drills, for example: as a student, I had every confidence that I could safely exit the building that I knew better than my house before being engulfed in flames. But as a teacher, I wonder about the one or two new kids who don't know where the nearest exit is in some of their classes. And if that kid is in the bathroom when the alarm sounds, and he finds himself separated from the crowd, what then? We need fire drills.

A thousand-and-some thoughts like this pass through my head every day. And the result? I'm not so cool anymore. This is the un-cooling process.

Still, some people manage to keep just the right balance between making sense and making fun. Mr. Brett always comes to mind. How did he do it? He wasn't careless. But somehow we still managed to have doughnuts on Fridays and sit in a circle having meaningful discussion on very advanced readings... I'm talking learning: the real, good, fun, lasting-into-college, changed-the-way-I-write, changed-the-way-I-think!-type of learning.

Many of you have asked about my mentor/cooperating teacher. She's a great model for this type of learning. But even if I use the same lesson plan, the same words sometimes, it's not the same experience for the students.

So, we keep going.

A Schoolday in Winter

It is hard to think of the sunrise

over the snow, pink and red, and then

everywhere! Unleashed!

The heat in the car finally kicking in

and warming my toes--

all as the sun rose!

It is hard to even think of reasons to live

when you're sitting in a 10th grade

health class, and they're copying from

their books,

and you're "observing,"

and you've forgotten your "essential paperwork,"

read "Mark Twain."

Imagine a Tone of Surprise and Stunned Reverence

If I didn't know any better, I'd say I'd inherited someone else's life in the past week.

My student teaching placement is in tenth grade in a large suburban high school. The students enter the room. They do not sit on the desks, or wander in circles in the room, or commence shouting, or toss things about, or begin altercations, nor do they stampede the teacher's desk and remove items (the intention of giving said items back being an absolutely separate matter). Some of them appear to be cheerful, others merely going through the motions of school--and they know the motions very well. They take their seats--seats they have been assigned. And they may chat with their classmates nearby, or finish their homework in the brief interlude before class starts.

My cooperating teacher was saddened to find that three students total out of the first two classes had failed to complete their homework. I was awed. Only three? At my last placement, homework was not assigned, because the students refused to do it. They were beyond refusing. There was simply no hope that they would ever do it. And a seating chart. Pahahalease. No, you poor, sad baby. We'll sit down where we like when we take the notion to sit down.

There is carpet on the classroom floors.

She puts the period's agenda on the smart board, and follows it. The students bring their books and their own pencils, with a few exceptions, and they work together in pairs or groups to complete the assigned work. I know! Maybe this doesn't sound radical to you.

But last November allowed me to step back from my expectations for classrooms. Apparently, I stepped pretty far back. Because this all seems foreign to me. Everything from the organization of the bell schedules to the presence of technology. The only thing to remain is that teachers care here, too.

Balance in Autumn

Study has intensified. It's no longer a matter of my own education. The education of others seems to be hanging in the balance of this semester. I grasp wildly at information, hoping to commit it to memory. Giving up hope. Straining. Rededicating my hope to Christ. But then grasping again.

I am reading On Being a Teacher: The Human Dimension. It says the most important characteristics of a teacher are charisma, compassion, egalitarianism, and a sense of humor. I think I really agree. My favorite teachers have displayed these traits.

It talks about how teachers must live a balanced life. Our lives are on parade at all times. We have the duty to be the most well-adjusted people possible. That means, occasionally, setting down the book in hand, and going to greet fall. Unfortunately, all caveats from my professors regarding balance seem to be aimed at a time in the future, not the present. They set up a useful conundrum: maintain balance, but most of your life should be comprised of schoolwork. One might as well pay to learn the lessons of balance.

It's not their fault that I swim in books. There is probably no shortcut to understanding the lesson plan, or to creating an effective, safe classroom environment. It begs to be studied. And I feel that I am studying for dear life!

________________________

I watch from the center of an indifferent crowd, each one a mandate to give or take.

How important we all are in our glorious busyness!

Rusty fall comes in, beautiful, a friend from ages past,

magnanimously bowing boughs, dipping her head at each guest.

But I cannot move to greet her, disturbing all these guests.

I must not go to greet her, although she is my friend!

She smiles from a distance, a look of understanding.

Dear friend, mentor, forgive me!

We cannot talk for now.

I'm confined to entertain a host of urgencies.

Hurtful Words

"Oh, that word," Grandpa responded. I looked up into his big eyes, so full of mystery to me then. "That's a hurtful word. People say it when they want to hurt us, son." He was grieved, "But it doesn't hurt us. It only hurts them."

"Is that why they look so angry, Papa?"

"That's why they look so angry. They are hurting a great deal inside."

First, Second, and Third Languages

I just finished an English "lesson" with Yazmin. We had a wonderful conversation, explaining "was," "would," contractions, the third person singular, and the varied cultural treatment of language learners. We agreed that many people in the U.S. seem to believe English to be the language that God speaks. For that reason they may become impatient with those learning English--and this often without thinking about why they are impatient. Their mindset is different. They will give up on the conversation more easily, deciding that it is not worth the embarrassment for both parties to keep trying.

We agreed that the same puzzlement exists, for example, in Mexico, where people may also expect their conversational partners to speak perfectly. But instead of impatience with the learner, the native speaker in Mexico will usually exhibit curiosity at the learner, thereby aiding the conversational transaction.

I see more and more that a dignified and determined attitude toward language learners is most likely to instill confidence in speaking. I think the main impediment to language learning is fear of making mistakes and sounding stupid. Learning is first admitting that we don't know something; and secondly forming that knowledge, usually by experience. The implications for this are as follows: we shall make mistakes. Praise the Lord. What better way to remain humble than to be continually frustrated in our attempts to communicate even a basic idea?

I have a wonderful example of humility. On our way to Tapatios on Sunday, Kevin was explaining to Yazmin, Kiko, and Moises his understanding of American Sign Language. He has had two years of college Spanish, but he still lacks some confidence, and it had been some time, he said, since he had practiced. He was explaining his second language in his third language! A few times he looked to me for help, using a sign and a questioning face, as if to say, "how do I say {insert sign} in Spanish?"

How do I tell you? You had to be there to laugh with us--to know with us that we don't know. I remember those moments with a new affection, a renewed vigor to go and do what seems at first to be uncomfortable, and therefore unnecessary. Perhaps that is what makes the reward so great.

Educatin' and Mackin'

I have begun my field experience through my education class. I get to spend time in a REAL middle school in Lancaster, with REAL teachers and REAL students. The thing is, I'm paired with the school librarian. She is a wonderful person, truly. But her time with students does not overlap much when I am there. Also, I do not want to be a librarian. Not at all. I dig the Dewey decimal system and all. I dig books. But I have never been on good terms with large-scale research or large amounts of paperwork. Not surprisingly, Research + Paperwork = Being a Librarian.

This experience taught me a few things already, though. Teaching does not solely involve students. It comes with other teachers, too. And teachers all have opinions. All of 'em.

In other news, last night I was preparing to close around 8:30 at the deli. A guy came in who had called in his order, which was not ready at the time he paid. Assuming Gary would bring out the completed order when it was finished, I resumed sweeping in the dining room. Soon, the customer and I struck up a conversation. We talked for several minutes, 'til I had finished sweeping the entire room... Still no food. I thought maybe it was time to check on it. The order had been ready since (Gary claims) "just after the guy arrived." Mortified, I handed the guy his order with a smile, "it just came up!" ...Gary was sure that I would have checked for the order already, so he had assumed I was just "mackin', looking for a Valentine's date." No. No I was not.