This response will be in part a continuance of the previous post (okay the previous rant) as I feel the successful prosecution of the work of Dr.'s Horner and Hopkins is a prerequisite to any serious pursuit of the type of involvement in the professional community beyond required activities such as faculty meetings and teacher workdays.
Popken's recounting of Dr. Hopkins' work recounts in a fullness that mirrors everyday life for any teacher of English (at the secondary level where the course is in all aspects) and especially any composition teacher the horrors of the workload our profession presents. The students can be wonderfully energizing, but there is nothing more draining than confronting that huge pile of papers without any of the kids you love working with around to remind you why the effort is worth it.
Finding out from Dr. D that research shows comments on student papers are next to worthless as a teaching tool was not a great comfort.
I admit that every year I hit a low point where the work drives me to consider leaving the field for some job that actually ends at some point. Because Teaching doesn't. If you're not teaching, you're planning or doing some other grunt work in preparation for the next class or the next day's class. If you're not doing that you're grading. If you're not doing that you're involved in some extra curricular or a second job to make ends meet. Or perhaps, you've given up your family in another way by shipping the kids out so both parents can work.
Popken notes that Dr. Horner is equally concerned with other aspects of the commercial social aspects of being an English teacher than the workload, but I knew coming to the profession that I would be, by the standards of the world very, very poor. I am not interested in getting rich. It would be nice, but honestly, if I chose to be teacher I did not choose to pursue wealth. I do agree with Dr. Hopkins that I feel teaching to be a calling, and I really wonder how I would hold up doing something else. I love the feeling of purpose and duty that arrises with the importance of the work I do. I place a lot of value on feeling that the work I do has intrinsic value beyond making me and someone else richer. After that I get to continue working with the literature I love, in a setting that I love, and in a way that I hope touches others as I was touched as a student. However, as young as I am in the field, the workload (not the nature of the work but the sheer amount of time required) drags at me more every year.
This is especially true as I try to move closer to what I feel is best practice. Those things, differentiation within the general education classroom, meaningful, close reading of texts, varied writing and project based assessments that avoid bubble memory testing as much as possible, all contribute to greater workload as the years go by. I feel I am a better teacher in many ways than when I started teaching, but I find myself continually wanting and feeling guilty about all the things I could and should do if I didn't have to compromise from simply not having the time to do it.
Are my students getting the best education I could possibly give them? Yes, under these circumstances given who and what I am as a teacher I feel they are. Is it what they could get from me under better circumstances? No. Is it everything I want to be able to give them? A thousand times no! And that drags at me. I want to be a difference maker. Not to be remembered and recognized, forget that. I don't care. But to feel that what I am doing is truly what is best for the kids and is best suited to prepare them for college and life, to help them to think for themselvs and master the art of written communication as receivers adn producers of text, and, hopefully, to open their eyes and enrich their thinking and their lives. Why do I teach English? Because I'm a romantic and I firmly believe that words and ideas can change the world. Because I believe that understanding things, broadening your knowledge of culture, history, literature, science, math, art etc. and especially broadening your knowledge of their interconnections literally makes your life richer. That is the real life benefit I want to pass onto my students not the preparation to make more money. More is only more money. "Superfluous dollars can only buy superfluities...money cannot purchase one necessary of the soul." I can't give these students the necessaries of the soul either but I can show them how to find them, how to recognize the necessaries of their own souls and help them recognize the tools and equipment for the search. Wanting so badly to do that, being a perfectionist, the workload is the most depressing thing because it is a constant reminder that I am not the teacher could be with the classes I could have because I simply cannot get it all done. Unfortunately, while my angry bitter head knows this is true, I cannot convince my perfectionist, romantic idealist heart.
No comments:
Post a Comment