Show Me

I am generally a very patient person, but this month I have been working three jobs: two part time and one full time. I have to admit it has tried my patience. Not only has my workload grown exponentially, I’ve been reading reflective essays about what my students have learned this semester. These letters are often encouraging, but this semester, more than most, my students wrote repeatedly of how they came to this class expecting to learn nothing and, thank God, they were mistaken. The teacher (yeah, that’d be me) actually knew what she was talking about and things like revisions, workshops and active reading actually helped. Gasp.

Now, this is a compliment. For whatever reason – blame the inadequacies of our educational system or student’s lack of focus in the classroom – most of my students have woeful tales of past English classes and I am happy to change that perspective. But this constant barrage of blatant surprise does wear on a person.

It was in this mindset that I entered my afternoon class today. These are students at my new full time job and I’m enjoying the campus, but this specific class is sleepy and generally unresponsive to anything class related. So after 1 1/2 hours of tedious stop-and-go conversion, I sent them on a break to get refreshed. It worked, but then the questions were all about when class would be over. Now, on Tuesday, these students had asked me (yes, I swear they asked) to go over grammar before their essay was due, so that was the plan. I admit, it’s not exciting, but they requested it. But now, they hated it. They avoided eye contact, wouldn’t answer questions and kept asking if we were done. Then, something in me snapped. I couldn’t keep my yap shut any longer. I broke into a rant. “Why are you even in school if all you want to do is leave? Why pay all this money to bitch and stare at the clock?” On and on I went. After the shock wore off, this surprisingly opened up an interesting line of discussion. They talked about the frustration of working full time making only minimum wage and how school was so much better. I challenged them to show it. Show me. Show everyone.

I’d like to say that everything changed, but this is reality. We did, however, have an interesting discussion about the grammatical structure of a few sentences and that was enough for me. And I know that, when I see them again next Tuesday, they will be sleepy and sluggish, but I think we may have broken ground on something helpful and maybe, just maybe, we can revisit it and keep them focused on the means to their end. And maybe the next time I open my yap with them, it will be praise and excitement, not a searing rant about the value of their education. Maybe, just maybe.