My MTC Experience

There's no way I could give a complete portrayal of my experience in this blog, or even in a book.  Maybe I could put all my blogs together as a sort of book of letters, and then fill in the gaps and make an interesting story, although it would be extremely long.  I think it's an experience someone has to live to understand, so I'm sure all my fellow MTCers can relate. 

If I had to sum it up, I'd say that I did what I felt I had to do, first of all in order to survive, and secondly to succeed.  I'm still here, writing this blog, and I'm even planning on coming back to my school for another year, so I've survived.  As far as success, John Wooden says that's achieving your personal best considering what you're given and what you're up against in order to make the greatest contribution you can to the world.  Something like achieving your full potential.  I'm not going to sit here and say I did that every day.  There were times I put everything I could into something, and there were times I didn't.  I'm proud of a lot of done, and ashamed of some things I've done as well.  So I'll just say I'm a human and that I'm still striving for success, aiming to improve so I can come as close as possible to my personal best.  Some people will tell you they did their best, but I won't lie here and say that about myself.  Showing up and giving your best everyday is the hardest thing in the world, because you can never do any more than that. 

I think the ultimate result is that I learned a lot about human beings, primarily myself.  I learned what was most important to me, I learned how to lead, how to adapt, how to accept reality while striving to shape it.  This was an exercise in prioritizing.  I prioritized everyting from my values to my classroom rules and my curriculum frameworks.  For example, I really don't care if a student's shirt is untucked.  Come to class on time and do your work.  I definitely learned which values I could compromise, and which I couldn't.  I learned to shop at Wal-Mart without feeling too guilty about it.  I also learned that paddling students wasn't as awful as it's cracked up to be.  And having students do worksheets and bookwork... not a horrible thing at all.  Keeping a neat, clean, organized desk/room/office... that was the first thing to go.  I told several people that compromising values is what teachng is all about. 

I also learned the values that I couldn't compromise, no matter how difficult things got.  The idea that students have to be responsible and work in order to earn something is something I couldn't part with.  If I ever have kids, I'll probably emphasize that more than anything.  My students were told on day 1 that they would have to come and work in my class every day, and that was 99.9% true.  Working to earn something was as important in basketball as it was in my classroom.  Cheating and cutting corners makes me sick.  Lots of teachers let students get away with it because it's less work for them, but I couldn't do it.  So honesty, hard work, and responsibility for your own actions are values I couldn't compromise. 

I also learned what a creature of habit I am.  I am extremely dependent on my habits, especially working out, eating, sleeping, and generally taking care of myself.  I have to get my exercise, and I have daily and weekly routines that I live by.  This is more true outside of my classroom than inside.  If I wasn't flexible at work, I would have stroked out very early on.

I think the thing that allowed me to have whatever amount of success I had was that I found ways to enjoy my experience.  People who latch on to negative things and can't let them go are totally miserable.  I've talked to a lot of people who do nothing but stress out about bad things that happened at work.  I like to complain, too, but most of the time I would make myself think about it, hold on to it for a second, and then just let it go.  When I go home, who cares if a student was disrespectful to me?  A teacher my first year told me how he paddled students and it relieved his stress.  He said never let a student's bad day ruin yours.  Although you may not need to paddle them every time, that's great advice.  There were times a class would be disresepctful or refuse to listen to me, so I would tell them I was going to write their assignment on the board and go sit down and take it easy.  It's not always the best approach, but I've stayed happy and sane enough to keep coming back and avoid the bitterness many teachers have.  One of my students told me recently that I always seem calm, cool, and collected (the three C's he said).  That's what I try to do, really.  I don't like stress.  I like to stay on an even keel.  So, I may not be the energetic teacher who's bouncing off the walls and performing for my class, but I'm also not the one who rips his hair out, screams, cries, or has a nervous breakdown every week.  Part of keeping your cool is to let go of the negativity, laugh at a lot of it, and just roll with the punches.  Don't take it personally.  That's an approach I hope I can take with me everywhere I go.

I made sure to find the enjoyable parts of my job and try to cling to them instead of the negativity.  I spent a lot of my time coaching basketball and track.  Coaching was something I loved and I would do for free (I did most of the time).  It gave me some positive feelings about coming to and being at school.  I loved to joke around with the other coaches, I loved planning and running practices, and I loved working with my teams.  I also had positive interactions with my students.  I learned to enjoy when they would tease me and make jokes, even "hagging each other."  Sometimes I'd joke with them and play around a little.  I didn't mind sacrificing 2 or 3 minutes of class to tell a joke or laugh at something.  I think some of the advice teachers get (don't use sarcasm) is wrong.  It's important to be yourself and show them you're a human.  You just have to learn how to interact with your students.  If I wasn't able to use my sense of humor and laugh, I would have been gone a long time ago.  I remember laughing as I was writing students up for outrageous, inappropriate things they'd say or do, but I couldn't help it.  Enjoying things at work was the most important thing I did, because it helped me survive and made my classroom a more positive environment.  My best classes were those I had the most positive interactions with, and the worst were the ones where we never clicked, and I was always serious. 

I think a good analogy for the whole experience is the way I feel when I go home for a long break or holiday.  All the misery, difficulty, and hard work I've been through leave a feeling of accomplishment and satisfaction.  A lot of the crazy things that happen and cause headaches during the day turn into funny stories down the road.  I end up missing my students and my job, in spite of all the daily crap I deal with.  I wonder how I could quit doing the job that I've dreaded and trudged through for the last 9 weeks. 

And then I think about my impact.  I really don't think I've had any impact whatsoever on the educational or social system here.  Nothing more than a drop of water in the ocean at least.  But I know I've had an impact on the lives of all the individuals I've taught and coached.  I've shown many of them that they can succeed in a demanding class and a difficult subject.  I've shown many of them that they can get along with and trust a white man.  I've shown many of them that a person can be calm and disciplined, and still have an enjoyable life.  And I've shown many of them that at least in some corners of the universe, life can be fair and hard work can pay off. 

I don't think I'll do this forever.  I'm planning on coming back, teaching and coaching here one more year and applying to grad school for sociology.  I want to get a PhD (piled high and deep, as my uncle says).  Maybe I'll teach at the college level, but I don't think I'm a high school chemistry teacher at heart.  It's not my passion.  I know that I will miss coaching basketball a lot, and maybe I'll be drawn back to it one way or another.  And I know that I'll take many of these life lessons with me.  I know that every day, life is a challenge, and that I have to be myself and do my best to make the best decisions I can make and act on them to the best of my ability.  If I do that, there is no reason to regret the past or fear the future, because I'm doing all that I can, striving for success: my personal best and making the greatest contribution I can.