Inspiring in spurts--waiting for Rhythm

I finally joined the NCTE (National Council for Teachers of English) and subscribed to their English Journal, a professional Secondary English teaching journal, only three years after my English Education professors started suggesting it. At the time I was a budgeting student who couldn’t afford to relocate rent and food funds to anything of less immediate import. I forgot all my good intentions of joining NCTE and reading the journal after graduating and beginning to work. Having recently awakened to the joys of good journal/magazine writing at my fingertips via my kindle (yes, I caved; it didn’t take much) I suddenly remembered the English Journal and have just spent the last couple hours reading articles on such subjects as digitalk, political power writing communities and motivating students to care about in-class writing.

And now I’m thoroughly depressed. I’m a third of the way through my teaching year, just finished one incredibly crazy first term that I started running and finished in an exhausted heap, and I just don’t know how the teachers who write these inspiring articles have time to, first of all, think up such passionate, creative lessons, second of all, teach planned passionate and creative lessons, and third, write about it! Okay, so some of my lessons this year have tried to be creative and go beyond the text book basics but mostly I feel like this term has been one long circle of assigning and marking with little time to be passionate and create. And if I’m feeling like this… my poor students! I’m not sure what it is. This is my second year; I thought it was supposed to get easier, Professor Vande Kopple? So far, this one is much more out of control than my first.

I long for time to read and think and plan and create so I can question and challenge and prompt and inspire but all I do is assign and mark and edit and administrate!

What is the answer? Is there an answer? Maybe it’s just to wait this time out, to try as much as possible to not be completely sucked into the whirlpool, to inspire in spurts as I come up for air occasionally, and then, when there is a rhythm (oh, please, let that be a rhythm on the horizon!) maybe those spurts can slowly become long, deep, luxurious breaths.

Cat ladies: I think I get it

March was not been a good month for keeping on track with blogging but the holidays have started and I'm slowly emerging from the haze that is the end of term. I'm also alone for the weekend, dog-cat-house-sitting for my parents and I will never admit what channel of DSTV I've been watching for a large part of the afternoon: time to get back on track. But what to write about now there are no lessons or students in my life?

Then this evening I realised how some women end up as "the cat lady".

I was sitting outside on the concrete by the pool (not a pleasant image but the grass has ants and dampness) and the dogs, realising that they, after keeping me company in the lounge all afternoon, had been deserted, came to join me. And Bingley, our little white toy pom who likes to be close and whose advances I had rejected by sitting on my hands, leaned hard against my back. And he felt so real and present and alive. Maybe that's obvious or odd, but I have been thinking about living alone recently, since moving onto campus. I don't think I could ever live on my own in an ordinary situation (such as not living as part of a hostel of 35 high school girls) and in fact, the thought terrifies me a little. And after being alone for a total of, let's see, 2 days and 15 hours, I suddenly realised that maybe this is where some cat ladies begin... and why I might end up as one. (Now my mother's terrified).

Those who know me may find this a bit weird because, while I like animals, I'm not crazy about them like some members of my family, but it is amazing what solid, comforting company they provide, particularly when you are alone. They sit on you. They wait for you to get up in the morning and let them in. They look at you. They need you.

About 10 minutes after I had left the poolside and Bingley's warm back I was washing the dog bowls (one of my least favourtie activities of dog-cat-house-sitting) in the outside sink when I heard loud, rather desperate yowl. Up on the roof was Ponyo, cat no. 1. So I dragged our wobbly old wooden ladder over to the wall and stretched up. She was desperate to come down but not quite sure she could trust me and stayed just beyond reach. Eventually I succeeded in grabbing her by the scruff of her neck and slowly backing down the shaking old ladder (time to up-grade, Dad) with her clinging for dear life to the top of my head. When I lowered her arching, tense body to the ground I stroked her quickly for comfort before she could run. But she didn't, she turned and wound herself firmly around my legs, gratitude personified.

Who knows why the "cat lady" is always depicted alone but I think I know now why she is the cat lady. If I ever end up living alone, without 35 high school girls, I mean, I'm going to do it with cats. Or at least, a dog.

Holidays and Afternoons-off

I spent the last week trying to come up with a witty--verging on cutting--response for the next person who tells me how lucky teachers are to have holidays and afternoons off. I wouldn't mind this so much if the tone of the speaker didn't almost always imply that, really, teachers have it easy. How unfair it is that all the rest of the world has to slave away 8 to 4 or 9 to 5 while teachers (and honestly, how hard is it to qualify as a teacher?) get to lounge the day away after lunch and get whole weeks off at a time!

I did not come up with any fittingly biting responses because I was too busy spending my afternoons, evenings, early mornings, late nights and weekend marking, prepping and writing reports.

Two weekends ago I had 14 different sets of marking to do on my list. About 3 of those were small sets of less than 5 pieces each but the rest were all full-class marking sets. This weekend I only had 12. And this is before grades and report writing. Not to mention the recycled fashion show I am helping to plan and run with the Environment club, the book drive with the Volunteer club, or the hostel I'm supposed to be running.

I often feel bad and that I should apologise when someone points out the extra time off awarded to those of my particular career and I usually mumble quickly, "Yes, it's great, we are lucky, shame poor you, you hard-working lawyer/doctor/receptionist/banker/waitress," shame-faced and full of sympathy for their terrible, cruel situation and guilt at my light, happy, carefree one. And I wish I had a ready retort that was punchy, to the point, and perfectly explained how, yes, the holidays are wonderful, but a large part of them is spent preparing and marking, reading for the next course, getting over the flu that hit you as soon as school closed because the final weeks were too much for your body, and how, in those final weeks, teachers walk around like zombies, grunting to each other over papers and books and computers, trying to teach students in between, pushing and pushing, until the end, and then, the end is not really an end but the time to pick up the pieces that you couldn't pick up throughout the term because there were 14 or 12 more important things to do...

But I don't--have a clever retort, that is. And I don't think I ever will.

Because I don't think any amount of explanation of what it really takes out of you to teach (and I haven't even mentioned what happens when you venture beyond the surface level of teaching and into...oh my, say, relationships?) would really, truly be understood by someone who wasn't a teacher.

So, yes, I am lucky to have my holidays and apologise for them to everyone else.

Forced writing: water

I love to write and am thoroughly enjoying this blog so far. I have to admit though, I do need the enforced stipulation of a post a week (no one work out how many times I have just missed that deadline). I think because I pour myself into whatever present I happen to be part of (right now, teaching, marking, counselling, being part of family) I struggle to do things that I know are important and that I know would fulfill me and add to my general well-being. Things such as communicating with people from the past (or just siblings!), staying on top of the news, reading good, non-teaching books, and writing. So, this forced blog has been wonderful and I've enjoyed it, but I know I would not have written past blog no. 4 if I had not publicly said that I would post once a week at the beginning. Such is my present living (or time management, or self-control, or long term commitment abilities).

In a weird but pretty cool coincidence, I was invited this term to join a writing group that the friend of a work-mate friend was starting. We've met once and we're all pretty clueless about what a writing group is supposed to be so the atmosphere is fairly relaxed and forgiving. Two of us are teachers, one of us is a serious writer trying to publish, another has a degree in fine arts and we meet every two weeks. I'm loving being accountable to write creatively again (the last time being high school). I go through spurts of private poetry writing but having to write something every two weeks is going to be good, I think. We're meeting for the third time this week... I haven't written about "brown" yet... but I need to by Tuesday night, so I will. And that is good, even if it happens on Tuesday evening!

Below is my first writing group contribution. It's rough... but I enjoyed it and I find I am feeling its sentiments a lot more at the moment than when I first wrote it. Funny how writing is like that, hey?

Water Want

I want to feel the rain on my face

and in between my desperately spread fingers,

to dance in the drops that beat firm and true

on my head

in my mouth

and slip into the places of myself that I have hidden away.

I want to splash and stamp in the rivers

beside blaring, cursing roads

to twirl and laugh in the torrents

while cars drive blind and blank with their windows up.

I want to stand, solemn and silent and wide-eyed with awe

on the edge of a pier

while all around waves crash and roar

oblivious and terrifying in their power.

I want to lie and be rocked

by a kind, gentle sea

back and

forth and

up and

down and

back again.

But I cannot.

Because there is no rain and so there can be no dance,

And the streets are full of rubbish and the rivers do not flow,

And the pier is crumbling and full of dangerous slats,

And the sea

--oh the sea--

the sea is just so far.

Sometimes teaching just takes

It has not been a good week overall.

1. I had to tell two different upper level classes how disappointed I was in them with them not handing in work. Last week I sat down with one -- a group of Lower Sixes who have just chosen English Literature as one of their three A-Level subjects, emphasis on the chosen and had all failed the test because of simply not reading, who last week did not hand in their homework-- and at the beginning of the lesson in disappointment, asked, "Why are you here?" and then told them how they were destroying my love of teaching... well, not in so many words, but pretty close.

2. My matron (who lives in the hostel and looks after the girls as a "mother" figure and is old enough to be my grandmother) was not here on time on Monday when girls were being dropped off from the long weekend and the head of Boarding found out and told me I have to "speak strongly" to her about it... still haven't done that.

3. I feel even busier this term than last year and seem (somehow!) to have less time to plan creative lessons or to create new lessons and creating is one of my favourite parts of teaching and if I can't do it occasionally, I just don't feel fulfilled.

4. I had to be stern to a little Form One sent by the matron who had dropped the iron and broken it as she looked so sad and I just wanted to give her a hug and tell her it was okay--I've dropped many a thing in my day--but I can't because I'm supposed to be in charge and holding them all accountable and sometimes my job is to just look stern.

5. I missed a class. Yes, I just didn't go. It is a class that has been added to my teaching schedule and so I looked at an old timetable but still. And they had a party.

6. I spend most of my free time marking books, or thinking about marking books, or feeling guilty for not marking books.

7. I counselled two different girls with two different problems and I can't solve either of them.

8. To add insult to injury, I've ended up with 3 Lower Six classes (I asked for extra because I loved them so much last year) and they all seem to be a particularly uninspired lot who don't do their homework or think or care much about anything.

On the other hand, the last couple days have had some bright moments:

1. Toby--the resident campus dog--went crazy in one of my lessons, running around and barking at all the girls (usually he is very well-behaved and sleeps under someone's chair) and I thought, yet again, "This would never happen in the States."

2. One of my Form 3s complimented my colour combination of skirt and top (it's amazing what a compliment from a teenager can do to your self esteem!).

3. I had a lively, engaging discussion with my Upper Sixes about Introduction to Poetry by Billy Collins and marveled how one year group can be so different from the next. These are my L6s from last year, my favourite class then, the level I am despairing over right now. My U6s last year where my most dreaded, painful class and having any kind of discussion with them longer than two minutes was major work.

4. We sent off Amnesty International letters today to the North Korean UN Representative about closing Yodok Prison Camp and I think I may have made them think about the important uses of English outside of English class (shocking revelation, let me tell you).

5. I walked past one of my classes as they were having a Maths lesson and when they saw me (their teacher busy shutting the windows) they all waved excitedly--probably because I was a welcome distraction from vectors but, at this point, I'll take what I can get.

So I guess while I love this job and I know this is absolutely where I want and am meant to be right now, I'm realising just how much it takes from you and how little it leaves at times.

Roses

It’s the day after Valentines and I’m thinking of roses.

On Saturday I stopped by Strathhaven shopping centre to get some veggies for the week (one green pepper, some beans, a Chinese cabbage and 2 carrots – it’s odd shopping for one person). I was slowly putting my things back in the car because I was kind of hoping Mum’s Mango Man (yes, she has a Mango Man) would descend upon me at that moment when you are stuck outside your car, caught in between getting in and driving away very fast and putting away your groceries – a moment I try very hard usually to avoid and one Zimbabwean fruit sellers are highly skilled at capitalising on. Today though, I wanted mangoes.

The Mango Man was refilling his bags on the other side of the parking lot and I was trying to decide if I would completely rewrite shopping parking lot rules and conventions and drive over to him, when the Rose Man found me. I know this Rose Man. He and I go way back. He knows I’m a sucker and will probably buy some discounted roses from him (business is always bad, he’s always desperate, I’m always a sucker and the roses actually are pretty cheap). We have a nice acquaintance – this time he didn’t even bother asking if I wanted roses. We talked for a couple minutes about business (bad) and how much money people had (none). I tried to be positive and point out that Tuesday was Valentine’s and that was sure to be good for his line of business. He wasn’t convinced. It’s hard to hope once you’re out of the habit. I asked how much his roses were and bought a yellow bunch. 20 for $2. A bargain.

And then it was Valentine’s Day. Zimbabwean private schools have a tradition of sending roses amongst each other. A group at the school, usually fundraising for charity, takes orders from its students to send roses to each other and to many schools in the city. So you pay a dollar and send your girlfriend who goes to another school a couple roses, her name is called out in assembly or lunch and everyone sees what a lucky, loved person she is. It’s horrible. I remember high school. By the middle of high school, my friends and I were sending each other roses but before then, those of us who were roseless each Valentine’s felt unlucky and unloved, all day as we watched the lucky and loved walk around glowing holding their wilting flowers. What I would have given for a wilting flower.

Anyway, I decided to send my boarding girls roses (because it actually doesn’t matter who they’re from because no one knows when your name is called out and they might be from, say, a boy, instead of Miss Bell and only you and Miss Bell have to know if you want, it’s mostly about the illusion). I decided to buy my own roses (cheaper and I had missed the pre-ordered ones) so I headed out Monday afternoon after lessons to a group of rose-sellers down the road – not my Rose Man, who was a bit further away. Anyway, this rose man wanted to sell me a bunch for $10! Five times the price of what I had paid on Saturday. Well, I like a challenge. I had facts and knowledge of rose prices on my side; he had the roses and knowledge of my desperation on his. Eventually I got him down to $4 a bunch. Fair, I think, for Valentine’s Eve. So I found a prefect, and got my roses slipped in amongst the official ones.

Yesterday, my girls were happy (I saved a few of them from the “zero-club”), and I have the left-overs in a glass on my bookshelf. They are slowly opening and smell gorgeous. I’m happy, too. But even now, even though I am content with who I am and where I am in my life, and even though I like to challenge accepted perceptions about love and gender and relationships (usually not on Valentine’s day because people aren’t usually in the mood to be challenged about love or gender or relationships then), and even though I have mostly moved on from high school and know that roses on Valentine’s do not make me lucky or loved, I kind of – secretly! – wish someone had sent me roses.

Disappointing poetry

Last week my Form 4s and I tried to figure out the poem "Full Moon and Little Frieda" by Ted Hughes together. It's a beautiful poem that captures the innocence of a child and a moment in time when she interacts with the universe and the universe interacts with and responds to her. It is a tricky poem though: the images are confusing and the sentence structure is not clear. You have to work hard to get to the beauty of the poem. And last week I made them work. I never just give out the meaning of a poem (I don't presume to know many meanings of poems anyway). I make my students annotate and think and write and then we discuss all the way through, often line-by-sometimes-excruciating-line. It is sometimes painful but I want them to learn to analyse poetry for themselves and to think through a difficult poem. It is rewarding to have come to conclusions yourself. You get so much more out of something if you work hard and see the light in the end. And once they see that you're not going to do it for them and that you trust them and their ideas they really get into it, if they have to figure out what the poem means themselves (sometimes they get into it a little too much and come up with some wacky ideas and then you have to gently prod them back onto the straight and narrow).

So, we spent a tiring but thoroughly enjoyable 40 minutes working through "Full Moon and Little Frieda". And they were wonderful. With a few questions and guidance they made some really astute comments about the poem and "figured it out": who the he was, who the you was, the perspective of the author, some ideas what the blood river was (one I had never thought of!), the trembling star and unspilled milk... They started off completely lost and with looks on their faces that said "why would you do this to us on a Wednesday afternoon, Miss Bell?" and by the end I was thrilled with how involved they had been and the ideas they had come up with. I was so proud and got to the end of the 40 minute lesson feeling invigorated and just tingling - you know that feeling, at the end of a really good lesson? Where everything has just fallen into place so perfectly and you couldn't have planned or executed it better? Rare, but oh so good.

After my final "Okay, any last thoughts or comments about this poem?" I put down my poem and said with passion, "Wasn't that a great poem?"

...

And my balloon of love and happiness popped as I was met with groans and sighs, "No... not the best.... the other one was better... ugh." What?!

Oh poetry. Oh students. Will you never cease to play havoc with my heart?

Here's the poem for your enjoyment (don't tell me if you don't):

Full Moon and Little Frieda

A cool small evening shrunk to a dog bark and the clank of a bucket -
And you listening.
A spider's web, tense for the dew's touch.
A pail lifted, still and brimming - mirror
To tempt a first star to a tremor.

Cows are going home in the lane there, looping the hedges with their warm
wreaths of breath -
A dark river of blood, many boulders,
Balancing unspilled milk.
'Moon!' you cry suddenly, 'Moon! Moon!'

The moon has stepped back like an artist gazing amazed at a work
That points at him amazed.

Ted Hughes