So Many Teacher's Dirty Looks

There's a really cliche moment in every sitcom where the leading lady gasps, puts her hands to her mouth, and breathlessly stumbles over the words, "Oh my God! I'm turning into my mother!" In the past week, since we last conversated (a word which my students refuse to believe is fake, and which I've therefore invited into my vernacular), I've had about three to four moments daily where I stop myself and follow the sitcom queen cliche. Except for me, I only mentally make that stereotypical "Oh no!" face as I consider how much instantly I've morphed into my junior high teachers.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, we'll all have better days if we can just complete this silently and stay on task."

"I don't want to give you consequences, but apparently you want to receive them!"

"I'm not yelling. Keep it up and I'll show you yelling."

"[choose a student's name], that's your warning. This isn't a conversation. Get back to work."

"No you can't go to the bathroom. If you were that thirsty, you wouldn't have thrown your juice away at lunch."

"I'll wait...[crickets] Ok, as I was saying..."

I think it's worth noting that I actually jot these down after each day, just to serve as gentle reminders to avoid at all costs, absolutely, no matter what, sounding like another droning "Womp womp womp womp wahmp" teacher from Peanuts. And this is in the first week, when energy's still there, and students don't, you know, always hate me yet.

On the first day of class, we began by passing out a survey to students which contained questions ranging from "how can we contact your parents?" to "what would you like to learn about this summer?" Respectively, the most popular answers were "404" and "math". Those of you who know telephones well probably have already recognized that "404", while an acceptable guess at the area code, is probably not the student's entire phone number. Diligent readers will recall that my students are in summer school only for reading. So, you know, strong off the starting block.

From there, we moved to Two Minute interviews, also known as Hot Seat, a game I learned from Corp legends who preceded me. Essentially, this involves the students yelling questions for two minutes and me trying to come up with a witty answer to questions like "How many kids you got?" If you think of a witty answer for that question which also makes clear that I have zero chilluns of my own, please do let me know. Other highlights included:

• Mr. Glasser, how'd you get your hair like that?
• Oh. So do you shower everyday?
• You going to wear those pants tomorrow?
• How many dates have you gone on in your life?
• Do you know Wiz Khalifa? (Actually, kids, this one time...)
• Why are you in summer school?
• Oh. So you ain't got anything better to do?
• Do you think we're smart kids or dumb kids?

And that was pretty lclose to the exact verbiage of non-stop question barrage to which I subjected myself on day one. 

These kids are smart kids, as I've mentioned before. But, like kids are wont to do, they say a thousand words just by speaking their minds. From that question, I gathered that everything we had learned so far was true for these kids. these twelve and thirteen year-olds, just getting into the glory days, haven't been told in a long time, if ever, that they can succeed, that their work is valuable, or, in a lot of cases, that they themselves are valuable. During training two weeks ago, we watched a video in which a teacher from Chicago told each student who answered a question just how beautiful or brilliant or talented or brave he or she was. Everyday, she would hammer these points home and demand that they do exactly as she told them to do. Her philosophy was that, if she just refused to stop saying these things to her students (who, incidentally, she actually believed were all capable and driven, despite reputations and records) that they might just believe her one day. Fourteen of the sixteen students from that video received at least a college degree. the other two were unavailable for interview.

Without belaboring the point, I also jumped right into the game of calling parents. As you may know, the phone is my jam. I'll write an email, I might respond to your facebook post (though I'm terrible at keeping up with it), and the occasional Saturday night will result in a tweet. But the phone is where I really hit my groove. I spent a week trying to get in touch with half of my class's parents, or about 8 individuals. On day 1, I realized that approximately 1/3 of our entire class roster showed numbers which were disconnected. On day 2, after we issued the student survey, I realized taht I was no better off because, again, 404 is not a phone number. On day 3, I made some initial contact. In each convo with these rents, I explicitly said that his/her student was very bright or a talented reader or some variation thereon. Two of the first three parents legitimately disagreed with me. Tiger moms are one thing, a beast until themselves. But having a mother or aunt or grandmother who not only doesn't encourage you, but downright discourages you can't be a good thing to come home to.

It's no surprise then that many of these students find diversions to avoid going home, or frankly, just to attract some attention from an authority figure. In the past week, at my school, there's been an outbreak of eighth graders drinking some cocktail of Xanex, Jolly Ranchers, Sprite, and Robitussin. Last Wednesday, a student left her backpack in class. Upon exploring its contents to find out who it belonged to, my Faculty Advisor (the real teacher in my classroom), found a blade (exactly nine inches in length and far too haphazard to be considered a knife) rolled in a red bandana. This girl was permitted back into my room the next day. And HOLY CRAP the movies and songs these kids know. I mean, I listened to Tupac in seventh grade, but that would be Disney Radio compared to some of the lyrics that these kids spit in class. Also, no seventh grader should have an unedited knowledge of Friday. Innocence is gone.

In a moment of levity, one of my students did a spot on impression of crazy legs from don't be a menace. I got in trouble for laughing at him. But it was hillarious.

Speaking of levity, here's puppies, a reward for sticking it out this far.

As I explained to some of you, the vast number of TFA new Corps Members training here in Atlanta (nearly 800) means that many of us teach every other day for ninety minutes. Last week, I taught Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. On Monday, I walked in, and my advisor commented that I should prepare to roll with the punches. After all, "First days are rough." Preach. First day was rough. After the smashing success of administering the survey, the train really jumped the tracks. And went barrelling down the whole mountain. It took out women and children and whole villages. It was just not pretty. But think back to seventh grade, and imagine being in summer school for five weeks, five hours a day in the same room. No recess, no cafeteria, no library, no PE, no music, no science, no math. Just reading, reading, reading for five hours. The only natural reaction, as some of students so graciously taught me early on day 1, is to spin move around teachers (read: me) as they run laps up and down the hallway.

Monday ended, and I still felt great. Laps down the hallway I will take. There were no real issues, our kids seemed nice enough, I knew their names, and the didn't seem to mind me. Well. Then came Wednesday. I would have traded eight Monday hallway lap days just to get out of Wednesday. It really all began with what the school calls hot lunch, a Wednesday special in which these kids get more than bologna, bread, an apple, and a suncup. Instead, they get pizza with (probably) bologna on top, bread, an apple, and a suncup. I was caught off guard by hot lunch, but was actually kind of relieved, as I thought that studnets might feel better fed, a little more energized, and at least they burned some calories on the walk down to the steps.

I've never lived through an apocalypse (can't wait til November when I don't have to confess that anymore), but in hot lunch, I saw what the Book of Revelation was talking about. Fire and brimstone surged as students literally Ponged themselves from one side of the room to the other. The nice, neat single-file line which I lost my voice trying to facilitate dissolved instantaneously, and my students straight up dis-afriggin-peared. And then. The punch heard round the lunchtable was thrown, and it was as if he punched right through the floodgates of teenage boy hormones. No sooner was fight #1 ended then fight #2 already had a take down, and fight number #3 had devolved into some weird sort of giraffe fight.

Needless to say, hot lunch has been cancelled. While I wish it was due to lack of hustle, I think it was actually in response to the Grecian-style flash riots our kids whipped up.

One particularly eager hot lunch culprit was a sassy young lady who embodies most things unfun about teenage girls: boy crazy, attention-seeking, way too smart for summer school, but way too self-absorbed to realize it. I told her several times that she either had to get pizza or get back in line, but she could not roam the cafeteria. Several times, she acknowledged my request and made moves, only to pull some crazy under the table crap to avoid all lines. I was not feeling it. Even a little. When I finally cornered her, I felt ready with the BS Teacher D, and strolled up to her knowning exactly how to proceed. "You can either get in line to come back to class or your not coming back into my classroom," I said calmly.

"Betchu I will," she (literally) spat back, much less calmly.

"You're too smart to take such stupid bets, ma'am. You need to go see the principal."

As if she hadn't already ruined her odds, she turns around and looks me in the eye. "FUCK YOU!" she said, channeling Cee Lo Green. Incidentally, having those words put to music only makes them more gratifying for seventh graders to invoke. Just when you thought it wasn't possible. Anyway, sufficiently satisfied with my management skills, I swaggered back into my classroom only to find that student, the Cee Lo impersonator herself, back in her seat, grinning from ear to ear. "Can't kick kids out, Mr. Glasser. Here to learn," the principal informed me. Good thing I didn't take her bet on whether she'd be back, or I'd look like a wounded puppy who just lost $10, rather than just looking like a wounded puppy.

You can imagine how much work we completed in the last hour of that lesson. If you can't imagine it, try to. Then divide that amount in half. 19,000 times and you'll see exactly how much work we did (somewhere between none and negligible depending on the student).

Then came Friday. "Fridays can be really tough" was the best advice my advisor had to offer as students began to trickle in. And Friday was tough. But seriously, if Fridays are tough, Hot Lunch days are tough (Wednesdays), and Mondays are rough, we're looking at a pretty sparse week, eh? Friday was actually like watching a slow motion game of telephone

I just made a lot of fun of these kids, so I feel obliged to lay some more heavy stuff on you all. Scuse me, folks--on y'all. One student, of whom I am particularly fond, wrote a paragrph about her mom. As a warm-up activity, I asked her to expand it by adding details. At 12 years old, this yound girl's happiest, most available memory with her mother is a recollection of her mom arriving home from a jail a month earlier than expected. Why do you care about synonyms when that's what's on your mind? But somehow, she's the allstar in the bunch. Another student who is, once again, plenty smart to ace seventh grade without summer school (but way too lazy to attend enough regular school days to pass seventh grade) wrote freely about a "bad" day when she had to call the Atlanta equivalent of child protective services so that she could be removed from her mother's care.  #howluckyweare

Rereading what I have here makes it sound like I'm complaining. I guess I am complaining about a lot of things. But none of them are teaching, or my classroom, or my kids, or this decision. I've righted exactly zero tracks and transformed precisely goose egg students in my four days on the job, but I have a good feeling about day five.

Sure, we still have to do crazy things, like look in the mirror and adjust our "teacher stares" until we are actually burning holes in glass. And yes, we do have to practice our teacher voices, in front of other people. Sure, there's busy work. And Woah my Lawdy Lah, what did teachers do without copiers? It's like the fall of Saigon to get into the TFA-specific copy center (which, though a fantastic resource for us, has named every copier and computer there after famous educators, movie stars, political figures or others. Copier number 19 seems easier to say than "Please advance to Dostoevsky, the ninteenth printer on your left"). But as long as copies are the low point of my day, I'll call it a good day.

Ok, for real finally, I saw Aaron Rodgers just chilling at a burrito place, loving life, and seemingly banking on a lockout (it dun lopped over). I tried to trip him, but turns out the guy's pretty light on his feet. And just in case you still think I'm not living the good life, consider this: I had a burger stuffed with shrimp and grits for dinner recently. My side? Tatchos, a multi-cultural mix between south of the border and tater tots.

If this place kills me, it won't be the kids. It will be the deep fryers.

Mr. Glasser, huh?

First off, apologies for the delay in updating things. I'm sure you were all concerned for my safety. I appreciate your concern. You'll be glad to hear that I am alive.

Today was what you might call Day 1. That title seems appropriate since it was, in fact, the first day that I was teaching in front of students. It's important to note that this is the first day with actual students, as opposed to the two weeks I've spent teaching seventh grade reading to college graduates. I know practice is supposed to make perfect, but seriously, the most creative minds could only do so much to transform a group of 23 year-olds in suits into seventh grade summer school students. And for most of my TFA colleagues, their imaginations could only go so far in making them into seventh graders. Even when the TFA-ers were piling it on, I had to coax them into throwing a spitball my way. The same was not true for the students in my classroom.

To prepare us for entering the fray of summer school, the TFA training corps (must things in TFA are divided into Corps. Given the other Corps I know--Marine, end list--this seems like an overstep) gave us a series of lessons on classroom management and student investment. For those of you not yet indoctrinated in the Teach For America vernacular, classroom management refers to the series of non-corporal measures taken by a teacher to maintain law and order in the classroom. It's apparently important to specify corporal versus non-corporal because its still legal to beat kids in school in both Georgia and Louisiana. Yep. Why old-style Catholic schools haven't made a surge down here is beyond me. Seems like their cup of tea.

Anyway, classroom management stands in contrast to student investment, which refers to the series of positive reinforcement techniques employed by teachers to encourage students to take more agency in their education. At first, much of the suggested techniques for both management and investment seemed fairly juvenile to me, and I tried like hell to avoid exposing these seventh graders to kindergarten tactics.

I, along with some others in my cohort, expressed this theme of concern to our group advisor (who, incidentally, won the national award for teaching excellence from TFA last year. Casual. And studied at Oxford. Or Cambridge? Either way, she's a year older than me...). In order to highlight the importance of tight classroom management techniques, she recounted a story of bad classroom management which I am obliged to share with anyone and everyone. So tell your friends.

It went like this:

[Student texting]
Teacher: Now, you know we can't have cell phones in school. Put it away now or I'll take it.
[Crickets. Student presumably is exceeding her 160 character maximum.]
Teacher: Ok, I warned you. Give me your phone. You can have it at the end of the day.
[Student does not glance up, let alone hand over the contraband]
Teacher: (Student's name omitted), give me that phone or I'll have to send you to the Principal's office
[Students replies with incomprehensible syllables]
Teacher (in raised voice, approaching student): Ok get out. I'll let the office know you're coming.
Student (as if returning to consciousness all of a sudden): Man, you can't take my phone!
Situation escalates
Student: Man, fuck you, man.
Teacher: Fuck me? Fuck you!
Student: You can't talk to me like that. I'm calling my mom (presumably on the contraband cell phone).
Teacher: CALL DA BITCH!

This is, I've learned, a poor example of how to manage the classroom. For those of you taking notes, never call da bitch. Always don't call da bitch. Got it? Good.

In addition to management, we've talked extensively about lesson planning. I wish I could tell you what I've learned, but the feedback I've gotten on my submitted plans so far has put me in the Novice to Pre-Novice grouping. So I don't feel too comfortable propagating that wisdom yet.

One things that's become increasingly apparent is the number of gulfs between myself (and TFA at large) and the population we're serving. Some aren't too surprising: We, by and large, come from stable, supporting households. They do not. We, by and large, we're raised with college as a eventual educational terminus. These kids were not. We are nerds, almost exclusively. The kids we're teaching are not. Many of us are white, and therefore cannot speak firsthand to how racism feels or manifests itself. These kids can.

Other divides were less obvious: We were motivated by good grades and exciting teachers. Many of these kids are still waiting for an exciting teacher. We had to have our egos reeled in. You could tell these kids how brilliant they are for months, and they'd still laugh at you. Geographically and socioeconomically, TFA members are largely Northeastern, with all the connotations that brings along. These kids are black and from southern cities.

And maybe its not the nature of the divides, but more how obvious they are in watching some new teachers interact with students. For example, I heard some co-teachers debriefing about a "Getting to Know You" survey, during which several kids were confused by a question which asked who they would have lunch with if they could choose any historical figure. A fellow TFA member, in an effort to clear up questions, suggested several figures: "What about Malcolm X or Martin Luther King?" Now don't get me wrong, clearly those are two incredibly monumental figures in American history, and would make for great lunch dates. But when you individually suggest only those to options to each of the 14 students in the room, that becomes a red flag.

Another example: Having come from Georgetown, a place which is bad at diversity and where powerful student voices worked to begin diversity dialogues, I've had the opportunity to be a part of several diversity conversations. These are often uncomfortable, particularly when 11 white kids are staring one person of color in the face. TFA, however, facilitated a really impressive conversation about diversity, which began on a high note when one white, Corps members who was placed in Memphis opened up about his initial hesitations in accepting a placement in Memphis. What began as a soliliquoy about embracing his own ignorance and dismissing his embedded prejudices took a hard turn right and ended soundly in a ditch. One excerpt, which may be paraphrased, but I'm pretty sure is verbatim: "I just have never had a meaningful relationship with a black person. (Later, in a smaller group):I've played basketball with black people. But aside from that, I thought I could only talk to black people about kool-aid, watermelon and fried chicken."

Tactful right. Let's go party like its 1959..wait a second.

But as much as I want to totally divorce myself from statements and people like that, I'm acutely aware that we all, regardless of race, have some learning to do. More importantly, we're all acutely aware that as long as time is of the essence, as it is now, we don't have time to allow mindsets to subvert what we're after here. It's not secret that the achievement gap exists along racial and economic lines. Kids who need the most help are going to be poor minorities, especially poor minority males. And I'll never know even what it's kind of like to live in that skin. But I have learned that half the battle is realizing what you don't know.

I'm just going to go ahead and warn you henceforth: the more you learn about educational disparity in the U.S. the more it sucks. I'm no expert by any stretch. But a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, apparently, because I find it hard to resist indignance. Hence the paragraphs-long diatribes with no levity whatsoever. My bad!

Anyway, so my classroom. First off, I know good things would come since the room number is 412. And I was mostly right. I'm lucky enough to have kids who, by and large, want to be there. Or, at least show up most days, which is a huge plus compared to most classrooms. These kids, also, are by and large reading between 4th and 6th levels, so only 2-3 years behind where they ought to be. Which sounds terrible, until you hear about the 7th grader who's reading at a first grade level. Which is what we teachers call "perspective".

I walked in this morning a little nervous, which I cannot deny, but I had a couple things going for me. First, I chose this awesome sauce book that I read in seventh grade to use for my lesson. And the kids ate it up. Just like I did in seventh grade. Getting to revisit the Outsiders and Monster and Captain Underpants [deep sigh] glory days.

Anyway, probably the most noteworthy that occurred whilst I pedagoged (yep, I'm a reading teacher) was that nothing happened. Kids followed along. And answered questions. And it was awesome. One thing I forgot: Lunch is a huge deal when you're in school for hours upon hours. These guys were like Pavlov's dogs as soon as they heard a brown paper bag krinkle.

As a reward for listening to my co-teacher and I talk for hours and hours (seemingly), we played a game called hot seat, during which students got 3 minutes to ask each of us anything they wanted. I was concerned when the game started off slow.

This concern was erroneous.

One bold little feller started asking if I went on dates. If so, where? If there, with whom? (I actually wasn't too mad at that one since the student used the objective preposition. Big win.) If I'm dating why don't I have kids? Do I want to have kids? How long was I going to wait to have kids? Did I shower? Do I wear normal clothes on weekends? How old was I (they would have bet millions on >30 given the millions to bet)?

Questions went on in this vein for a while until the buzzer finally rang. But even after this period of full disclosure from me, you wouldn't believe how many kids refused to give us real phone numbers for their parents.

I also learned that getting along well with kids is not always a good thing. I'm really inclined to be all buddy with them, talk about their hopes and dreams, build them up, buy them things, hear about their lives, etc. But sometimes, especially inthese early days, they will take that slack and run with. Literally. One kid ran up to give me a high five, as I instructed, then pulled a spin move, ducked under my arm, and ran down the hall. But I felt pretty legit when I wrote him up. Who's laughing now, you crazy fast super human?

So, thus began the career and the series of adorable and infuriating anecdotes that will characterize my next two years. In sum, I don't have it yet. not by a long shot. But I'm feeling like it's attainable now, which is certainly progress. And I'm really rocking the teacher bag with some swagger. Probably the most important progress to date.

In TFA, they talk about setting big goals that challenge students without frustrating them. Talk about big goals: taking the 700 english and polisci majors here assembled and making us good at (at least faking) teaching. But somehow, they're doing it.

Finally, I have to say that I knock TFA for the Kool-Aid drinking a lot. And it is excessive at times. But when we got back to Georgia Tech, there were signs posted all over campus congratulating us "teachers", I couldn't help but get goosebumps. I just hope some kids get as much out of this experience as I am.

That does it for now. More to come tomorrow (now that's kids involved, and we all know they say the darndest things, I'm expecting plenty of fodder).