Another Year Over (A New One Just Begun)

December 23, 2017June 4, 2023 ~ Blue Cereal

I’ll be honest with you. I’ve always liked New Year’s more than Christmas.

I know. I’m sorry, but it’s true.

Christmas is fine. Here’s to redemption, and kindness, and gifts that say, “I’ve tried to pay attention.” I like seasonal movies and music – the same 74 songs have been playing endlessly from my red flash drive since Thanksgiving, only a few of which are humorous and none of which involve singing animals or grandma’s demise. And I cry at the same parts of the same films annually – Bill Murray’s redemption in Scrooged, Michael’s efforts to stir up Christmas Spirit (so Santa’s sleigh can fly) in Elf, even Charlie Brown and that same, sad little tree every year since before I was born.

I don’t really do “wacky dysfunctional family” movies whether they’re Christmas-themed or not, so that’s eliminated most of the seasonal fare from the past decade or so. I won’t even talk about Bad Santa or anything crass and offensive but with Noels and Tannenbaums slapped on for cheap laughs. I do generally enjoy obscure claymation, but I’ve dialed back that genre since experiencing Nestor, the Long-Eared Christmas Donkey about five years ago. It was just so… sincere. And disturbing. And wrong wrong wrong, only with an actual Nativity anchoring the plot.

There’s just not enough nog in the fridge to risk something like that again.

So I’m not anti-Christmas. I am, however, a much bigger fan of new beginnings. Fresh starts. Rebooting to factory settings. The season may begin with Thanksgiving, but it doesn’t end until New Year’s Day. It’s practically a package deal, and rightfully so. Whatever else the Baby Jesus was about, His story is certainly about being made new, yes? About the possibility of having your failures and screw-ups washed away – at least metaphorically – and starting over. Being born… again.

Which is, you know… amazing.

But it’s New Year’s that makes it tangible and contains a less lofty, more literal rebirth. It’s not really about staying up until midnight, although I usually do, even now. I personally have zero interest in big parties or raucous countdowns, and while I’ve been known to have a drink or two, most of the time it takes about 2/3 of a single Redd’s Blueberry Ale before I’m asleep on the couch with my neck in some horrible position and fruitcake crumbs spilling down my Star Trek PJs.

And I don’t really make big resolutions – at least not any more than throughout the rest of the year. People talk about keeping that Christmas feeling all year long, but the holiday I’m most likely to emulate endlessly comes a week later.

The number of things I vow I’ll never do again times the number of healthy habits I swear I’ll get serious about next week minus the total occurrences of complete and utter failure equals the square root of why do I even bother – plus or minus self-loathing and hope.

But that’s the thing about reboots and new beginnings. It doesn’t really matter how much you’ve failed before. How often you’ve fallen short. How regularly you wish you’d just… ARRRGHHH! GET IT RIGHT, YOU $#%^*!

Because tomorrow you get up and try again. Because it’s a new morning. It’s a new week. It’s a new semester, a new season, a new job, a new place, a new chance, a new identity, a new direction.

It’s a new year. Like, literally.

I know it’s not miraculous – that’s the one from the week before. I know that a clean slate, like fresh snow, is in many ways just another canvas on which you’ll no doubt spill your badly-mixed watercolors, probably sooner rather than later. And it will smudge right away and smell funny and tear on the one side you thought was actually going rather well, because…

Because that’s just how real life is.

But for a moment, it’s new. For a moment, there’s hope. Enough of those, strung together… well, that’s kinda like ongoing possibility, isn’t it? And it’s not like you can keep doing everything wrong the same way forever – if nothing else, the sheer volume of monkeys and typewriters should produce moments of merit if you simply give it enough time.

And sometimes you get it right. Sometimes you do good. Sometimes you don’t suck. Sometimes… you’re a slightly better version of you.

When that happens, make a note. Mark it down. Build internal monuments, not to worship, but to remember.

That it went well. That it helped, and you mattered, and things were a smidgen better when you tried. That the risk paid off and the hurt lessened and she felt hope and he felt stronger and maybe…

Maybe that can happen again.

Mark it down, dammit – CLING TO IT LIKE LIFE. You’ll need it for reference, and sooner than you think.

Because you’ll probably mess something up again, or at least not catch something you should have caught. You’ll try to fix something and make it worse, or act like a jerk when you fully meant to keep it together. Maybe you’re not as creative as you wish or as smart as you like to think, or maybe you’re simply alarmingly average in the grand scheme of things.

Maybe you’re a screw-up and terrified of how much worse it could be if people really knew. Maybe you feel fat, or maybe you throw up to numb the chaos, or you wish you’d stayed in school or found a better job. Maybe you’ve hurt people and they’ve hurt you and you’re not even sure which parts are your fault anymore.

Maybe you’ll have high hopes for the new year but still find yourself tired and angry and wrestling with despair because what the hell is even happening anymore and why do more people not see it and how can we possibly respond when we’re just so inadequate and small and flawed and…

stupid

dirty

emotional

tired

numb

poor

tired

meek

scared

tired

worried

broken

tired

angry

tired

inadequate

tired

seriously so very tired?

But it’s a new year in a few weeks. And a new week even before that, and again after. It’s a new day tomorrow, and the next day, and the next.

And you’re surrounded by other inadequate, frustrated, flawed, wonderful folks who will probably make you crazy as often as they make you feel better. Help them. Encourage them. Push them. And they’ll do the same for you.

Don’t lie to them, or to yourself. You can’t fight darkness with lies (duh). But help them see what they’re doing right, and to notice when they do good. Sometimes they don’t suck. Sometimes… they’re that better version of themselves they always kinda hoped they might be.

When that happens, make a note. Share it when it feels right. Build some monuments, not to worship, but to remember. Be a Reminder, a Did-You-Noticer, and a Hip-Hip-Hoorayer for those struggling around you. And when you do fall short, or go so so totally wrong, know that morning is coming. A new week is near. Just keep restarting, dammit.

It’s a new year, kids. You can help. You can matter. Things can be a smidgen better because we kept trying, and because you helped someone else keep trying as well.

We just need enough monkeys. Bring your typewriters.

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The Sticker Revolution

November 14, 2017June 4, 2023 ~ Blue Cereal ~ 2 Comments

Several years ago, I had a sub who went a bit above and beyond. She not only took up whatever assignment I’d left for that day – she organized the papers and completion-graded them. In other words, she noted who’d finished and seemed to have taken the work seriously. She didn’t give them a number or a letter grade, of course – that would have been bold. But she did give each paper meeting her requirements a sticker.

I chuckled when I saw the papers the next day. Clearly this was someone more comfortable with elementary, maybe middle school. Nothing wrong with any of that, of course, but these were high school students. Pre-AP Freshmen. They were practically people. They weren’t going to be motivated by…

Holy Moses in a leaky basket, how they lost their minds when they saw the stickers. There was squealing from many of the girls, and almost genuine protest from some of the boys whose papers lacked the adhesive trolls or monkeys or whatever they were. I couldn’t believe it.

“Mr. Cereal! How come you never give us stickers? Don’t you love us? Do you not care if we do well?!?”

OK, they were partly kidding, but not entirely. Not even mostly. Many of them responded more powerfully than I could have ever imagined to the freakin’ stickers. Still… surely it was a fluke, right? A one-time thing? Kids are weird – you never know what’s gonna trigger them one day and mean nothing the next. I dismissed it as quickly as I had pet rocks and disco back in the day.

A week or two later I was at one of those Everything’s A Dollar So Stop Asking places with my wife, looking for who-knows-what, and I noticed several packages of the most obnoxious rainbow and puppy stickers. I grabbed them. Then some generic superheroes – not Marvel, not even DC, but some cheap knock-off assortment of colorful caped stereotypes. I spent less than ten dollars total, purely on a whim – what they heck, right?

The next reading quiz, students who scored a natural 100% (getting all the multiple choice questions right, not factoring in bonus points available from the more-involved short answer questions) received a sticker on their quiz next to the grade.

They loved it. It was almost embarrassing how quickly it escalated.

Students previously satisfied with 88% actually put in extra time to get stickers on their quizzes. A few kids who weren’t going to be getting 100% on their best day received them periodically for the largest jump in scores between quizzes or other nonsense. In short, it became a thing. I did it for years just because I found it amusing. Sometimes it seemed to actually change behavior, but over time it was mostly just stupid fun. The stickers weren’t driving the curriculum or anything – I wasn’t gamifying my flipped project-based #edtech lesson. They were a fluke that found traction.

I may have gotten a bit too excited and purchased way too many random, quirky packs of adhesive approval throughout the years. There were a few times I almost gave assignments just to use my cool new stickers! (Almost, I said. Stop judging me!)

Why am I telling you this?

We can professionally develop ourselves silly and memorize every Marzano text available-at-this-sponsored-link-please-buy-everything-I-get-a-percentage, and still sometimes it’s gonna be the weirdest, most random things that work – or at least work with some kids, in some situations, for some teachers, some of the time. When I’ve shared this with other educators, no one is surprised. Kids are weird like that, but of course teachers aren’t the most normal people in the world, either.

I suspect it was a type of unexpected approval, or a relationship-builder, maybe. I don’t really know for sure. And honestly, I didn’t entirely care – it was just something that worked for me, so I share it. Other teachers share what they do, also, and together we figure out what works most of the time. Some of us also lead workshops sharing ideas and strategies, much based on research and sound pedagogy, and some just based on experience and time. We can explain why some of it works, while some things just… do.

And then one day it didn’t.

I was bouncing through an introductory discussion with a new group of kids and someone shared a particularly pithy comment (I have no recollection what). I reacted with great approval and announced that THAT deserves a STICKER! as I marched back to my desk where I’d tucked them away for just such a joyous…

Nothing.

There was nothing.

I mean, I gave her the sticker. She said thanks, and looked a little confused. We kept going, and eventually I reacted to another thoughtful response with a second sticker. Then a third. Because when something’s not working, you have to do it more, faster, and with greater emphasis.

Still… nothing.

They were polite enough. The discussion went fine. The stickers just made no sense to them. Maybe it was my timing, or the context, or just a different group in a different state coming from different backgrounds. No biggie – we’ve found other ways to connect and learn and for me to push them to give a little more. I don’t need to understand what changed, precisely – although in hindsight I do wonder if I went a bit Bill Murray throwing snowballs in Groundhog Day and killed it. If I’m being honest, it had stopped working in conferences a couple of years earlier, but I’d kept doing it out of sheer momentum (and teachers tend to be overly polite about such things).

So, mild embarrassment I hadn’t caught on a bit more quickly, but no real harm and no lasting foul.

It never occurred to me to write a book about it, do a video series, start upping my lecture fee, or smother social media in derisive comments about teachers who don’t use stickers. I suppose I could have at least hit up Pearson or TEDx, but like I said, I’m just… slow that way. Plus, while the most casual perusal of my Twitter feed will easily dismiss any suspicions I might be carefully building a brand over here, I do have some shame. I may not get edu-famous (and yeah, I want to – who doesn’t?), it’s more important I be able to sleep at night.

Still, I could have shared it more vocally, I guess. There’s nothing more rewarding when you’re a relatively new teacher than stumbling across something that works – a lesson, a classroom management technique, even a book of stickers. And you should rejoice in those moments; they’re largely why we signed up. And I’m always happy to share. I have entire sections on each of my websites hoping there are folks who find them useful from time to time.

And one day they won’t work, or at least they won’t work the same way. That doesn’t mean I’ve failed, or that you’re doing it wrong. It just means that things change. The kids are different. You’re different. The context is ever-evolving and the exact dynamics maddeningly elusive. So we’ll find something else. You’ll try it another way. I’ll screw up a few times, feel like an idiot, then stumble into pedagogical brilliance once again.

Keep sharing those ideas. Keep going to those trainings – if you wish, I mean. Take in all useful ideas and figure out how to make them your own.

But don’t be afraid to follow your gut and do the illogical or unexpected thing, as long as it’s not unfair or in some way detrimental to your overall goals. And don’t be too proud to borrow from that irritating lady down the hall, or that coach who you won’t admit you feel smugly superior to in the classroom, or even from that weird sub who organized all of the papers and wrote completion grades on them.
It’s a tough enough gig even when it all works – no need to invent it all yourself or go it completely alone. Try stuff. Who knows what might happen?

And if you take a few risks and they turn out particularly well, I’ll even give you a sticker.

I have plenty left, believe me.

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All Or Nothing

November 9, 2017June 4, 2023 ~ Blue Cereal

It’s funny how badly we want things to be all one way or all the other. For such maddeningly complicated creatures, we seem wired to crave the binary.

Coffee is good for you, or it’s bad for you. You love her, or you don’t. I’m overweight because of genetics, or because I eat too much and don’t exercise enough. I’m an extrovert or an introvert. A patriot or a traitor. I can be trusted, or I can’t.

My success is my responsibility, entirely in my hands, or it’s the statistical result of a rigged system. I’m latently racist, or lavishly progressive. He’s handsome, he’s creepy; she’s hot, she’s not. I’m a good teacher, or a bad one. A success, or a failure. I’m full of wisdom, or I’m full of—

Well, you get the idea. (Or you don’t.)

I see it in my students all the—

Actually, correct that. I often, but not always, see elements of this in my students. Mixed with other factors, of course. Because nothing in real life is that absolute, whether we like it that way or not.

We’ve all had those kids who seem to believe in the core of their being that nothing is, was, or could ever be their responsibility to tiniest degree. They usually have parents who feel the same way, and who let us know regularly all the things we’re doing to thwart their lil’ Boo-Boo’s success.

He’s just acting out because he’s bored, you know. Because he’s SO SMART. He was tested as gifted when he was four. He needs someone with the proper training to meet his special-gifted-smartness needs.

I couldn’t do the assignment because I wasn’t here. You didn’t tell me. I didn’t understand. I had band. I had tryouts. I had to work. I don’t have internet. Our printer’s broken – I keep telling my dad we need a new one or I’ll flunk school, but that’s not my fault.

That’s binary. It’s declared victimization to the nth degree. The only thing surviving the constant barrage of injustice they so nobly endure is their outrage.

But honestly, I have far more little darlings on the other side. They don’t merely own their role in the whole learning-and-grades thing – they resist with holy fervor the suggestion that other factors might even play their own parts. And it’s far more prevalent when they’re struggling than when they’re succeeding.

They apologize for being tired – it’s just that sleep is a character flaw. Even protein is for students who don’t care about that biology test tomorrow. They didn’t ask for help earlier because they should have understood, if only they’d tried harder. They didn’t email because they didn’t want to bother me. They’ve never had trouble like this before – they used to be smart.

Last year.

Their grit is admirable, but lacks a certain… practicality essential to long-term survival. Their solutions tend to involve brute force – texting the essay a sentence at a time. Having a friend take pictures of every page in the chapter and snapchatting it to them. Moving into foster care in hopes of being accepted by a family with reliable internet. Redoing assignments in hopes of raising all those 88% and 93% grades to something respectable.

Far too often they end up thinking maybe they should drop this class.

OK – a few are just whiney. They’ve had it a bit too easy and now school’s getting hard and they’re crumbling. Suck it up, Boo-Boo! Put on your AP panties and get to learnin’!

But many are simply broken. Shattered. Not always from abuse at home or tragedies outside of school, although there’s more of that than any of us care to confront. Mostly, though, it’s just the full weight of “can’t” swinging on a long chain of “all-my-fault” BAM! right through their innermost sense of self.

It’s binary. Raised to take personal responsibility, they fear the least acknowledgment of factors outside their control – lest they find themselves “making excuses.” In not wanting to flake out, they take denial to the weirdest places – stuffing the resulting misery down into their little psyches for safe-hiding.

What they all need, of course, is balance. They’re rarely without the slightest trace of blame, but neither are they omnipotent beings who’ve simply chosen the path of ignorance and sloth. We’d like to help them learn to better manage their time, stay somewhat organized, and be a bit more practical when it comes to finding solutions.

And lest you think I’m coddling snowflakes here, kids feeling stressed out don’t process information or perform complex tasks very effectively. In other words, if we can’t help them find some balance – to become a little less binary – they won’t learn much.

Plus, they’re one thin veneer of civilization away from going all Lord of the Flies on you if you’re not careful…

My school is on trimesters, and this is the end of the first tri. I thought it might be nice to do a little review game, kinda dial back the intensity for a few days as they prepare for exams, but still reinforce some content. It was typical classroom stuff – I ask, they answer, teams get points, etc. I’ve done it for years with great success. If anything, I was worried it might be a bit funzy for an AP class. You know, too silly.

Then, I inadvertently released the Kraken.

I wasn’t being fair. Their team gets easy questions, while ours always gets the hard ones. Why are we doing this anyway? It doesn’t help. How are we supposed to remember all of this?! Can I just go work in the hall?! WHO CAME UP WITH THIS LIFE DESPAIR ANGER DARKFARGLE ACCUSING DEATHCRY!

It wasn’t everyone, and it didn’t spiral completely out of control. But boy, the angst did fly, in a variety of forms – complaints, frustration, helplessness, and some unexpectedly childish slapstick. I was… surprised. And mildly annoyed. What the everloving…?

Here’s the dirtiest of secrets about educators – it’s not how lazy we are, or that we really just want summers off. It’s not our incompetence or our hidden socio-political agendas or our secret need to have teenagers for friends.

It’s that any time we catch ourselves losing our patience with kids – tempers rising, clarity of thought fading, word choice becoming less and less ideal for the classroom – we’re immediately struck by an accompanying conviction that we’ve failed. We’ve blown it in Classroom Management 101. We’re annoyed with them, but from the deepest recesses of our internal pomp’n’circumstance comes the ululation that we’re supposed to be the teacher. It’s on us.

We misjudged the lesson. We screwed up the organization. We choked on difficult content. We let a 13-year old push our buttons. We got careless, or overly ambitious, or maybe we just suck at this but it’s too late for dental school.

It’s all my fault. I should have planned better. I should never have let them get so comfortable, or ridden them so hard, or changed direction, or kept things the same for so long. If only I’d spent more time… were more talented… just thought to…

You see the twisted little irony in play?

Most of us suspect deep down that every conceivable shortcoming of every child boils down to our failure to work the right miracles for those most resistant to our care. We rarely think of it in those precise terms – that would be insane, after all – but it runs through everything else we feel, think, say, or do.

Except when we don’t.

Because maybe it’s not us at all. Maybe it’s those darned kids. I’m busting my butt here, day in and day out, and they belittle my best efforts like that? I can’t help that they just won’t do the work. Horse-to-water, amiright?

I can’t control how badly they’re being raised. This is my classroom and I’ll run it how I think best. If they don’t like it, they can call up their representatives and ask for one of those vouchers they’re so hot’n’bothered over. It wasn’t like this back in my day. Someone really ought to do something about kids like this.

Binary. Just like our kids. We probably fight it a little harder; hopefully we’re at least aware of it a little more. Still, the gutters here at the Psychological Bowl are mighty generous while the actual lanes seem far too uneven and narrow.

Are there things you could be doing better? Probably. Is it worth examining your approach to classroom management? To lesson planning? To interactions with students? Absolutely. But is it all you?

Don’t be inane. Of course not.

But neither is it all them, and even if it were, it wouldn’t matter. We signed up to change the world one starry-eyed delusion at a time, and that means we do it whether it’s possible or not. Reality may be an inconvenience, but it will NOT be a permanent barrier.

All the more reason to stay aware of the lanes between the absolutes, even if we’re rarely quite sure exactly how much is us, or them, or the weather, or circumstances, or pedagogy, or…

*sigh*

They’re such maddeningly complicated creatures. Then again, so are we.

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Weird Silence

August 24, 2017June 4, 2023 ~ Blue Cereal

It’s funny the things that make us uncomfortable.

Not, like, in general. It’s not funny that snakes make me uncomfortable, or anyone messing with someone else’s eyeballs. Hair anywhere other than someone’s head. Dogs in the backs of moving pickup trucks. Those things should make anyone uncomfortable.

But it’s weird what can make us uncomfortable in our classrooms. One of them happened to me today.

It’s been a wild start. I wrote previously about trying to “hit the ground running,” which we did. Friday was all photos and orientations and policy manuals. Monday was a shortened schedule so kids could view the eclipse (yes, we used funny glasses). Tuesday was a “late start day” for meetings and then “Bonus Hour” in the afternoon and a special “close reading” activity and boy-howdy was I relieved when I realized we’d finally have THREE DAYS IN A ROW on the same schedule to finish out this week!

In the midst of the chaos, we’ve introduced “World History” and what it means to add “AP” to the beginning. I’ve crammed in a few lectures, some jigsaw reading, a pretty big discussion about foundational themes – all while trying to get to know my kids enough to be effective in a new subject in a new place in a new reality stream.

Yesterday, I introduced an assignment I knew might take them a while. See, at some point, if you’re going to learn history, you have to start learning some history.

I’ll let that sink in.

I love creative teaching strategies and movement and interaction, and yes, I let one class talk me into showing “The Mesopotamians” music video after they’d been particularly productive. But eventually one of two things has to happen if kids are going to learn world history. Either I’m going to need to tell them stuff they need to know about world history – probably with visuals projected on a big screen in some way – or they’re going to need to read stuff about world history – probably from a book or article I’ve provided.

It’s that latter option which led to the weird, uncomfortable thing.

See, we busted out our textbooks for the first time yesterday – but late in the hour, when they barely had time to admire the large, consistent subheadings and svelte incorporation of maps and graphs. Today, I gave them most of the hour to read through the chapter and figure out what parts seem important before beginning this nifty, artsy-fartsy assignment I chose mostly because I think it’s pedagogically sound at this point with these kids, but partly because I have a huge classroom with very bare walls and I think the results will look both academically impressive and decorative.

Judge me, baby – I will not apologize. *throws arms open and head back, waiting*

So after some introductory things and a recap of goals and expectations for the assignment, I sat down and… let them work. I had to start figuring out the online grade book and enter some assignments from earlier in the week. I’d also planned on looking over next week’s content when I realized…

It was silent in my room. Eerie creepy quiet, in the wrongest sort of way.

Thank god I’m a weathered veteran, or I might have bolted right then. Instead, I forced myself to maintain a detached, pseudo-disinterested facade as I casually surveyed the situation.

My ears eventually picked up the subtle scribbling of little mechanical pencils, and the periodic turning of pages. After what must have been seventeen or eighteen hours, a young lady leaned over to her tablemate and pointed to something in the text, whispering an apparent inquiry. Her cohort considered whatever she’d said, then nodded and gave a brief response which seemed to satisfy her. They both then continued doing this… this… horrifying “old way” schoolness.

I considered clarifying that it was OK for them to work together, including actual speech if necessary, but I knew they already knew that. And they were collaborating, at least here and there. So instead I took a casual stroll around the room, answering a few questions of the sort apparently important enough to ask when I pass into their “inquiry zone,” but which hadn’t merited a trip all the way to my desk or the labor of raising an entire hand.

It seemed they were all on task. Some were more productive than others, of course, but they were by and large playing school. So I did something crazy.

I sat down and entered some grades, then started reading up on the Classical Period of China in Chapter Three.

And that was perfectly OK. Productive, even.

The weird part is that for several minutes, this made me feel guilty. I was afraid someone might walk by and see what was happening and judge me – a fear having nothing to do with my very supportive and sensible co-workers and everything to do with reading too many education books and blogs.

If you’ve taught for any length of time, you’ve endured endless PD days, videos, handouts, faculty presentations, and perhaps even a horrible skit or two, built around three basic assumptions: (a) all teachers used to suck in every possible way, providing endless “before” examples, (b) most current teachers have no idea how to work with young people and probably don’t even like them very much, usually because of our cultural insensitivity, and (c) if we don’t embrace {insert trendy strategy here}, we’ll continue to suck and most likely destroy the future.

It’s much more pronounced on social media. The blogs, the chats, the #irritweeting platitudes. Somehow, the worst offenders seem to always have 28.6K followers and a new book you should buy.

“Classrooms don’t have to be quiet all of the time. If I come to your room and it’s loud, I won’t scold you – I’ll congratulate you!”
“We need to be the guide on the side, not the sage on the stage!”
“Whoever’s doing all the work is doing all the learning. If you exert the least bit of effort in preparing or implementing a lesson, you’re stuck in the Dark Ages of mimeograph machines and overhead projectors!”

Ironically, there are some pretty hard and fast doctrines generally accompanying these “revolutionary” ideas. Kids should be in charge of everything related to their education – content, methodology, evaluation, location, etc. – from about age four through their first Master’s Degree. Teachers who lecture or use Powerpoint in any context or for any purpose are the Devil’s Pedagogues. “Relationships” are more important than content or structure or pedagogy or pedigree, reading or writing or math – after all, they don’t care how much you know until you stop lighting stuff on fire in buckets and embrace starfish as they learn grit by celebrating failure, thus leaving two sets of footprints in the sand.

Honestly, it may be rooted in good intentions, but it gets a bit judgey. Most religions do when they stray from their central purpose.

So I’d like to assure all of the baby teachers out there, and remind some of the veterans, that all instructional and classroom management advice – the pedagogy, the brain research, the anecdotes, the activities – are (or should be) about giving you ideas. Options. Tools. Challenging you, or inspiring you. Maybe shaking you up or forcing you to question how you do things from time to time.

They’re not divine revelations. Flipped classrooms are a cool idea that work for many teachers in many circumstances; they’re not carved into stone tablets that Moses posted online for the Israelites to view as many times as necessary at home and ask questions about during the assembling of the people. Close reading strategies are good for many kids in many situations, and most of us could stand to be a bit more intentional about stuff like this, but they’re not silver bullets, no matter what that sample class from New Jersey did in that video. Even Socratic Circles or Inquiry-Based Anything sometimes work and sometimes don’t – that’s what keeps teaching interesting.

If you’re boring the crap out of your kids with droning lectures, then stop. If you’re ossifying their little brains with book work and worksheets, then you really do suck – you’re the guy in those horrible anecdotes they use to justify torturing the rest of us. And if you don’t actually like your kids… dude – go sell shoes or something. Less stress, more money.

Question your methods, absolutely. Challenge your perceived results. Be transparent with your co-workers in considering ways to be more effective. Don’t be insecure and stuck in the mythical, dark “ancient ways.”

But if you’re doing your best to figure out what works for you and your kids, and that involves a lecture or two, then you go, girl. If you require kids to occasionally sit down and crunch some content, do so without shame or apologies. You may even sporadically find use in multiple choice quizzes or a *gasp* movie or two.

“Old school” is not a synonym for “failure.” Neither is “direct instruction,” “hard deadlines,” or “quantitative assessment.” Progress is doing what works for your kids in your classroom in your reality. If you’re doing that, you don’t owe anyone an apology and have no need to make excuses. Buy that teacher book because it motivates you; not because it shames you. You’re already awesome, and many of you are working miracles in a fallen, stupid world. For totes realsies. Thank God you’re doing what you do, every day, so damn well.

Even if your classroom is, you know… occasionally a bit too quiet.

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Seven Reasons You Probably Don’t Suck (For Teachers)

March 19, 2017June 4, 2023 ~ Blue Cereal ~ 3 Comments

Well, it’s that time of year. Spring Break has passed – the last landmark of rebootage and rejuvenation.

Many of us are returning without much idea what we’ll be doing in class this week. Maybe you feel behind again, and have big plans for getting things ‘back on track.’ Or maybe all that stuff you were gonna do better this year has already kinda fizzled, and you’re just hanging on until term ends. Some of you are excited about seeing your kids again – which is weird. Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy for you… but it’s still seriously weird.

So maybe you’re optimistic, or maybe you’re sad break is over, or maybe…

Maybe you don’t actually know anymore. Maybe you had the best intentions ever, but when it’s quiet and you’re alone, you wonder…

Oh god, do I suck at this? Maybe I’m not cut out to be a teacher. I mean, I like it sometimes… often, really. I just thought I’d be better at it. It’s like I can’t quite… they just aren’t… I wish… *sigh*.

I get it. Whatever variation taunts you, I hear you. I don’t really do nurturing or warm fuzzies, but I am a fan of reality – so let’s be candid for a moment, shall we?

You don’t suck at this teaching thing.

I mean, it’s possible, I suppose. Some teachers do. But most of the ones who DO suck don’t realize or care that they suck. They certainly don’t read education blogs hoping for insight or inspiration. So it’s very, very unlikely that you suck.

Statistics say, in fact, that you’re probably pretty good. Once you control for poverty and upbringing and factors well-beyond your control, the reality is that most American public school teachers are at least adequate, and many are quite impressive much of the time. If this is your first year, you’re probably not as good as you will be in two more; if this is your twentieth, it’s possible you’ve lost some of the passion of your first fifteen. But overall, I suspect you’re a miracle worker every day and simply don’t see it.

Ridiculous – you’d know if you were any good, right? You’d feel it. You’d… you’d be happier, wouldn’t you?

Maybe. But not necessarily. I’d like to respectfully suggest seven reasons good teachers feel like failures – especially this time of year. Feel free to add your own thoughts below.

1. Your elected leaders despise you.

If you live in Oklahoma, or somewhere similarly enraptured by Social Darwinism and state-subsidized elitism, you’ve already endured years of passive-aggressive chipping away at all you hold dear. Teachers are lazy. Teachers aren’t accountable. Schools are failing. Kids are trapped. Public education is wasteful. It’s atheistic and immoral and corrupting and Socialist. Teachers are incompetent pedophiles and whiney welfare queens.

It’s tiring. You tell yourself it’s just politics, but over time it leaves you feeling a bit marginalized. That’s not you, honey – that’s them.

2. Your values are under assault.

Those principalities and powers don’t just target you, of course. They despise your students for being different colors, coming from different cultures, speaking different languages, having different faiths, or sexualities, or even just different interests and abilities. You decide every day to treat your kids as if their value is innate. You carry on as if all of them deserve opportunity, challenge, enlightenment, and basic dignity – no matter how straight, white, boring, or Protestant you yourself may be. That makes you a problem.

Statistically, the folks next door probably voted against you and your kids. So did most of the people in your small group at church. Most of your students’ parents voted against you and the skills and the knowledge you’re trying to instill in their child so they can function in a diverse and challenging world. It offsets a whole lotta Starbucks gift cards if you let yourself think about it too long.

These are tough times to be a believer in public education. Or the equal value of all men. Or common decency.

But here’s the thing, sweets – the majority is wrong. They’ve let fear and resentment trump the better angels of their nature. Like their forebears a century-and-a-half ago, they think they’ll find strength and clarity in pulling away from what America can and should be. They’ve idealized a past that never existed for most, and at the moment they’re twisting and blaming and striking and rationalizing while you stand there stuck on all-men-are-created-equal and the-pursuit-of-individual-happiness and such. It sets up a glaring national cognitive dissonance, and they resent you for it.

The majority may find their way back, or they may not, but their blindness and thinly-veiled desperation doesn’t make you a bad person or a bad teacher. It makes you a holdout – a rebel, even. It makes you Neville Longbottom, Mal Reynolds, or Piggy insisting on holding the conch shell. It makes you a bringer of light in a fallen world.

They are not the arbiters of suck, I assure you.

3. Kids can be a pain in the @$$.

We’re so often our students’ primary defenders that it leaves us little opportunity to express legitimate frustrations with the little turds when they’re being idiots.

Of course I love my kids and of course I’ll fight for their right to exist and flourish in this murky world. That doesn’t mean they don’t wear me out. That doesn’t mean they’re not complete dillweeds from time to time.

And yet…

18% failed their common assessment; what can YOU do differently? Absenteeism is up; what can YOU do better? Some demographics are being disciplined out of proportion to others; what are YOU doing wrong? How can YOU reach more kids? How can YOU solve more problems? How can YOU meet more needs? What are YOU doing to modernize or personalize or gamify your curriculum? Why did YOU give little Bobo that ‘F’? How can YOU get more parents involved? What are YOU doing about global warming? Nuclear disarmament? World hunger? Transgender issues? That one computer mouse that keeps getting stuck? WHY HAVEN’T YOU FIXED IT ALL YET?!?!

Sometimes your kids suck. Sometimes their parents suck. Sometimes your administration sucks, your state sucks, or the universe sucks, and it makes your day suck.

Obviously, once we’ve acknowledged the things that are OUT of our control, we have a professional and ethical responsibility to consider everything IN our control we could try differently. It’s never OK to just blame the kid, or the parent, or the system, and call it a day.

But that’s different than taking it all on yourself as your fault and your responsibility. If you’re doing all you can reasonably do, then you don’t suck, whatever the outcome.

4. School is stupid.

The setup under which most of us work is antiquated and not at all conducive to individualized learning or going above and beyond pedagogically. Most of you receive students in blocks of time throughout the day with limited resources and no control over who is or isn’t in which clump or what their individual priorities or interests might be.

You keep finding ways to make it work. You keep finding ways to reach as many as you can. When you can’t, it’s not because you suck – it’s because the system simply isn’t set up in a way that benefits most kids individually – it’s set up in the cheapest way possible that still kinda teaches kids in bulk.

5. No one understands what you actually do.

Single people think they know how marriage should work, but they don’t. They can’t; it’s just not possible. And just because I’m married doesn’t mean I understand your marriage. There are too many variables. Too many factors.

People without kids often think they know how they’d handle this or that child in whatever situation, but they don’t. Spawn rarely work the way you think they should, and you can’t return them, so you’re stuck. Being a parent doesn’t make me an expert on your family dynamics or how to best raise your kids; I’m sure you’d have been at a loss what to do with mine.

Teaching is the same way. Everyone thinks they know how it works, or what it’s like, and they don’t. Even other teachers are quick to project their experiences as the universal guide to what everyone else is doing wrong. You can end up feeling very alone if you’re not careful.

6. Teacher Movies.

Movies are pretend. Idealized versions of one slice of reality. Those based on real people are particularly dangerous, as they tend to leave out how badly those folks’ lives crashed and burned as a result of doing whatever it was that made them interesting enough to be in the movies.

Be inspired by pretend teachers all you like, but don’t judge yourself by them. They’re not real. You are, thankfully.

7. Maybe you do actually suck.

I know, I know – I said earlier that you didn’t. But maybe you’ve started to recently. Maybe you’ve gotten tired or frustrated or lazy due to any or all of the things listed above, or any number of other reasons. It happens.

But you don’t have to suck – not going forward. You’ve had the training, you have (or had) the ideals, you know kinda how it’s supposed to work. So fix it. Try something different. Consult trustworthy peers in your building and ask what’s working for them. Find that administrator who’s not a jerk and let them know you’re looking for ways to improve – they LOVE that stuff.

If you’re not going to get better, then get out – go get a real job. It’s not like this one is going to make you rich and fulfilled anytime soon. But if there’s still a spark… well, at the risk of being hokey, these kids need you. Society needs you. The educators around you could probably use a boost as well.

You’re doing the Lord’s work, friend – literally, if that’s your thing, or colloquially if it’s not. Either way, truth has a certain ‘setting people free’ element which is in short supply recently. Knowledge is power, and skills are potential, and you can matter so much if you only decide to.

Lots of things suck about this fallen world, but you don’t have to. And you probably don’t.

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