It's been too long.

Looking over the last month of teaching is at once infuriating and illuminating and even inspiring.

I just finished a meeting with a student who has yet to turn in a big essay assignment that was due two Sundays ago. He's a smart kid, a bit of a troublemaker but often a good contributor in class, and he has huge problems getting work done, not just for my class but for several others. Two things happened during our meeting that struck me:

1. We had finished discussing the overdue essay and were now talking about this weekend's writing assignment, because he has to finish (and start) that one as well. It's supposed to be a little essay where you create an ethical dilemma, and use your response to that dilemma as a springboard to discuss your own personal ethics. We were talking about his ideas of where right and wrong came from, and all of a sudden he described an experience this week in which he was disciplined for an incident in the dorms. He opted to tell the truth despite knowing he'd be punished (a deontologist if I've ever seen one). This, we decided, would form the basis of his ethical dilemma, and of his personal ethical principle. I was pretty surprised that he was so honest with me about his experience, and a little proud of myself to hear that he'd considered our class discussions on teleology and deontology in this disciplinary situation.

2. Looking back at the handouts and assignments I've given thus far, it is abundantly clear to me that I had (and still have) essentially no idea what I'm doing. Things that made sense at the time, or that I chose because I didn't know what else to do, are now so transparently useless that I can't imagine I ever thought they would work. I sometimes pity this first semester of students because of how little their teacher understands about this job; I feel so much more competent than I did a month ago, but it's very clear that I am not even close to actually knowing the best ways to plan, to structure, to grade, to teach.

This is the inspiring part, though, because it really is exciting to think about how much better the second semester can (and hopefully will) be. If I actually take the mistakes I've made so far and do something with them, I can make my class that much stronger and get that much out of it. Today I observed our dean of faculty teach a class about the Parthenon for AP Art History - he put so much STUFF into 45 minutes and the kids were latching on to every second of it. There was so much energy and so much momentum, but also so much purpose and focus, and also so much spirit and enthusiasm and everyone was having FUN which is the crazy part. That's what I want my classes to be like, and the only way to get closer is to keep doing it. And to keep evaluating, and rethinking, and observing.

Which, I suppose, is why I haven't had the time to update my blog.

I'm on duty this weekend, so I'll be spending lots of time with the kids as a chaperone and generally responsible person. There might be enough time to check in again; I just got pumped up by that unexpectedly interesting meeting with my delinquent student and wanted to get some thoughts out.

Glee Club's going really well; we sang in three parts on Tuesday which I don't think any of these kids had ever done before. Yes, a nonsequitur, but I figured I should say something about it. That was an amazing rehearsal. Teaching is an amazing job. Amazing and really, really hard a lot of the time. But don't we all need more challenges in our lives?

Firsts

I guess it's been a while. Since school started in earnest, the weeks have been going by faster, although each Thursday I look back to the beginning of the week and it feels like a million years ago. But I've been keeping very busy during the week, and now, with our three-day weekend in its final afternoon, it's time to reflect a little. Mostly this is a break from lesson planning, and a reward (?) for having graded 32 quizzes (more on that later), and also I took some pictures I want to share. Also there are these guys hanging pictures in my apartment, because we can't hang them ourselves because the walls are made of concrete and I left my power drill at home, and this is a way for me to kind of ignore them while still making sure they don't mess things up too badly.

I titled this one "Firsts" because that's what this past week was. Though it was technically the second full week of school, it was the first with a full schedule including cocurriculars and other such meetings. And in my efforts to keep myself busy and learning things, here were some firsts from this week:

- First yoga class of my life (and second, and third). This semester, I don't have to lead a cocurricular (that is, an after-school activity that meets Sunday, Monday, and Wednesday) because they want me to spend time getting the Glee Club up and running. But I'm not going to spend 75 minutes every day just sitting and thinking about the Glee Club, so instead I'm using those three days a week to sit in on yoga classes. The instructor, a math and bio teacher named Maria, is very experienced and a great leader, and I've really enjoyed learning all the positions and breathing techniques (plus it feels like an extra workout). It's just me, Maria and her co-instructor Alli, and about a dozen female students, but no one really seems to mind that I'm the only boy. So I've been having a good time and will probably keep it up, though maybe other cocurriculars await this season (tennis? Model UN? who knows...).

Too much text! Here is a picture of knafe, also known as Jordan's gift to cuisine (besides hummus).

I know it's hard to imagine, but you have to trust me. There is absolutely nothing like it. OK more things.

- First Glee Club meeting! Weeks of waiting built to a fever pitch as 45-ish aspiring singers gathered in the Gallery for the first-ever meeting of the King's Academy Glee Club. And it was fun! We watched videos of singing, filled out forms, talked about how there are a lot of them so they have to be quiet (this happened several times), and even did a tiny bit of warming up. They are SO enthusiastic, and (so far) willing to cooperate, and they didn't sound half bad when we sang a little. Soon enough we'll start with actual repertoire, but for this coming week it's just going to be warmups and rounds to get them used to the whole singing experience. It's also incredibly helpful to have three other teachers with me, which I do; they were instrumental* in keeping the kids in line and asking for explanations when I forgot that the students have no idea what a "repertoire" is.

More to come with that once we really get started. Right now the repertoire is looking like it'll be "Fields of Gold," "Do You Hear the People Sing," and "Titanium" (I picked the first two under pressure from the arts department to "introduce the kids to something new," and they voted on that last one which I'll arrange). We're off to a good start though, and I'm looking forward to singing more this week.

More pictures! These from my first soccer game, Jordan v. Uzbekistan in a World Cup qualifier. It ended with a 1-1 tie, but then Jordan won the subsequent game in a penalty shootout, so we're playing Uruguay! And if we win, we go to Brazil next summer! (Look at me using "we" already). Winning is highly unlikely, but not impossible, and we very well may go to the Uruguay game in November. So here's the stadium:

And here's me with face paint (just 1JD!) and fellow teaching fellow Chase, enthusiastic spectators:

Anyway.

- First Arabic class. The Arabic class for teachers meets once a week, which doesn't seem like nearly enough to learn a language about which I know absolutely nothing. So INSTEAD I've been going to class with the preppy Americans! King's has a program called Arabic Year for high schoolers to spend a year (or more) in Jordan, and they know as little Arabic as I do. So I've been going, two periods a day, and it's been great so far. I feel like I can practically read the alphabet, which was my September goal, and I'm veeeeeery slooooowly picking up vocabulary. But it's felt good to be busy (without these two periods, it's an hour and half to putz around in between Philosophy classes) and I feel like the class is productive. So maybe I'll know some Arabic at the end of this year!

School has been good. Last week was sort of a jumble, planning-wise, and ended with a quiz on Plato and Aristotle that was WAYYYY too easy, but I've learned a lot about how to structure such things for the future, so it doesn't feel like a total waste of a week. We start ethics tomorrow, which I think the kids will really like, and they're also handing in their first essays tonight (just 6.5 hours to go!) which should be a thrill. Grading is definitely the worst part of teaching so far. It just takes so long.

But I'm done with that for the weekend! So all I have to do is shore up my plans for the week, which are coming along nicely, and sing some songs with another teacher who plays piano, and go eat all-you-can-eat sushi tonight. For now, I think it's TV time. Thanks for reading.

Ben

 *I used this word because I believe that it is an appropriate word. I did not want to put a little "(haha)" or a "no pun intended" right up there, but I also didn't want you to think I hadn't noticed, so here's this sentence to prove to you that I did notice. 

The First Observation

Two nights ago I had class on the brain, even more than usual. I had given my students an excerpt from Plato's Euthyphro to read, which (I will freely admit) practically stumped me the summer before college, and then watched as their writing assignments from the previous day flowed in. Many of them were terrible. I was very concerned. I was convinced that I would walk in the following day, yesterday, to classes with no idea what had happened in the reading, and no interest at all in figuring out some boring text from thousands of years ago. As I lay in bed, I actually started thinking about whether there were any careers besides teaching that I might be cut out for, because this suddenly seemed to be going down the drain. I steeled myself for the worst, and decided I would stay positive regardless of my students' reactions.

Yesterday was also the day I was to be observed for the first time. The dean of faculty is something of an icon here, beloved by students in his AP Art History class and respected by fellow teachers as a font of near-infinite wisdom. He's been instrumental in helping us feel comfortable these first few weeks, and he wasted no time seeing us in action. Frankly, I was excited that he'd be watching what I feared would be my worst class yet; that way, he'd have more advice to give.

So I was a little surprised that things actually went well in the first class. They absolutely got the reading, or at least some of them got some of it, and we got through our analysis of it faster than I'd even expected. I was pretty glad I've been having them ask questions about each reading, because it's a great way to spend class time if you end up with 10 extra minutes (which we did). All in all, though, it was a big confidence boost for the second class, which was the one with the observation. They're usually a little slower on the uptake, largely because they're younger (mostly sophomores), so I tried to take what I'd done for the first group and tweak it for a slightly less receptive audience. It worked well enough: they were engaged with the material (and even seemed to get it, sort of!) and I managed to get through the whole 45 minutes without letting the presence of another adult throw me off. 

And he seemed happy with how things went! We're having a longer meeting today to talk things through, but he offered some very complimentary thoughts immediately after class, which was a confidence boost through the whole day. No matter what happens with my future in teaching, I think I'll remember yesterday for that turnaround: to wake up thinking it might be all over and go to sleep having heard that I'm off to a good start was a quantum leap for one day's work. It was awfully nice to hear; now I hope I don't get lazy for future classes.

Taught first period today and now I'm done for the day; just meetings to go, plus a little performance at our first Open Mic Night (our faculty a cappella group is making its debut!). Time to take a moment to relax.