I have struggled today and it is evident tonight. It is almost midnight and I feel so sick. I've made myself sick with worry and anger and disappointment and humiliation and sadness. [Might want to Google "How to make Eggnog" right now...]
I truly, truly love teaching....but today was one of those days that makes you think that being pecked to death, slowly, by chickens must be similar to teaching middle schoolers. [Seriously]
Yet, I know that most of them are functioning on hormone highs and their brains are NOT working. [Seriously, there is research on the brain that says children at this age actually show regression in brain cells - as if we needed to pay some fancy, smancy researcher to know that. Spend a day with one of them - it is OBVIOUS.] So I should use my entire brain [Yes, I have one] to make decisions to:
A. Overlook some things
B. Choose my battles carefully [Not everything is worth making a huge deal out of]
C. Smile and say things like, "Honey I love you...even when you are mean and nasty to me" or "I don't understand why you are doing this but I'm willing to work with you to make it better for you." [Some of you have done some MAJOR eye rolling - You'll get over it.]
D. Love my job and the 100 reasons [aka students] that keep me teaching.
Sometimes it takes a step back and some deep thinking to get a better perspective. It's not worth being sick or sad or frustrated - there are too many good things about teaching middle schoolers like:
A. They will laugh at lame jokes [most of the time]
B. They love to listen to stories [and they will ask me to tell them if it means they don't have to work...and I gladly oblige them]
C. They do some crazy things that make me look WAY normal [and I laugh at them too]
D. They listen to my iPod with few complaints [I even challenged them a few times to guess the artists...of course I picked songs that I knew they wouldn't know...I didn't have the five dollars I bet them!!!]
E. Rarely do they let you forget when you owe them a treat [They won't bring a pencil for 6 straight days but they will remember you said you'd half a half of piece of gum with them - bizarre]
F. Some of the things they say and do in the hall give me tons of stuff to laugh about
G. They are "stuck" in the middle....someone needs to LOVE them :)
With all that being said, tomorrow will be a better day. Someone shared this with me yesterday and it is so appropriate for today.
James 1:2-3 ~ Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.
It's all about faith. Faith in my ability to be the teacher that not only imparts knowledge [Impressive I know] but the teacher that loves them [even when they are not being loveable material]. Faith that they will take the knowledge that I share and use it in a way that helps them learn. Faith that I can lead them to make wise decisions by the example I set. Faith that no matter what, in the good and bad times, that there is a reason why God put me in the classroom.
I am not perfect...that was evident today. I will fail [miserabely it seems here lately] and I will make bad decisions and I will be unloveable too. My prayers came fast and were many today. I read this verse and I know that I, like James, should consider all of today's events pure joy.
Tomorrow [well, today since it's 12:27am] will be a good day.
I truly, truly love teaching....but today was one of those days that makes you think that being pecked to death, slowly, by chickens must be similar to teaching middle schoolers. [Seriously]
Yet, I know that most of them are functioning on hormone highs and their brains are NOT working. [Seriously, there is research on the brain that says children at this age actually show regression in brain cells - as if we needed to pay some fancy, smancy researcher to know that. Spend a day with one of them - it is OBVIOUS.] So I should use my entire brain [Yes, I have one] to make decisions to:
A. Overlook some things
B. Choose my battles carefully [Not everything is worth making a huge deal out of]
C. Smile and say things like, "Honey I love you...even when you are mean and nasty to me" or "I don't understand why you are doing this but I'm willing to work with you to make it better for you." [Some of you have done some MAJOR eye rolling - You'll get over it.]
D. Love my job and the 100 reasons [aka students] that keep me teaching.
Sometimes it takes a step back and some deep thinking to get a better perspective. It's not worth being sick or sad or frustrated - there are too many good things about teaching middle schoolers like:
A. They will laugh at lame jokes [most of the time]
B. They love to listen to stories [and they will ask me to tell them if it means they don't have to work...and I gladly oblige them]
C. They do some crazy things that make me look WAY normal [and I laugh at them too]
D. They listen to my iPod with few complaints [I even challenged them a few times to guess the artists...of course I picked songs that I knew they wouldn't know...I didn't have the five dollars I bet them!!!]
E. Rarely do they let you forget when you owe them a treat [They won't bring a pencil for 6 straight days but they will remember you said you'd half a half of piece of gum with them - bizarre]
F. Some of the things they say and do in the hall give me tons of stuff to laugh about
G. They are "stuck" in the middle....someone needs to LOVE them :)
With all that being said, tomorrow will be a better day. Someone shared this with me yesterday and it is so appropriate for today.
James 1:2-3 ~ Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.
It's all about faith. Faith in my ability to be the teacher that not only imparts knowledge [Impressive I know] but the teacher that loves them [even when they are not being loveable material]. Faith that they will take the knowledge that I share and use it in a way that helps them learn. Faith that I can lead them to make wise decisions by the example I set. Faith that no matter what, in the good and bad times, that there is a reason why God put me in the classroom.
I am not perfect...that was evident today. I will fail [miserabely it seems here lately] and I will make bad decisions and I will be unloveable too. My prayers came fast and were many today. I read this verse and I know that I, like James, should consider all of today's events pure joy.
Tomorrow [well, today since it's 12:27am] will be a good day.
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