Sweeping up the Year

At the close of another school year, I am thankful for many blessings. I look back at this same time a year ago and remember that the stress of the year continued through the whole month of June. This year went so much more smoothly. Maybe this fall I'll feel like I'm not a first year teacher, for once!

How many years has it been? One-and-a-half teaching K-4 at a Christian school, then two years subbing, two years as an aide, two years teaching K at a public school; and now I have under my belt two years teaching 7-12 English at an outstanding charter school in Gooding, Idaho. Am I the real deal yet?

While everyone else was either barbecuing with the family or laying flowers on graves for Memorial Day, I went back to my classroom yesterday to sweep up. There were several end-of-the-year check-out documents I needed to finish, too. Turns out there's no better time for year-end reflection than when you're the only one in the building and you have a broom in hand.

Broken-off pencil erasers, a pen cap, scraps of writing assignments, a bent straight pin and bits of thread from my advisory class's sewing project--the year in sum. Like the room's detritus, my thoughts were flung across the floor to be meaningfully gathered: How could two classes excel in reading yet fare so poorly on their standardized language arts tests? Would this or that student return next year? What if I combined the 7th and 8th grades in my online assignment posts? And, not the least of my worries, could I leave the building in only two trips now that I had found yet another pair of pumps under my desk?

One of my credos is continuity. I will be a better teacher the longer I stay in one place. The longer we stay on one schedule. The longer I teach the same curriculum. Robert Stofel says in his book Survival Notes for Graduates: Inspiration for the Ultimate Journey, "Rats can go out of their minds. The way to induce psychosis is to keep changing the rules. Set up a maze. At the end, place a grain feeder to reward the rat. After a few good runs, change it up. Instead of giving the rat grain, shock him. Do it a few times, then change back to grain. The switching back and forth will drive the rat mad."

I am thankful for some continuity in my teaching life as I transition from one year to the next. Yet I suppose I "change the maze" on my students a lot. "Put the header on the left. No, the right." What could be more frustrating? I file this thought under "To do better next year." I guess for teachers, New Year's resolution time falls on Memorial Day.