Teaching

Photo by Lida Rose

As my juniors last year graduate from Greenwood this week, I've been pondering my own growth as a teacher. It's a strange and wonderful career I've chosen and in my two short years I feel like I've done it all. I've worked with little kids, adults, teenagers, college kids... everyone. I've given hour-long lectures, taught 40-minute classes, have one-lesson weeks now, did twenty lesson weeks last year. I've created my own courses from scratch, worked out of a book, and given one-to-one's in principals offices to explain how an American school board works. What have I learned?

Forgive. The most important thing is to never get angry with a class. It's pointless and you'll lose every time. Chances are if they're misbehaving, you've gone over their heads or your simply boring them. Never hold a grudge. Never expect the bad student (or class) from last week to be a problem this week. Allow them to redeem and redefine themselves. Reward instead of punish. Do this not only for your own sanity, but for the example you - as teacher - are supposed to set as a model behavior. Forgiveness isn't about accepting apologies. It's about moving on.

Entertain. That is, after all, why most students and parents think you're there. Let your personality fill the room and be the sole object of attention. You're competing against a lot of things. Flying paper balls, notes, books, and cute crushes have an advantage. Steal and co-opt them.

Think on their level. I once heard someone say, of teaching kids, that if you ever stop thinking like one, even for a moment, you've lost them. It's absolutely true. If your teaching businessmen, be prompt and efficient in your teaching. If you're teaching little kids, sing songs and be a ninja from time to time. Match the pre-existing vibe of the class and everyone wins.

Review. You'll be floored by how much they forgot. Make it as fun as possible though.

Meaning. Make sure they understand and believe that what they're doing means something and in some way will help them in a tangible way. Make them feel privy to some sort of inside information that others aren't getting. It works as well with history as it does with English.

Book Review: The Rum Diary

I’m glad I finished it because I almost didn’t. It didn’t demand my attention the way other Hunter S. Thompson books have done, but on the other hand the subject matter was a bit richer than I gave it credit for while reading it. The storyline, without much deviation and outlined in the first ten pages, follows a fictional Thompson to Puerto Rico to work for a dysfunctional newspaper with a horrible crew. It’s not meant to be a humorous setup and it’s not about workplace antics or cartooned bad employees. It describes, in one way or another, almost every workplace I’ve been in. It talks about being just a suckerfish in society, “trying to find the shark with the biggest stomach and smallest mouth” and never really being anything but that. It talks about “The Fear”, the fear that back home there’s just nothing for you. The same Fear that catapults clueless Puerto Ricans to New York City and drunkard writers to San Juan.

The story is mellow and plot twists expected. You can see why it took almost 40 years to be published. But I liked it. In the end, I couldn’t help but making two comparisons. First, who was I in that story of trying to find luck in a foreign land? Though I didn’t strongly identify with any one character, I think I fit the editor/manager archetype - the only one who takes the gig seriously, one of the few actually concerned about the future of the company and willing to put the time, heart, and money into making it something bigger and better despite the odds. What I wasn’t, in any case, were the free-willing shiftless drunks personified and maybe a little glorified by Thompson and the other main characters - running from The Fear further and further, paycheck to paycheck, one mediocre workplace to another, and drink to drink. In the end, the only thing that separated Thompson from the rest of the pack was his razor-sharp wit matched with a rock star charisma and attitude that sold a lot of Rolling Stones back in the day.

The second comparison, or question, I kept running through my head was why Thompson wasn’t part of the Beat Generation – that clique of pre-hippy bohemian artsy types that dominated the counter-culture scene of the 50’s, when Thompson was in his 20’s and getting his start as a writer. The simple answer, I think, is that by that time Thompson wasn’t part of any counter-culture. He wasn’t trying to create an alternate definition of morals or aesthetics. Though disgruntled, he was mostly dealt with those sentiments alone and not part of some bigger picture of collective discontent. He was just an intelligent drunk. He was still trying to fit into American society. He was still trying to sucker up to the man, in his own words, and get his fair share. He was still trying to find his place and despite his pessimism hadn’t fully given up hope that there was room for people like him in the big picture.

Perhaps that’s why I like Thompson a bit more than the Beatnik-types. He finally managed to force his own style into the system and actually made a lasting contribution to journalism. He worked inside the system as much as he could – preferring to submit “The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved” to mainstream magazines and later writing for Rolling Stone – instead of writing in the ‘zines of the day, like Northern Lights out of San Francisco. In the end, he won, and I like that.