Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Ups and Downs of Teaching

You wear many hats as a teacher; teacher, mentor, parent, sounding board, shoulder to cry on, counselor, friend, confidant, inspiration-leader, etc.  But being a teacher also feels like you have multiple personalities.  The different feelings you go through within an hour is unimaginable.  One minute things are amazing and within a second something makes you snap and you get angry... or frustrated... or sad.... or dumbstruck,... or tired... or loopy.  It's enough to make a person go crazy.  It's why teachers need happy hours; many of them. 

Today, during morning meeting, I experienced the "multiple personality disorder" in probably one of my favorite ways possible. 

The students were going around talking about their long weekend away from school due to two teacher work days.  As I was listening to their very similar stories, I became really sad and heartbroken about their home lives. 

...our electricity went out...
...we were starving but we didn't have any food to eat...
...we had to walk to the store because our car is broken and we don't have money to fix it...
...I had to sleep with my brother because there are cockroaches in my bedroom...

I can't even begin to imagine what they go through. 

And at the moment my heart couldn't break anymore and the tears were about to start flowing,  my favorite little student, J, jumped out of his criss-crossed sitting position on the floor and farted SO LOUD.  I kid you not, J literally fart-rocketed right.off.the.ground.  And then he plopped right back down on the ground and was completely shocked at what had just happened.  It was the best thing I'd seen all year long.  And it made me so happy inside.  Now, because one of my wishes was to stop laughing at this in front of my students, I did my VERY best to not crack a smile or laugh.  And I did just that. 

But I was DYING on the inside.

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