Tag: teaching

Closing time

Doo do-doo do-doo-doo…

Well, this is the final week of my current assignment. My home and my life these past few months has been this school and its students and mission. I am not so sure I can keep it together the rest of the week. Just practicing the song I will sing for them in each of their last classes with me, I was struggling not to bawl this evening… In one class in particular, I don’t know if I will be able to keep it together enough even to sing the song, let alone sing it well. (And I do believe that I usually sing it well.) In that class, I feel so full, my life feels meant for these kids – they make me want to buckle down and prepare the greatest and most wonderful curriculum possible for them for the rest of the year, that particular class. If I allow myself to be fully present to my emotions when we are saying goodbye Friday, I certainly will cry.

What’s more, it is likely I will be in tears for all the classes, anyway, saying goodbye to them – I love these kids so dearly. And I have never experienced wanting to stay with my students like this before now. Every time I left a school, while I was bummed, I was quite looking forward to an easier schedule and less intense work for myself. This time, however, is very, very different. I want to be a part of this school. I want to be with these kids and support them directly going forward.

I’m just not sure yet how that will look. 😉

Thank you, God and Universe, for this blessing.

Amen

Post-a-day 2021

Stressful rest times

The weekend has only just begun, and I’m already greatly stressed, and I have been so for several hours. Having loads of activities over the weekend, when I have work all week long both beforehand and afterward, is just exhausting and stressful for me. Plus, next week is my last week, and there’s much I have to do to make that happen successfully. And the main teacher reached out in a way that felt not very respectful – not disrespectful per se, but not respectful either – this week, disregarded what I offered for times to meet, and so is coming to school in the middle of the day one day, when I already will be swimming with work I still must complete… I am not delighted about it, and am rather stressed about it. Ugh…

God, please help me to experience the rest I need tonight and this weekend, and help me o have a lovely time in all of my activities throughout the next eight days especially. Thank you for this life. Stay with me and guide me, please. Amen.

Post-a-day 2021

Forgotten Gifts and Talents

Do you ever forget that you are actually really good at something, simply because you haven’t done it in a while? I think it happens to me rather often. Whenever I am not doing something consistently, I tend to think that I had previously overestimated my ability in it, and I the have at least a little bit of fear when it comes to doing that something again. It happened to me recently with teaching. And it has happened certainly with dancing. For the teaching, I always have a sense of imposter syndrome popping up, keeping eye in check – there’s always somewhere I need to improve and sort things out better. But, as I have now read from Adam Grant, that is actually something that tends to produce the best-quality individuals in something: When people experience the imposter syndrome but stick it out, they tend to give a better and more effective effort than all the rest. Of course, no matter how much evidence I have for that, I doubt my imposter feelings ever will go away fully.

Turn now to the dancing, which cam up for me this week. Someone asked me to help out – not lead, but just support – with a two-step dance lesson for a birthday party of a friend of his. Somehow, it felt right to agree to do the lesson, and so I did. I was nervous, and I felt like I didn’t remember anything important involved in teaching two-step. But I went, anyway, trusting that it felt right, and also trusting in the fact that this other guys was the one in charge of teaching, and I was just there to help with the demonstration side of things.

At the birthday celebration, though, in the lesson, I proved invaluable. My own knowledge surprised me. My own aptitude in teaching and, especially, in speaking up surprised me. I helped tremendously in the lesson, though, I believe, I successfully allowed for the other person to be the lead of the whole affair, even when I took over counting and starting and stopping everyone and determining the order of the patterns and moves and all.

And, you know, I had an amazing time. I had forgotten how much I love not only dancing but sharing dance… teaching it.

Because I love to teach. Period. And I especially love to teach those who want to learn what I have to offer.

It was wonderful on its own, but it also has been a wonderful reminder. When I watched a little video that somehow is still on my desktop of my computer, I was enthralled. I could hardly take my eyes off of me, though it was a group dance we all were doing. I was surprised at how good I was at the dance – a dance we had only learned right then and there, and to a song I had never heard before then. I was so chill and calm and on time and comfortable… it was beautiful.

And so, these two things – the dance lesson last night and this video today – have me wonder if it wouldn’t be extremely beneficial to the world for me to find a way to start teaching dance for real… Because I have much to offer, and I want to share it.

Post-a-day 2021

Casual, comfortable, easy love

I experienced a lot of love from the kids today, and it was wonderful. It was that somewhat passive love, where they just show up and hang out in the classroom with me, only sometimes talking directly to me, but choosing to be there specifically. And someone was almost always talking to me at any given time. They just kind of swapped around, so to speak. It reminded me of spending time with friends, like how was so normal in high school and college. Adulthood hasn’t much offered such scenarios. Everyone always wants to go somewhere, to do something. These kids did nothing but futz around in a classroom together today for an hour, and they barely even pulled out phones, but for the occasional picture display or something. It was wonderful. It was loud. Yet it was wonderful. And I am grateful.

Thank you, God and Universe. Thank you. If you please, give me more love and silliness like this afternoon. Help me to be surrounded by friends who can have fun with me in such a loving, easy way.

Post-a-day 2021

Amazing

Sometimes, I forget that I am an amazing person. I forget that I am talented and learnèd to a spectacular degree. I forget that my existence is an absolute blessing from God, both to me and to the world at large. (I truly think we all are this, though in incredibly different ways in life. However, that is not my current point.) You see, I get a bit worn out or lost, and so get behind on things, and I end up not giving my usual best for something. I take care of my physical well-being instead of giving my all to a certain time-sensitive project. I then, of course, give a completely acceptable and, even, great result on whatever that project is. However, I know that I certainly could have done better on it, much better than I did. I had, though, prioritized something else above it – myself and my ability to continue functioning as a whole, avoiding breakdown and wear-out. If, then, somebody happens to mention almost anything about that project, I immediately feel dreadful. Oh, dear, I’ve been caught being lazy. I knew I shouldn’t have given any less than my all on it.

But then, if, at the time, my all would have gotten me home sick afterward, what benefit would it have been?

Okay, so, let’s suppose I did the work ahead of time…., when there was no clear need for me to do it at all…. That just doesn’t make sense.

Well, so, here I am, stressed that I’m not doing a good enough job teaching. I didn’t prepare things ahead of time, because I didn’t want to do so, and they had no direct use in my life. Now, I am here. I did not do as great a job as I could have done on some – many – things so far this school year. Got it. That annoys me.

…….

And so, I sit here, feeling like crap about my teaching and myself – because I didn’t do it right, the best way. Okay, got it. However, just because I did one thing not spectacularly doesn’t make me a failure, doesn’t mean I’m failing my students. We can always do things better as a teacher – any teacher knows that. For now, I must accept the restraints I have had, or I will go nuts. I was limited on time, energy, and quick memory (It’s been a while for some of the topics, you see.), as well as the level and adaptability of my students. I chose to do things a certain way on purpose. I chose them, because I am a great teacher. Yes, I could have done a better job. That’s for next time. That’s for next class. That’s for tomorrow.

And, you know what? I’ve already set up the great stuff for tomorrow, and planned when to manage everything for the day after that and after that.

It’s okay not to be perfect at something, even though we are amazing at it. Even in dance – I am a highly trained and quite spectacular partner dancer, you see – I make mistakes. But, I think it is about how we recover from the mistakes that shows how spectacular we truly are. So, yes, I might have made some mistakes with things with classes so far this semester. Okay. Now, how do we move forward powerfully from those mistakes and from where we currently find ourselves? That is what matters most.

Huh… I don’t feel so lost in misery anymore… Yes, I’m a bit anxious about getting those things all done now that I want to do. But no, I don’t feel like I’m in trouble or have messed up horribly. Someone shall come observe my class next week, and it is going to be amazing…, because, even though I forgot it recently, I am amazing and I am an amazing teacher. God has blessed me greatly in this realm, and I’m ready to set flame to the world of my classroom. (Which, the students have already told me that I already have…, even though I had to ask them what they even meant, because I had felt like I was totally failing them as a teacher… They, however, were adamant that I had so far been the best teacher they had ever had in the subject… Pretty darn cool, huh? That’s the kind of thing I forget so often. I get lost in my head about having not done my best, and forget that even my not-best is still purty darn good.)

Thank you, God and Universe, for such a blessing in this life. Guide me to continue to be an expression of your love in the world, especially through my teaching and creativity. Amen.

Post-a-day 2021

le (gros) mot du jour

What could be better, more interesting, and more useful than simply the word of the day? The bad word of the day, of course. We cannot deny that, though we need not necessarily use bad words ourselves, it is important and valuable to know the bad words, so that we are able to recognize and understand what is being said in the world around us. Foreign language courses seem to avoid such things, but at what cost? Firstly, the individual is likely to be quite lost when interacting with a native environment. Secondly, loads of potential interest is lost without them. Because most teens and adults are quite interested in the bad words, whether they’re willing to admit it or not. And thirdly, such words and expressions share loads about the culture tied to the language.

I am very much not a bad word person. And yet two of my favorite words in Japanese are manko and oshiri. It’s probably because they are such silly yet useful words that I enjoy them so much. They are fun to know, more than useful. Which makes them even more fun to know, I suppose.

So, yeah… the (bad) word of the day sounds like a kind of amazing idea to me… so long as the students can handle it, that is…

Post-a-day 2021

Following

Bro, I don’t quite understand where God is directing me right now, but I am certainly following the calls and encouragements full-heartedly. There is now a very high chance that I will be helping with this martial arts thing at school, now, in the mornings… because, you know, I wasn’t busy enough already. 😛 My words and thoughts, by the way, and I believe them as both true and ironic. Haha

Anyway, must sleep ASAP, as it’s already after 9pm!

Post-a-day 2021

Giving up

Today, I had to give up being better than others. Instead, I had to acknowledge what was truly best for me and for my students. I need not be the one to put forth the effort regarding certain things in class, especially when it is specifically someone’s job to handle such things. I am paid to teach and asked to teach. When something else is preventing me from doing my job, it becomes my job to let the person know whose job it is to handle the problem.

And so, I did that today. I cried a bunch in that meeting, but I feel good about the whole situation now. I trust the person into whose hands I set the situation, and his words and approach and plans eased me, despite my initial aversion to reaching out for the support. And his casual comment about having been nearly three decades in the military somehow both surprised me and did not – “No wonder you are so calm,” I replied. His calm, calming, yet ruling demeanor makes sense with such context.

I have a high level of confidence that things will be much, much better going forward, and that I, much more so than up to this point, will be able to do my job and teach this one particular class. At last, we can begin to breathe and to have some fun.

Post-a-day 2021