1 credit down, 31 to go......

Is it bad that I am already counting? I'm not trying to be a Debby Downer, just extremely busy right now and not seeing any sign of a let up anytime soon. I think we as teachers should all be put in a position like the one I currently find myself in. As a coach, teacher, husband, and now a student, I am finding my workload to be ridiculously tight and trying to find time to complete everything a bit of a chore. It is for this reason that I think us as teachers should be placed in these circumstances. Many of our students are forced to balance work, athletics, family, and education and are often as busy as I'm complaining to be now. I think by putting ourselves in situations like this, we learn to empathize with our students and their workloads a little more. I think having an understanding of what some of our students are going though only makes us better as instructors. I'm not advocating that we give our students a free pass, only that we try harder to understand what they may be going through and what possible reasons may be when they fail to meet our standards.

Likewise, I think all of our students should have the opportunity to spend a little time in the same shoes we as members of this program find ourselves in. I find that many of our students think that they are going to get a job, make millions of dollars, buy a home that never requires any work and have all kinds of time to play with their toys that they are going to buy with all that money they are going to make. My students at least, seem to have missed the fact that most of us as responsible adults, work very hard for the money we earn and most of us, even though we work hard, have many responsibilities outside that job that keep us from being able to play with whatever toys that money has afforded us. They seem to have missed the fact that the house they intend to buy requires work to maintain or in my case, fix up. They seem to have missed the fact that in order to stay ahead of others who want their job, they will have to push themselves to constantly improve themselves in their jobs. They seem to have missed the fact that the family they envisioned will demand their time and likewise should receive their attention.

I know, I know, it will never happen. Just because we can't truly impress upon our students just how real life can be, I don't think it should stop us from trying. I regularly speak with my students about life and what happens behind the scenes of my life. Usually it deals with the fact of understanding the concept of money as I find most of my students believe that making $10/hr. is going to make them rich. When I ask them how well they think teachers are paid, usually their response is something to the effect of terrible. I agree and then tell them what exactly it is that I make/hr. This certainly opens some eyes. Of course, for reasons of full disclosure, I must admit that I break it down for only an 8hr work day and for the length of one school year as it makes the effect much more dramatic but still there is a point behind my doing so. When I explain to the students that with my salary along with my wife's who makes less than I do, we are able to afford a house, mind you it is 105 years old, I am able to afford a nice truck, yet my wife drives a totalled-out Saturn because she only has to drive 4 blocks to work, and I can afford little else, and finally I explain to them that my dreams of having a '66 mustang to fix up, a snowmobile to ride, a motorcycle to ride, a 4 wheeler to ride on my 200+acres of hunting land have all had to be put on hold because I first must pay back my college loans, my credit card debt that I've totalled up fixing up my house, and my bills, they start to understand that $10/hr. isn't going to cut-it if they intend to live life the way they think they want to. I then ask the students to go home, talk to their parents about what they make and what all they have to pay for. I ask them to talk with their parents about where they began and how they got to where they are. I find that these little peaks into what it takes to get the things that the students desire focuses the students and sets goals for them to achieve. In the same light, by putting myself in a situation where I am extremely busy, I can refocus my goals for my students and try to be more understanding and flexible when it comes to helping my students achieve the goals I've assigned them in the way I want to see them achieved.

I speak of this because of I've learned a lot from the readings this week but feel it was probably not the desired learning originally intended. By reading the text and having continued checkpoints along the way I realized that I was learning more than being asked to read it all the way through and then go back and try to remember what it was that I was reading. You see, I must admit that I've fallen into that old habit of thinking that by making the material harder and having the students work harder to get the information, that they must undoubtedly be learning more. In fact, I'm just teaching these students to find ways to cheat or get by with doing the work half way. This text reminded me that sometimes making the assignment as easy as possible is the most efficient way for the students to learn. It comes down to the fact that if this material was any tougher, I would have felt defeated. I would have looked at it and said no way, how can I get it done good enough to get a grade and call it good. The saddest part about this is I pride myself on being someone who believes in the mantra that if it is worth doing, it's worth doing well and I still found myself going into this with that defeated attitude. This is why I learned so much from this text. The text talked about using technology efficiently by providing examples and direction to make it easy for the student to learn. This can obviously be applied to more than just technology and for that reason I'm happy I've had the opportunity to learn from this text. Now if I could just make writ ting the papers so easy as I'm sure many of you have noticed writ ting is not my strong suit.

So 1 credit down, 31 to go and many more life lessons to go to help me better myself, achieve my goals, and who knows, maybe make it a little easier to afford my toys and buy myself a little more time to play with them.