So You Wanted to be a Teacher...

By Terry J. Ward

I think that I knew that I had lost it when I found myself driving down the road seriously contemplating whether or not I could actually consider ketchup a vegetable. I suppose that since I started teaching, I've been, well, perhaps a bit "casual" in my motherly role. To give myself some credit, I did, quite quickly,

I might add, come to the conclusion that, no, I could not consider ketchup a vegetable. And, yes, I would actually have to make some sort of "real" vegetable for my kids to sniff at and discard.

Working day in and day out with 9th graders, by its very nature, makes you peculiar. Thoughts come into your head that were just never there before. Take my office mate, for example. A very nice young man, pleasant, intelligent, another first year teacher. I'll be sitting there grading papers with answers like, "African art is important because its important" (knowing full well that I will have to argue with this kid about why I marked his answer wrong when I hand it back to him), when suddenly I find myself in this Felliniesque fantasy mix of Lolita and How-Stella-Got-Her-Groove-Back about this poor slob sitting next to me, grading papers with answers just as asinine as the ones I have. (Well, maybe his are better. He is doing the Renaissance, after all.) The point being, it scares the dickens out of me!! Let's just start by saying that I am well within the range of being old enough to be his mother, and if looks count, grandmother. I feel this is a desperate cry for help!! Well, maybe not precisely help, but a nice Caribbean cruise would do.

But there will be no help. And in actuality, there will never be any real need for any. They (Very 1984-ish, isn't it?) keep you so tired that there could never be any real possibility of movement that doesn't involve some sort of NYS curriculum objective.

Now, I've got to admit that I used to be the first one to spout off about how easy teachers had it. Six hours a day of teaching, of which, I might add, you only actually teach for about four hours, and all those lovely vacations. OK, all of you that are bristling right now, no need to. I have been INITIATED. I am

now so exhausted that I can barely think straight (Interesting that this is the brain that will be teaching your kids, isn't it?

This is your brain...This is your brain on 9th graders...) Lofty ideals - did I actually have those at one time? You know how mothers will run down the list of their kid's names when they're yelling at them till they get to the right one? Now I'm doing that with nineteen kids. Yes, they DO think I'm crazy. (One tells me this regularly, and I can tell by the look in his eye that he isn't kidding.) I have become a player of that

subtle game, "How can we outsmart them?"

Of course, there are good points too. Like the day that we saw a few snowflakes fall and I had ten paper snowflakes attached to my board by the end of the period. (OK, so they WERE supposed to be taking notes with those pages - or, maybe those were their notes.) I especially enjoy the lovely pictures that I get on their quiz papers when they don't have a clue about the answers. Very talented, festive, and quite uplifting, too! And somehow, slowly, but steadily, we move from Latin America, through Africa, onto the Middle East, and someday, when snowflakes fall for real, Asia. I am learning. And, yes, so are they.

I'm told that in ten years, they'll come back and thank me for everything. If my brains hold out until then, I'll be looking forward to that moment. But for now, maybe if I try real hard, I can find a way to justify that ketchup thing. Maybe while I'm grading papers.


©1998 APALACHIN COMMUNITY PRESS