A week ago yesterday, Jen emailed me about guest-blogging. Predictably, I forgot until about ten minutes ago. Hurrah for Eileen.
Today, my senior class read John Donne’s “Meditation 17.” We discussed how to read figurative language (which I thought they would hate, but they did rather well with it), and then we compared it to “I am a Rock” by Simon and Garfunkel (which I thought they would enjoy, but they laughed at it and ridiculed it and asked me if this was the music I listened to when I was growing up, which made my 22-going-on-23 inner self giggle). They don’t really like anything I give them to read. They are what can be termed “HATERS.” Some of them seemed to enjoy Macbeth, but a lot of them very vocally thought that it was stupid and worthless. They are very delightful people to teach.
Sometimes it is very frustrating to love literature, especially brilliant, gorgeous literature like John Donne’s Holy Sonnets, which have inspired me as an artist and as a person of faith, and bring that literature into a classroom full of seventeen and eighteen (and, um, twenty-one) year-olds, only to have them denounce it as “stupid,” “pointless,” and “without meaning.” But I teach students, not literature. I have to remember that.
I suppose most people struggle with vocation (and most often, I guess, would be struggling to decide whether one job or the other is actually their vocation). Jen has struggled (differently than I have), my parents have struggled, my boyfriend struggles. I want a life-work, you know? I’m just not sure if teaching is going to end up being it… but if I quit, I’ll wonder if I just didn’t try hard enough. Guess I’ll stick with it for a few more semesters and see if it doesn’t get better. I’ll end up where I’m supposed to be, one way or the other.
As a student teacher – I hear ya!
Conversation last week while studying Of Mice and Men:
Teacher: Steinbeck won a Nobel Prize for Literature
Students: Well it couldn’t have been with *this* book! It’s so boring. Why does he take so long to describe things?
Sigh!
You’re right about remembering that we’re teaching kids and literature. I need to remember that. I’ve wondered if it isn’t better to keep those pieces of literature that are nearest and dearest close to my own heart and away from the classroom so they aren’t trampled, and that way, I’m not so easily offeneded. Just a thought.
I have been there with you English teachers. I teach all Drama now, but have done senior English also. Keep up with the teaching.. It takes a few years to get the feel and truly enjoy it. I can’t imagine doing anything else now.. 12 years later.
I remember having the same exact attitude towards Stienbeck after reading Of Mice and Men in high school… I really hated that book. Fortunately, I was forced to read a few of Steinbeck’s other books later on, and I really enjoyed those.