2006-06-02

Two Corollaries

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Those who can't teach, must therefore do
    I am a good writer, and any mettle-worthy English teacher needs to be able to mould good writers.

    Moulding good writers does not appear to come naturally to me. In large part that is due to the second corollary, but we'll get there later.

    I think I might be a better teacher if I taught something other than my forte. I'ld probably be better off teaching history, for instance.

    Or just getting out of this entire crazy profession and writing for a living. I don't know.
A good student doth not a good teacher make
    I was a pretty good student. Frustrating to many of my teachers, but overall good.

    Much of that goodness was engineered by my choice of classes, of course. I often wish I had studied something totally outside my natural skills. Learning the exciting field of mechanical engineering, for instance, would have stretched me. Studying English was too intuitive, too natural, too inborn, too easy.

    Because it was just unearned skill that made me a good student, I haven't actually learned crap in years. I just play the same old lousy game and call it good. And it is good. But when I have never had to learn how to become good, I have no idea how to teach becoming good.

    "What do you mean you can't write an earth-shattering conclusion?!?!" I might ask in shocked abhorrence. "Why not? Art thou not human? Hath not a human eyes? hath not a human hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? If you prick a human, do they not bleed? if you tickle them, do they not laugh? if you poison them, do they not die? and if you put a pen in their hands, do they not write wicka strong essays with wicka strong conclusions?"

    My great problem is--since I have always looked at academic writing as a fun hobby--I have never examined it with the cruelty I have examined fiction, and so I find it difficult to explain or to teach.

    I suppose when I take a class in writing pedagogy this will change, but....

    It might not. Like I said: I haven't learned anything in years. I don't know how to apply myself to study and learn.

    The fact is, I am a terrible student. And if I can't do student, what in the world makes me think I can teach the doing of student?


Note: this post is not born of a particularly bad day or anything of the sort. In fact, these are issues I've been thinking about for a long time. These are where they stand at the moment. I am continually considering and revising and rethinking and trying to figure out just what the heck I want to be when I grow up. I need to hurry. I turn thirty this summer.

10 comments:

  1. Th.... I like the way you think. Simply because it gives me some company.

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  2. I need to hurry up and figure out what I want to do, too. You see, this Special Education Field is not my Plan A. My Plan A hasn't come to fruition as of it, so I'm trying to make a Plan B. I turn 35 next year, so I really need to get on the ball.

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  4. I feel that way a lot. Once I mastered my Child Development class I pretty much skated easily through the rest of my major classes. Like I didn't learn anything the last 3 years of college or something.

    I'm sure your doing a better job than you think. Keep it up!

    Just make a lot of red marks on their papers and write little comments on what they should have written. Make them read a lot and write analyses about what they read.

    One HS English teacher of mine (I had her Soph. and Senior years)was one of the most influential teachers I had. She was a little harsh and required a lot, but really she was the only teacher I felt prepared me for college.

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  5. I think that all teachers feel that way at some point.

    Since most people major in what they like, and most teachers happen (despite what some students may feel) to be people, most teachers end up majoring in what they like. This works so that you like the subject you teach, but you may not always know how to break it down into managable chunks for kids to process.

    I feel the same way about teaching reading. I love reading almost to a fault. Most kids that I teach, though, HATE reading, or have trouble reading. Since I've never had a problem with it, I have trouble breaking it down. The more that I work with it, though, the better I get at figuring out what works for THEM. The truth is, it's usually what works for me if I slowed down to think about it.

    So, to be a bit more concise, you're not alone and it may get better.

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  6. .

    I really wasn't looking for comfort or job offers or even nice pinnipedal sentiments (although all were appreciated). However, now that I have them, I am glad that I do.

    Thanks, folks.

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  7. Your post showed me a better way. Why, oh why, was I not enrolled as a chemical engineer? I could be devising ways to destroy the planet right now, not slowly starving to death in a ghetto Provo apartment!

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  8. .

    Sorry---

    Should have said something earlier....

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