ONE YEAR WITH AN ENGLISH TEACHER

Day 97, Tuesday, February 12, 2008

At the end of one of my classes today, I realized that I had completely forgotten to do a very important step in my lesson plan. Did I berate myself, feel remorseful, take off on a guilt trip? No, I just laughed out loud. I stood in my empty classroom and had a wholehearted laugh because I knew that, in the big picture, this mistake was no big deal. In my little classroom on this small planet in this relatively small galaxy in this measureless cosmos, the fact that I failed to discuss "the role of patience in reading" is not going to cause a significant change in the workings of the universe. Stars will still race along their pathways and cells will still do their magnificent work in living things. Night will come, and then day, and then night again. My little error is no more or less important than a leaf blowing this way instead of that. Things happen. Life goes on.

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Maria made an excellent comment as we were watching the film version of Our Town. I asked the kids why Wilder included so many little details of home life in the first act, and Maria quickly responded that the first act was called "Home Life", so it made sense to include small homey details. Her statement was short, direct, and filled with youthful wisdom -- the kind of statement I hear from students over and over again every day of the year.

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Alison spoke with great enthusiasm today about something Pip had said in last night's Great Expectations chapter. Her words were something like this: "I love what Pip said at one point in the chapter. It made me so sad. He said, 'I remember it all very well.' It was just a short statement, but to me it totally sums up what Pip has been feeling." As she was speaking, her eyes were flashing with her strong feelings for this troubled young man in Dickens' novel.