Lily Holland instructs. Photo by Julie McMahon.
My days this semester begin at 6:30 AM, around the time that I would generally get back to my apartment in Spain this time last year. It is this aspect of student teaching I still find hardest to get used to. Every morning that feeling of dread I had forgotten about since the early start times of high school creeps over my body: ohmygod I have to get up and it’s still dark outside.
A half hour later I am dressed in my most professional attire (much to the amusement of my non-student teaching friends), pouring coffee down my throat and enjoying the few minutes I will have in the day to socialize with people my own age. A small group of other early rising student teachers and two insanely loyal (and probably a little crazy) friends of mine are, for the most part, the only people in the JA dining hall. Seven thirty rolls around and I get to school with enough time to put up the morning chart, photocopy the day’s sheets and set up any lessons that need preparation.
Eight thirty is go time. I meet the munchkins in the gym; most of them have more energy than I would have if I robbed a Dunkin Donuts. My absolute favorite part of the day (besides recess) is morning meeting. All nineteen of my students sit in a circle and each student greets the person on their left, then the person on their right. It is the end of October and still somehow they forget each other’s names. It’s a simple routine, but hearing their small voices deliver such sweet and sincere “good mornings” centers me for the day. It reminds me just why I’m doing this in the first place and how much I genuinely care about each of them.
I teach second grade, so my students range from a very astute six-year-old to a handful of eight-year-olds. What fascinates me most about this age group is the irony of their abilities. We’ve discussed issues of sexism, prejudice and discrimination. My students got fired up when I read a story to them about deforestation and passionately told me how important trees were and that “the man” shouldn’t cut them down.
Yet somehow the phrase “put your hands in an appropriate place” registers blank stares. The most common phrase that comes out of my mouth Monday through Friday is “take your hands out of your nose [or ears or mouth or pants].” I have found myself begging students to take off their shoes just so they stop playing with them and then begging other students to put their shirts back on as they stare off into space, unaware that they are removing it in the first place. I could start a museum with the collection of things students have handed me that they found in the bathroom. I had one boy come up to me and place a misshapen paperclip in my hand. It touched my palm just as the words, “I found this in the toilet,” came out of his mouth. Oh good, thanks. Just what I wanted!
And I’m fairly sure I perplex them just as much as they perplex me. After learning I lived at school, one of my students asked if I slept on a table. In another instance, a girl asked me if I was really twenty-one. When I said I was indeed, a little boy confessed he thought I was sixteen. From across the room another girl exclaimed, “I thought you were ten!” Yes. I am a very advanced fifth grader who did such a good job at multiplication and division that they decided I could teach downstairs.
All in all, it’s been an absolute roller coaster. One day I love it and can’t wait to have my own classroom, and the next day I’m wondering if add/drop forms were really due in September or if I can somehow get out of this. And it’s usually at the point when I’m about ready to cry with frustration that a wide-eyed second grader will come up to me and ask sweetly, “Miss Lily, can I have a hug?” And that makes waking up before sunrise not seem so bad after all.
