Prompt #7

Now that my tutoring experience in Ms. Mara's classroom has come to an end, I can sit back and reflect on what transpired over the course of the semester.

I participated in Kahne & Westheimer's "Charity" model of service learning projects, but in doing so, I have become more enlightened about how to be a teacher who participates in the "Change" model, someone who truly gives her students the tools they need to succeed in their education and their lives.

Ms. Mara is a teacher that pushes her students to do their best. She wants all of them to achieve an A in her classroom and she clearly sets the expectations for her students, so much so that she had one class perform skits about the four cardinal rules the middle school has posted in every classroom throughtout; attend school, be prepared and ready to learn, respect yourself, others, and property, and finally, do your best to avoid conflict and help others to do the same. Through these skits, the cardinal rules were reinforced in a creative and meaningful way for the students, instead of just being repeated over and over and memorized just for the sake of memorization.

She expects students to come prepared to class; if they don't have the required list of materials, they lose points for the day's grade, and fellow classmates remind them that they need to be prepared for every class.

Ms. Mara is a teacher who commands authority, but not in an over-the-top authoritative way until it is necessary. She usually lets students run warm-ups, a routine they are accustomed to because she does it the same way every single day. They take comfort in routine, but also in creativity.

Ms. Mara never yells at a student, ever. She may raise her voice, but it is only to be heard over the twenty others in the classroom to restore order until she lets them disperse into their performance groups. With the right look and posture, however, she can convey to the students non-verbally that she means business and won't deal with anything out of line.

When I think of Ms. Mara's classroom, I think of learning, of concepts, of big ideas, and of skills that the students can take with them throughout their lives, but they don't come forsaking creativity and fun, being silly, being serious, being exploratory. They don't come forsaking self-discovery, ignoring friendships, inhibiting new alliances between students in a school system that may not be able to provide all the necessities that they may need to succeed educationally. In her classroom, the students learn to improvise with what props they may have, or to do without. They forge a community, one that's a safe-haven for them all, so that they feel comfortable in their own skins while trying on the skins of others, and qualities they don't necessarily possess. They discover themselves while discovering the characters they portray, much like I did during my experience with them.

I've discovered that I would love to be a great teacher like Ms. Mara is, one who can teach her students without having to resort to yelling or rewards in order to get good behavior (she does give out Dragon Bucks, but very infrequently). The students behave well because they just instinctively know that it leads to her being happier in the classroom, which they benefit from because there's no hostility in the atmosphere; it's a non-toxic learning environment for them.

I want to be a teacher that her students feel comfortable coming to with stories, questions, and problems that they need help with, a teacher whose door is always open to her students, who genuinely cares for them and their well-being, knowing that they may not have an environment like that outside of her own classroom. I want to be a teacher that students come back to see after they've graduated, who gets emails from students letting her know of their journeys, their lives, and what they are up to at that point.

I want to be a teacher that students will miss when the year is over.

On my last day, the class I helped out with the most this semester watched a portion of their performance of "Snow White & Rose Red" that they had an elementary school nearby come to see. I hadn't been able to attend because the first show date was postponed due to weather (the elementary children were supposed to walk over but it was much too cold for them), and the second date was pushed up a day when it was found out that the weather would be nicer the day before the rescheduled date. We were watching the performance and two of the girls came over to me with a card and a gift bag. The students had all signed the card inside the bag, Ms. Mara had bought me a candle as a thank you gift, and I couldn't stop thinking that I was going to have a very big hole in my heart as soon as I left the confines of the classroom walls.

Three hours later, I was crying over my card because the hole was bigger than I ever thought it could be.

I want to be the teacher that, even though when the students leave, I feel a little piece of me has been removed, I know that they are better for it because they have taken a piece of me with them and will remember it forever.