The Hard Lesson...

I chose to be a teacher because I believe: I believe in the power of learning, the power of ideas; I believe in students and in their potential to succeed; I believe in people.

But today, I learned that everyone doesn't believe the way that I do. And today, I learned that, more often than not, there's only so much I can do for those people.

I can't force students to remember their work and turn it in on time.

I can't force students to actively listen to me in class.

I can't force students to know that they are capable of so much more than they could imagine.

Don't get me wrong, I can post deadlines in three different places and make announcements about those same deadlines five different times in a class.

I can be an engaging teacher that comes up with exciting, collaborative ideas to try to maintain student attention and engagement.

I can care for my students and offer them opportunities to try again when I see them performing far below their abilities.

But when those efforts don't work, what do you do?

I had an assignment due today - I took the time to explain it several times, I answered questions and had students repeat the directions back to me.

My rate of return on those assignments was about 50% for all of my classes.

Why?

Most of them are human and forgot.

Some of them just didn't care.

So my gradebook has all these zeros staring me in the face, taunting, Look at me... I'm failing already! Hahaha.

The hard part is, I know I can't fix those zeros for them. And as much as I say, "Come and talk to me, I'm here to help," they have to do the work.

Here's to never giving up on them, even if they've given up on themselves. And here's to not taking any of it personally.