When a Door Closes...

...five other doors open. And these are not doors of opportunity. They are doors of improvements to be made... and they just keep opening!

I had the opportunity after school yesterday to phone several parents. I've realized that my choice to make the call first makes ALL the difference.

I had one student in my class who has a hard time staying focused and actually doing any work. His journal is full of scribbles and stick people, his assignments are missing or drastically incomplete and he hasn't been reading at all for the last month and a half. I had some luck several weeks ago getting him to do some assignments in class, but since that point, he has shut down on me completely any time I talk to him about missing work or class expectations. So, yesterday, when we were doing the project for our second book (a tribute letter), he refused to work. I knew he hadn't actually read a biography book, but I'd asked him to write a letter to me with his commitments for improvement.

3...2...1.... Shut down.

He wouldn't do a thing, and any time I would approach him, he would only cower deeper into his shell.

I was frustrated. I didn't know what to do. So - of course - I did the wrong thing. I told him he would not be able to leave my classroom until the letter was completed. This has worked before with students who are just lazy or who fooled around during class, but it didn't work for him. In fact, it backfired. He stood against the wall refusing to look at or talk to me. He took the pencil he borrowed from me at the beginning of class, put it in front of my face, then snapped it in half.

I knew at that moment I had lost him. That any further attempt to get him to work would not be successful. I didn't even know what to say. Probably reading my hopelessness, he glared at me and stomped out of the room.

So I rummaged through the contact information I had collected at Back To School Night (best idea ever). I found his mother's phone number and called. Turns out, several other teachers had called home as well in the last few days. This student is failing most of his classes. In speaking with the mom I learned that her son was feeling cripplingly overwhelmed by middle school - so many assignments, so much homework, so much to remember and do. She was worried about him, but was committed to helping him. Speaking with her, we set some goals for collaboration to help her son, and I made some adjustments to my own mindset: positive reinforcement is 1000 times more powerful than my, "You'll stay in class til this is finished" threats. I realized that my actions had probably only added to his heightened anxiety about school. Keeping him after class meant he would be late to his next and miss the work there too. Continually reminding him of the work he was missing only added to his mental list of to-dos. I have to make some changes - he needs to know, more than any other message I could possibly send, that I believe he CAN do it.

I called a few other students' homes because some were looking really depressed in class or had been struggling with some family issues and I just wanted to check up on them. I just wanted my students and their parents to know I cared. And they were more grateful for the simple call than I had expected.

I walked away from the day feeling great - I loved my students and my students knew it.

So when I walked into the faculty room before school started today and was met by another teacher with a message of, "One of my students just feels like you're really picking on him in class, and he feels really embarrassed by it," I was like, Seriously?! My one step forward feels more like two steps back! I was so grateful that she told me, but I waited anxiously for that student to walk into class. I didn't make a big deal about it, but I apologized to the student for anything I had said or done to make him feel uncomfortable. I promised him that it was not my intention to pick on him or make him feel wrongfully targeted in class. He was very "chill" about it, waving away my apology, telling me he had never felt embarrassed or anything. Classic middle school guy response. I pleaded with him to signal me or talk to me if he ever felt unsafe or uncomfortable in class. I told him how impressed I was with his work and how grateful I was to have him as a student. He smiled ever so briefly, chuckled to himself, and walked back to his seat.

All I could ever remember saying was, "(Student), do you need to go get a drink?" It was obviously my way of letting him know that he needed to get a hold of himself, but I suppose the true purpose behind my question could have been obvious to the rest of the class, too.

I swear, every day of this journey brings to light one more thing I could do better or that I did wrong. As an epic perfectionist, it's challenging but invigorating. Each criticism, each shortcoming, feels stifling at first - like there's a cumbersome rock lodged in my throat, threatening to make a permanent home in my stomach. But, more often than not, I face that rock and find a pebble. Something that needs to be attended to, but not something to take personally.

No one every told me how sensitive middle school students were. These sweet students just need someone to care, and I'm afraid I've taken my own teaching and curriculum too seriously to see that. No one ever told me that you would need to think of absolutely everything as a teacher: the student in front that can't function with distractions, the handful of students that were absent from class the day before and won't actually think to talk to you about what they missed, and the sweet emotions of each of my students that can erupt at any moment with the most unintentionally hurtful comment.

So, how do I stop taking it all so seriously? Right now, every period starts with a simple prayer: Please help me remember that each of my students is a child of God, that each of them just needs someone to prove that they are loved and cared for. And please . . . please help me be to be that proof.

I suppose if I can remember that, the rest will follow.