Lucky me

"You know," I say to one of my advisees, "you guys are really lucky I'm not in charge this year."

"I know!" he says. "We were just talking about that."

We're walking up to my classroom from the library. I've pulled him out of study hall because I'm too curious, I need him to give me some details. Now. And he has just complimented me. He doesn't know it, but it's the nicest thing he's said to me all year.

"What do you think will happen?" he asks.

"I have no idea," I say, "but I know what I would do in this situation – suspend you. All 30 of you!"

He gulps. Last year, I tried my hand at administration, and one of my goals was a get-tough-on-crime approach. And I think it worked. Sure, we had a few disciplinary cases, but not a single alcohol or drugs offense. Kids either didn't party or (more likely) they hid it well.

But this past weekend 30 students were discovered to have been partying in a hotel. Six of them from my advisor group. Which means that I have, quite by accident, the cool kids in my advisor group. Their biggest crime, as far as I'm concerned, is that some of them were mixing vodka with Coke. No wonder one girl had to go to the hospital to get her stomach pumped! Their other crime, more serious, was drinking enough to get caught. When one person goes to the hospital, everyone else signed out of dorms for that event gets called in and busted.

Funny, sad, true story about the girl taken to the hospital:

The staff member who went with the girl informed the doctor that the girl had drunk a lot of vodka.

The very Indian doctor asked, "Oh. Is there alcohol in vodka?"

"Can you please help her? She's been throwing up a lot!"

And he asked, "What has she been throwing?"

I had to laugh when I heard that. And I couldn't restrain myself, I had to laugh in class.

"What's the matter with you guys?" I asked one of my classes. "I know it's Monday and all, but you all look absolutely hung over today!" This didn't get the laughter or applause it deserved. Later, some girls accused me of being mean, of bullying the poor wretches.

In another class, my advisee asked me to repeat something. "I'm sorry," I said, "I know you killed some brain cells yesterday. So ... do ... you ... need ... me ... to ... speak ... more ... slowly?" His friend laughed; nobody else did.

But my philosophy this year is different from last year. I don't need to worry about the safety of all the students and the reputation of the school anymore. I can laugh. And, really, these guys will laugh about this someday, too. Maybe when they return from their one-month suspension. (Well, that's what I would've pushed for.) Maybe at graduation. Or five years from now. Who knows when, but they will see the humor eventually.

"It's not like you guys killed somebody," I tell my lucky group of six. "So relax, you'll be OK."

But they're worried about their parents' reactions. About missing school. About losing leadership positions. About a blemish on their transcript.

"Well, you should have thought about all that when that booze came into the room. And anyway," I say, "you want to know what a college admissions counselor will say if he sees you were suspended for partying? Probably: 'Oh, he's guilty of being a teenager.'"

I don't really know if this is true, but it makes sense to me. Every university official knows teenagers drink. And maybe it's better that kids get the partying and trouble out of the way during high school. If a high school junior gets in trouble in the first quarter, and then is clean after that, well, that's a sign of growth! Of learning! Maybe he or she won't drink to excess during the first week of college life. Maybe. I don't really know anything about that (although maybe I should remind my advisees that two years ago, a group of juniors was busted drinking and they were suspended. Today, they're all in college). And anyway, I do know that I drank less after the age of 21 than before. I also know that I wasn't ever stupid about drinking, that I slowly built up my tolerance before getting completely smashed.

Well, that's not entirely true.  But the only people who really know about my first drunken experience aren't around anymore. No, they're not dead. I just don't know them anymore.

These kids today, they don't want to snitch on their friends – there's a code of some sort – so they won't reveal who provided the alcohol, and so they will probably all face the same consequences. When I tell them that their friendship rules are stupid, they are horrified. "So, what's your definition of friendship?" one of them asks.

"I don't know about definitions," I say, "but I'll tell you this: Out of my very best friends from high school, the guys I thought would be around forever, well, I don't keep in touch with them anymore." And it's true. On facebook, I'm friends with four or five people from high school, and I keep in somewhat regular contact with two. "You'll go to college, make new friends," I continue. I'm on lecture mode now. "Then you'll get a job, move, meet new people, forget about old ones. And the people you're protecting today, you'll forget all about them. Probably."

High school life, I guess, is so immediate. So eternal. With so little perspective. So everything seems like such a big deal. But they'll all survive this. They'll laugh about it. I just wouldn't want them laughing at the school, which is why I think they should get strong consequences. They need to laugh at themselves, at their stupidity, their own foolishness and naivety. But we'll see who laughs last. I'm just lucky I'm not in charge.

Must write

Comments. Must write five sentences (at least) about every single student I teach. How many different ways are there to write, "I'm unimpressed"? Just kidding; many students are actually quite good, but comment-writing always brings out my inner bitch.
Anyway, here's one way I'm procrastinating: Great piece in the New York Times Magazine called "What if the Secret to Success is Failure?" It's the perfect length to forget all about unwritten comments. And the headline alone gives me an idea for my next comment: If the secret to success is failure, then your son is well on his way.

In the article, an educator looked at former students and found that "only 33 percent of students who graduated from [his] middle school 10 or more years ago have graduated from a four-year college. That rate is considerably better than the 8 percent of children from low-income families who currently complete college nationwide, and it even beats the average national rate of college completion for all income groups, which is 31 percent."

However, "he noticed something curious: the students who persisted in college were not necessarily the ones who had excelled academically at KIPP; they were the ones with exceptional character strengths, like optimism and persistence and social intelligence. They were the ones who were able to recover from a bad grade and resolve to do better next time; to bounce back from a fight with their parents; to resist the urge to go out to the movies and stay home and study instead; to persuade professors to give them extra help after class."

So ...
What to teach? And when? Can "exceptional character strengths" be taught?

Maybe I should finish reading the Times piece to find out. And then start on those damn comments. 

Free throw

Writing, I think, is like riding a bicycle. No, that's a cliche (which one avoids in writing), and it isn't true. Riding a bicycle requires a little bit of balance and a willingness to just let go -- two qualities writing shares -- but, ultimately, you learn to ride once and never forget. With writing, you get rusty. You forget and need to relearn.

So, then, a comparison as simple but more accurate: Writing is like shooting free throws. It's the easiest thing -- well, it's certainly the easiest shot in basketball -- and it's beautiful when you get it right. The audience hushes when you take aim and exhales only when you nail the point. Still, it takes lots of practice to get good at it, it's impossible to be perfect, it's frustrating when you miss, and if you spend enough time away from the line, you need to relearn the process. Back to the practice court for many, many hours of bend the knee, flick the wrist, release. Bend, flick, release. Back to the practice court just to get into the habit.

I am back on the line after some time. The hardest thing for me right now is listening to students and noticing: ah, I can do something interesting with that.

Lucky for me there is email. This morning I noticed a student had written at around midnight. Here's his message:

I am writing to you at this hour because I simply want you to know that I suck at managing my time. Please help me manage my time better. I had a week to read the book, but due to misplaced concerns and laziness, I was not able to read the book. I would like you to help me improve my time managing skills.

There's a quiz on Part 1 of the novel this morning. Let's see, he has class at about 11 a.m., so he still had almost 12 hours to go. But it was late, he was sleepy, and so he sent a last-ditch email to, what, get some sympathy? This guy's a basketball player, so maybe he'll appreciate the metaphor. He threw a last-second full-court shot, hoping for that elusive three-pointer at the end of the half. My response, though, is that the full-court shot isn't really a proper play. Sure, you hope it goes in, but it's not really a strategy for winning. A coach doesn't say in the locker room, "Let's fall behind by a point or two; then, at the end of the half, we'll pull out our secret weapon -- the full-court bomb for three points!"

A winning strategy is practice. Want to be a better writer? Practice. Every day. The same can be said of reading. You can't think that when you open a book for the first time that you'll just absorb the information. You need a quiet room with no one around, and for 30 minutes, you bend, flick, release. Bend into a comfortable position, flick through the pages slowly, and release your mind.



Ah, crap ending. I'm out of practice, you see.

So, let me finish this way: Ultimately, it's really disappointing that this kid didn't read. More so than any other. Because last week, when I handed out the novel, he stuck around after class to tell me that he remembers this book from when he was a kid. "I remember my family sitting around and talking about this book. For many days." That story blew me away. He actually has this childhood memory of people being so excited about a work of literature that they spent several evenings in deep conversation about it. And now he has the chance to read that novel and join the conversation.

He needs to get into practice. If he wants to nail that simple, single point and win the game, he'll need to practice.

Changing attitudes, changing grades

There are many teachers that get offended by the way students write emails. They start off with "Hey," they include shorthand and misspellings, and they just seem rude. I've never been offended, but I also want to teach students something more proper. So I recently presented my students with this offer: Send me a polite email -- one dripping with respect and appreciation -- and I will change one of your bad grades with a good one.

And so students sent me the most sarcastic emails I've ever received. I've always thought using satire and wit was challenging, but these kids nailed it. Here are some examples:


Thank you for being such a merciful and generous teacher.

Thank you so much for your kindness in allowing us to replace one of our bad grades with a better one. I promise that the bad grade will be my last and i will always give my best to achieve good scores on every assignment you throw at me.

I'm so honored to have this amazing opportunity to change my crappy grade to a better one.

Thank you so much for being such a great person in understanding students struggles and being kind enough to provide a second opportunity to increase our grades. In taking hold of this opportunity you provided,  I  kindly request you to change my grade for "Thank you for arguing" quiz, in which the result was 2 out of 10, 20% , in accordance with  my  recent essay plan which was 28 out of 30, 93. 3%. Thank you again for considering this small favor and thus helping me in saving myself from mental and physical disorders such as depression, constant head-aches, late night sleeps, sleep-talking, etc. By doing this you are not only helping me in the improvement of my grade but also lightening my burden of worry a little, which currently seems to be the main reason for all the disorders in me.

Thank you so much for this opportunity to raise my dismal mark in English to a slightly less dismal mark. I received a total of twenty-nine (29) points out of thirty (30) on the Leadership and Madness Essay Plan, which roughly translates to ninety-six point six recurring percent (96.6%). On a previous quiz, the first Train to Pakistan Quiz, I scored an abominable twenty-two (22) points out of thirty (30), which roughly translates to a horrendous seventy-three point three recurring percent (73.3%). It would complete my life if it were possible to substitute my twenty-nine (29) points in my Leadership Essay Plan into said quiz, which would bring the total points up on that quiz to twenty-nine (29) out of thirty (30). Thank you so much for the fantastic opportunity and for taking time out of your incredibly busy and fulfilling schedule to even consider my humble request.

And more than that, thank you for helping me (along with the rest of my class) brush up on my mathematical skills. I did more calculations trying to maximize my overall grade for English than I did in all my Math classes this semester. What an incentive! I can't help but wonder if you're secretly a mathematician at heart....

You are a very, very sweet person, and I would not complain about you to [your future wife] anymore.

Thank you for this opportunity, i will work harder and focus on the criteria and rubric next time, to create better paragraphs in every essay :)

I'm truly sorry for adding another annoying message in your inbox but if you could do this small thing for me, it would really brighten up my day. I got 22 out of 30 which is a 73 percent in the essay plan. I would like to replace my first  quiz on Train to Pakistan (I'm very sorry for not italicizing.I just can't figure it out how to do it) with the 73%. I promise I'll strive for the best in the upcoming assignments. If you're not in a good mood right now, please do come back and check this pitiful message again. :)

Thank you so much for reading this. Have a wonderful evening!

I'm back to talk about back then

From Rueters: The military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" law for gay personnel is slated to run out as scheduled on Tuesday, the armed forces said, ending a 17-year rule fraught with controversy.

Likewise, I am ending a several-year ban on my blog. Chicago Teacher Man is back, but he's still in India, so it really should be International Teacher Man. But I'm in the classroom, and even though this isn't the inner city and the day-to-day events aren't as fraught with violence and anger, there are still stories that I want to remember. Some poignant. Some funny. Some memorable. Some just plain and ordinary but worthwhile in their own way.

Like last week. Students were doing a Pop Oral Presentation -- a POP, I like to call it. I had given them a famous speech to read, put them in groups, gave them 15 minutes to prepare, and had them quickly present the speech to the rest of the class. One group had JFK's inauguration speech, another Gandhi's "Quit India" speech, and another had Mary Fisher's 1992 Republican National Convention address. This one isn't as famous, perhaps, as the others, but a pretty great speech, asking Republicans to fund AIDS research.

Here's something I'm slowly discovering as a teacher: Many students are actually better at writing and speaking when they don't have a lot of time to think. Well, they perform better. Or at least I'm more impressed with the results. Give students 15 minutes to prepare a presentation and the expectations are quite low, so when they do OK, that's impressive. Give them a couple of nights to do the work and the expectations rise -- they should be much better, right? Usually they're not. So grades on formal assignments are low while in-class work gets high marks.

The first POP group was great. One girl had somehow managed to research Fisher's speech and told the class that Fisher convinced the nation that AIDS was not just a gay disease but rather something that could affect anyone. A boy in the group said something like this: "You have to remember that, back then, there was a lot of anti-gay prejudice in the U.S."

The whole class nodded thoughtfully, and I was stuck to my chair. "Back then." For high school juniors and seniors, 1992 is "back then."

I've always hated when students say those two words. It's usually used to refer to something in 1947, or 1492, or some distant time in history, a time students don't actually know or remember, so they'll make some blanket statement about "back then." Back then people were dumb. Back then people didn't know about love. Back then the world was black and white. And I'm always like, come on, do some research, don't just fall back on "back then" when you don't actually know anything about it.

This time, though, the kid said "back then" about 1992. Back then, I was a university student. This means, ultimately, that I grew up "back then." I grew up in history. Am a relic. A man from the past, a time traveler. Old. For a 17-year-old student, 1992 is ancient history, a time he doesn't know much about, so he puts statements into context by saying "back then."

In this case, the student was right: Back then, the world was more anti-gay than it is today. Evidence: The U.S. military's don't-ask, don't-tell policy, which was passed 17 years ago, ends today.

The people who think growing up in 2011 is difficult, more difficult than when they were young, are wrong. In some ways, the world today is a little better. But history will have to decide. And if history doesn't, there will be some student 17 years from now talking about 2011, and he'll say, "Back then, people still thought blogging was cool."

Subject: A Monkey Took Someone's Yellow Bag & Blue Chappals

An email from one of my colleagues (an only-in-India kind of email):

Dear Fearless Middle School Staffers,

I wanted to let you know that I saw a monkey take someone's yellow cloth bag this morning from the MS area outside of the ESL classroom or near the lockers. By the time I saw the monkey, it had taken the bag up to the corner of roof area above the lockers. I saw it take out a blue pair of chappals from the bag, but didn't see if there was anything else in the bag. If any of your students are missing these things (or if you are) you might find them up on the roof.

I hope you all had a good Tuesday.

Dharamshala

Fifteen minutes into a conversation with a Tibetan refugee, I noticed some of the girls shuffling around, looking restless. One tried to signal me, mouthed some words I couldn't understand, and reached into her purse. I just shook my head.

For the past three days, I had been chaperoning a group of 23 high school students, mostly twelfth graders, in the city of Dharamshala, home of the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan government-in-exile. Though educational, the trip was up to this point mostly exasperating, as it usually is on something like Activity Week, constantly waiting for latecomers, shushing them at night, watching in horror as they look bored or fall asleep during an audience with the prime minister.

This was our last morning in town, and we were visiting the Reception Centre (For New Arrivals From Tibet). After a short introduction to the centre from a staff member, we met a 38-year-old man who had recently arrived. His story was typical for one group of refugees, the ones who risk arrest or worse if they stay in their home country any longer: He and a group of about 40 people had participated in an anti-China demonstration in the capital city, Lhasa. Shots were fired, some of his friends fell, but he and his wife managed to run away with only the clothes on their backs and a scar on his arm from a bayonet wound. They left their 12-year-old daughter behind, hoping she would be taken in by relatives, and made a 23-day trek over the Himalayas to reach Nepal. From there they were taken to Delhi and finally to Dharamshala.
The other typical refugees are: children whose parents send them over the border to receive a Tibetan education (one of the main schools is in Mussoorie); monks and nuns who want to continue practicing Buddhism; and old people who want to meet His Holiness the Dalai Lama before they die. (We had also hoped for an audience with the Dalai Lama, but he was out of town.)

As some students asked questions which were translated by the employee ("When do you hope to return to Tibet?" "If I return, I will be killed."), others were looking like they were up to something. Please, I silently pleaded, just this once don't do anything stupid. Instead, as teenagers often to when you least expect it, they did something wonderful: They discreetly took up a collection for the man and his wife and whispered something to the centre's employee, who accepted the money and quietly rolled up the bills. I saw 500-rupee notes, as well as smaller denominations--plenty of money the kids could have blown on lunch and snacks and souvenirs.

The man looked touched when told of the donation. But when one of the students told the employee to "tell him that we are praying for him and his family," that's when tears welled up in his eyes and he said, "I thank you from the bottom of my heart."

For years, I had heard of the Tibetan struggle for independence; in fact, this year marks the 50th anniversary of the Dalai Lama's exile in India. Growing up, "Free Tibet" seemed like a trendy catchphrase uttered by Hollywood celebrities and pop stars. These days, the cause seems to be less fashionable, and even Barack Obama has refused to meet the Dalai Lama, afraid of Chinese response. Reading about and listening to stories of the struggle, it is evident that the Chinese are close to their goal of eliminating the cultural heritage of the country. Tibetan children are taught in Chinese and sing patriotic pro-China songs. There are now as many Chinese living in Tibet as there are Tibetans. All residents of Tibet, regardless of their background, must speak Chinese to get a white-collar job and won't be served at stores and restaurants if they speak Tibetan. Buddhist monks and nuns have been marginalized, and "reeducated" by their Chinese handlers.
But all is not lost in Dharamshala. The cry of "free Tibet" is slowly being replaced by "save Tibet." Religious and cultural practices are continuing here in India, with young and old practicing the ancient arts, speaking the language, sharing the cuisine with visitors. The government-in-exile is still trying to engage the Chinese, still asking to be allowed to return home. Instead of independence, however, they ask for autonomy, for the right to live in peace.

At the same time, there is a sense of hopelessness. When asked what young people can do to support the cause, Prime Minister Samdhong Rinpoche paused, then said, "Pray for us. But also, pray for the Chinese people."

This kind of answer does not satisfy everyone. We met one man, the owner of a bookstore, who disagree with the Dalai Lama and his government. His more radical approach would call for each Tibetan family to send one child to become a "mosquito," trained to disrupt China by performing small acts of sabotage on the mainland. So far, he has five volunteers.

On a visit to a nunnery, we watched the young women--heads shaved and clad in red robes--debate. One nun would loudly and energetically shout a question and clap her hands, while the second one, sitting on the ground, would respond. If her answer was incorrect, the one standing would perform an inverted slap. With dozens of voices and slaps going at once, the courtyard was a spectacle of noise and animation. This kind of religious training can probably no longer be seen in Tibet, according to the principal of the nunnery.
As we groped for answers to unspoken questions, as we searched for hope in this hopeless situation, we met nuns from Tibet, India, Bhutan, and Korea. One student mused: "At least because of all this, the Tibetan culture is being spread around the world." A small victory for those hoping to "save Tibet."

Past and present

Chatted on Facebook with one of my former advisees earlier today, and his advice to me regarding the blog: More stories, fewer photos. ("Write more about us!" he said, and I thought, you guys are gone, away at college, what am I supposed to write? But here goes anyway ...)

Speaking with former students is a good guage as to how I'm doing as a teacher. I always ask them how it's going, and if they think they were prepared. Now that they're gone, there's no need for them to lie. It turns out that speaking with former students is also a good way to plan what I am going to say to current students. So ...

All day today, in all my classes, I said, "You guys remember Jag? I chatted with him earlier. And guess what he said about college?"

Students in one of my classes were pretty funny about it:

"He said you did an excellent job of preparing him for college!"

"Well, something like that. But he said more."

"He said that the warm-ups really helped. He said you're one of the best teachers. He said college is easy compared to your class!"

"No, actually he said almost the exact opposite. He said that college is great, but that there's a lot of reading and writing, way more than he expected." And I told them that I've recently had emails from two other former students, and they said the same exact thing.

And then the kids all knew what was coming.

For my English 12 kids, read the entire chapter of The House of the Spirits, there's a quiz tomorrow. For journalism kids, sign up for on-line tutorials. For English 11, read a chapter in a textbook and revise an essay, including new information from the chapter.

"Thanks a lot," my current students are now saying to my former students.

And I just smile, saying, "I don't want to get the same email message from you in a year or two."

Lane

I work at a school that everyone seems to know, one of those places that you can mention anywhere in the world and someone will say, "Oh, I know someone that once worked there." Or studied there. Or whose husband or wife or parent knew someone that visited once.

But the fact is that I myself attended a high school just like that.

Today I was conferencing with a couple of parents. Their daughter, born in New Jersey, is here for her junior and senior years to get a global education and get in touch with her Indian heritage.

Her parents and I were talking about something or other, and they asked me what school I had attended.

"I went to a big public school in Chicago," I said. "Of course it was the number one school in the city at the time."

"Which school?" the wife asked.

"Lane Tech."

"Really? My niece went there, too," she responded. "She graduated in 1991."

"Two years after me," I said.

We then chatted about how it used to be number one but isn't anymore, how things change, how no matter where you go, you run into someone with connections to the place.

This was a nice little coincidence because, just this morning as I walked to work, I realized that I've missed my 20-year reunion. During my 10-year reunion, I was living and working in Japan. And as I sat down to write this, I looked at the date--Sept. 29, or 9/29--and that reminds me that back at Lane I was in Division 929.

Something's going on.

Coffee break

Spent all day Saturday at school. From about 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. I was writing report comments for all my students. After that, I was working with the eleventh graders on the talent show. Such a long day calls for lots and lots of coffee. Luckily, we have a coffee machine that grinds out a pretty OK cuppa, so I can usually stay awake, even on the longest of days.

As I walked past some students for the third time, I stopped to chat.

"I saw on the Discovery Channel something about how coffee can kill you," I said. "Supposedly, if a person drinks 60 cups in one day, he'll die."

One of my guys looked at me and asked, "Sixty? Or sixteen?"

"Sixty. Six-oh," I said. "I want to test it out. This is my sixth cup so far."

And he responded with an all-time cute comment: "Can you please stop? I don't want you to die!"

English class is

A couple of years back, I wrote about an Application for English Class that I have students fill out. The schools and even countries may change, but my teaching techniques don't. I have modified the application a little, resulting in some different humorous responses I can share.

Students have to plug in personal information and answer questions like "What are your strengths and weaknesses in English class," "List three things that make your extraordinary and/or different from others," and "What (or who) motivates you to pursue your goals?"

Here are some of my favorite responses to the final question, "Complete this sentence: English class is ..."

• like chocolate. Its flavor remains even after it's over.
• necessary for my future.
• where you get to excell and learn an universal language.
• cool, OK, coolest, good. one of my favorite classes.
• very interesting compared to other classes.
• a short story.
• like a woman, you must cherish every moment before she walks off.
• going to be tough but totally awesome!!
• a piggy bank.
• everything the teacher and students make it
• a training ground for oblivious minds.
• a philosophy.
• where we learn how to transfer emotions into words.
• ironic, in how its overall greatness cannot be put into words.
• fun when we don't do Shakespeare.
• an interesting class but very tricky and difficult where I have to be really confident and attentive.
• scary and stressful, but necessary.
• a lighthouse in a weather of mist is about to come in any second.
• a mystery
• a series of thriller movies that makes me awake all the time with tension.
• a bittersweet symphony.
• boring unless the teacher is fun.
• a mobile phone (it helps people to communicate with one another)
• not an elective.
• English class is a tribunal and I am the criminal being persecuted.

I sure am glad they don't come in with any preconceived notions.

First day fun

Walking to the library during a free period, I spot three twelfth grade guys hanging out with two new kids.

"I can't believe you're teaching them bad habits already," I say.

"Oh, come on," one of them says. "What can I possibly teach them?"

I stop. "Now that you mention it," I say, "you're right. You can't possibly teach them anything."

He laughs, and I go off on my merry way.

Today was the first day of school. I got to meet a whole new batch of kids. And so far, the kids are alright.
The eleventh graders are hilarious, because they've heard all sorts of things about me.

During one class, after explaining the syllabus, I asked, "Any questions?" Nobody moved. Nobody looked my way. So I waited. That's one of the questions about teaching, I guess. Can you wait long enough?

Finally, after an uncomfortable 45 seconds, a hand went up slowly. "Yes?" I asked.

"I heard you are a strict teacher," the new kid said. Where did he get that idea, I wondered.

"That's not a question," I said and stared him down.

"Sorry," he said, "someone told me you were strict." He looked at me expectantly.

"So what's your question?" I responded.

"Are you a strict teacher?"

I laughed. "I don't think so. But why don't you stick around and find out for yourself?"

Frank McCourt, 1930-2009

Bummer.

Several summers back, McCourt's book Teacher Man kept me in the profession and inspired me to write about my experiences. His book--about his 30 years in New York public schools--is hilarious, poignant, and true; McCourt admits his insecurities about teaching, much the same way I feel almost every day in the classroom. This New York Times article sums up his teaching days nicely.

Symposium

Or: Tears, Part 2

Five minutes before class: A student is standing solemnly outside the staff lounge. I am heading out of the room, going up to the auditorium where this girl and two classmates will present their "Senior Symposium."

"I have a problem," she says nervously. "I'm not ready."

"Sure you are," I say as I brush past her, knowing full well that she's probably not. She's one of my weaker students, working with two other weak students. Today's the first day of the Symposium, and the three of them got the unlucky break of being selected to go first. "You go on in five minutes. I'll see you there."

Three minutes before class: I've peeked into the auditorium; everything seems to be in place. A table and three chairs, plus a podium on stage. Lights on. Students are wandering in casually, filling in random seats. Two of the presenters are at the door; unprepared girl is not. I step out, see her standing in a corner by the stairs.

"I lost most of my presentation," she says as I approach. "I can't go on. Can the two guys go on without me? I'll take a zero."

"What do you mean you lost your presentation?" I ask, pretty much knowing what she'll tell me. All year long, whenever an assignment has been due, at least one student was bound to tell me something about a computer crash or lost storage device or some sort of technical snafu.

The girl pulls out some typed-up notes and mumbles something about working all night and not saving it properly.

"Looks like you have something," I say. "Just present that. Even if it's not great, even if you get a terrible grade, it's better than nothing. Remember what I've said all year, an F is better than a zero." (It's true: an F will not drag down an overall average like a zero does.)

She doesn't look convinced, but I turn away, distracted by some silly seniors asking questions about the Symposium. It begins today, and they still don't know exactly what's expected of them. It's not that difficult. In groups of three, they've all read and analyzed independent novels, linked by author or theme. Today, groups must present that author or theme. Each group member chooses something that links the three novels and speaks about it for ten minutes. Afterwards, there's a question-and-answer session, group members defending their conclusions.

The symposium has been a tradition here for at least 15 years. It's something every twelfth grader endures in the weeks before graduation. But I guess it hasn't hit them until here and now. They are graduating in less than 20 days.

"Does everyone have to dress formally, or just today's presenters?" someone asks. As if I'd tell her to leave if she wasn't dressed properly.

One minute before class: Unprepared girl is now a total nervous wreck. Tears are streaming down her face. She's probably wondering why she's here, cornered, why she didn't run somewhere, anywhere instead of showing up. I should let her off the hook, let her take a zero, fail the fourth quarter, possibly the semester, not graduate. I should. But first I need to trick her onto the stage.

"Let me ask you something," I say. "What do you think of me as a teacher? Am I OK? Or terrible? Or somewhere in between?"

She looks up. Wipes some tears away. "You're a very good teacher," she says.

"Thanks," I say. "Now let me tell you a story. Are you listening?"

I tell her--in as few words as possible--about my time student teaching, back in the early 90s. I was having a terrible time. I got along well with the students, but I just wasn't ready to teach. I quickly realized that I had blown off my entire four years of college. I hadn't learned a thing about teaching. I didn't know how to write a lesson plan, how to teach, how to assess. I didn't even know my subject well. When the university supervisor asked me specific questions about what I was doing or why, I couldn't answer.

So I decided to quit.

There was about a month to go, and I was in pain and agony. I realized that I would never actually work as a teacher. I didn't know what I would do, but I knew I'd never teach. One evening I told my parents that I was quitting. They were upset, but for the first time ever, they didn't attack my decision. They listened. And when I was done, tears streaming, they said something like this: "Maybe you won't ever teach. But just finish this. And if you decide to teach in the future, you'll have the degree, the qualifications."

I did finish that semester of student teaching. It wasn't great. But my cooperating teacher was encouraging, and the university supervisor gave me a pass.

"My point," I tell unprepared girl, "is that I'm glad I finished what I started. If I had quit back then, I wouldn't be here right now."

She agrees to give it a try.

30 seconds before class: As nervous girl walks into the auditorium, I smile and give her a final word of advice: "I promise you, you will not die. It might not be great, but you will not die."


I turn out to be right. Her group does fine. She does fine; in fact, she's better than her more confident group members. And the audience is approving, asking loads of serious questions. It's not the greatest 40 minutes of anyone's life, but nobody dies, life goes on, and maybe someone has even learned something.

Bravery

What is the bravest thing you have ever done?

I personally don't know if I have ever done anything brave in my life. Definitely never as brave as what one of my twelfth graders did today.

For the past two weeks ago, the twelfth graders had been talking about staging a senior skip day. "Tell us when you're going to do it so we plan accordingly," we teachers would say. "We haven't decided anything," they would reply. Well today was the day. At morning assembly, the seniors were noted for their absence. They were simply gone. Where to, nobody knew.

One girl, though, was there, sitting and smiling when the school principal stood on stage and said, "I take a dim view of this action at this time of year."

"Why aren't you skipping?" I asked her after assembly. She was going to be the only student in my first class.

"Because I don't feel like it," she said. "I have nothing to rebel against." She said the same kind of thing to other teachers, with slight variations. "I know it sounds cheesy, but I want to go to my classes." This girl is not in the running for valedictorian, nor is she going for a perfect attendance award. She just didn't feel like skipping.

Turns out she took a lot of heat from her peers. Apparently, she got all sorts of nasty phone calls and text messages telling her how big of a bitch she was, how she had ruined skip day, how the whole class would suffer because of her actions. Thing is, the principal did drive up to the top of the hill, where the seniors were congregating, and told them they'd either come back to school and face minor consequences or stay away and face major consequences. Almost half of them came back.

"It was the scariest thing ever," one of the returnees said. "He came up, delivered one sentence, and got back in the car and left."

Meanwhile, the lone holdout was reeling from the attacks.

"Basically we were all blackmailed by the class governors to say we'd skip school today," she said. "I signed something saying I'd skip, but then I didn't feel like it."

At the end of a grueling semester, at the end of four long years of high school, the senior class isn't very united. Most of the kids just want to get out of here and get on with their lives. Today's failed attempt at unification won't make things better.

"The whole thing's so stupid," holdout girl said.

Finally, one of the returnees approached. "You're my hero. You really are," the returnee said to holdout girl. "I wish I had been smart enough to say 'screw it' and come to school like you did. But it was so hard."

The pressure was on. And one girl was brave enough to push back against the weight of all of her peers. It took guts.

True

Or: Tears, part 1

"Did you really write this? Is all of this true?"

It rarely happens, but every once in a while, a student writes something so good that I have no choice but to ask. I'm in the English office with one of my eleventh graders, reviewing his personal essay.

"Yes, everything is true," he says. "Well, I'm not sure about all the dialogue, but I think that's what he said."

"This is pretty incredible," I tell him.

High school students have the hardest time writing about themselves. Many claim that they've never experienced anything worthy of an essay, that their lives are boring, that they are nobodies. Or they write too much about the most minor point, or a negative trait that they really shouldn't be revealing. But with a little digging and a lot of prodding, most produce some really interesting stuff. Back in Chicago, there were plenty of stories of survival--from gang warfare, drugs, bad parents. Here, at an elite boarding school full of well-to-do Indians and other Asians, there are stories of success and tradition--the uncle who became a billionaire, the grandmother teaching Tibetan ideals.

One kid, though, really blew me away. I probably shouldn't reveal too much--it is a personal essay after all--but maybe he wouldn't mind.

One boy found out at some point in elementary school that he was a quarter Jewish. Living in Germany at the time, he was given a new nickname, and a game called "Catch the Jew" was established. He thought it was all hilarious (his emphasis, not mine).

Then, about a year ago, he met his one remaining Jewish relative, his grandfather. The boy laughed so hard he cried when he saw the old man's big nose. Then, the grandfather told a story about the time he left an orphanage after the war, after four years in a concentration camp, when all he wanted was an ice cream cone.

That's the sparknotes version, missing the emotion and cleverness. But trust me, the essay is incredible. If it's true.

In class, I raved about it and asked the writer if he'd be willing to read it. He agreed. He's sort of a show-off, likes being the center of attention, so he stood proudly in front of his peers. His pronunciation isn't the best, plus he started reading way too fast, so he wasn't doing any of it justice. At a pause, I interrupted, "Are you a little nervous?" He admitted he was. "Well, slow down," I said.

He did. When he got to the ice cream incident, he paused a little longer. "Just a minute," he said. He bent over, hiding his face behind his paper, shoulders heaving. Soon, he was sobbing out loud. He couldn't get a single word out, just remained crouching at the front of the room, tears and mucus running down his face.

The class sat in stunned silence. Here was a campus tough guy--someone who flirts relentlessly, who gets busted smoking and doesn't care, who influences shy Korean boys to talk to girls, who plays sports and laughs and openly admits he drinks--weeping.

I let him stay in that position, all by himself, for a minute. The longest, sweetest, most beautiful minute of the school year. I'm pretty sure the story is true.

The art of teaching

Every English teacher knows the story:

You try to discuss a novel, try to point out some possible symbols, try to get the kids to create meaning out of what's there. Soon enough, skeptical faces stare back, and finally a brave soul says, "Yeah right! How do you know the author meant that?"

"Well, I don't know he meant exactly that," you say, "but he definitely meant something. I mean, do you think that scene--or those words--are there by accident?"

"It's possible," the skeptical student says. "Why do you insist that everything has some hidden meaning? Can't things just be what they are?"

"Of course they can," you say. "And they are what they are. But the beauty of literature is that there's more to it. Literature is an art."

Anyway, if you're an English teacher you know the story. And if you've ever been a student in an English class, you know the story from the other end. In fact, you probably hate reading because of the damn analyzing you were forced to do.

My eleventh graders have been grumbling about this stuff for the past few days. The grumbling almost turned to shouting when I handed back a multiple-choice test on Parts 1 and 2 of Ian McEwan's Atonement.

Writing multiple-choice questions about literature is hard enough. Defending the questions and answers against the skeptics is almost impossible.

But today I think I made a breakthrough.

"OK, I'm working on my multiple-choice-question writing," I announced at the start of class. "Take out scratch paper and answer two questions. They're based on a New Yorker article about McEwan. You'll read the article next week, but today I want to see what you think."

This was a brilliant tactical move. I highly recommend it. The New Yorker article is brilliant, because it's not just about the author; it's about the writing process. The reporter follows McEwan as he works on his new novel.

"Question 1," I said. This was an oral test. "How long do you think McEwan worked on Part 2 of Atonement? Was it A. several hours, B. several days, C. several weeks, or D. several months?"

The kids scribbled their choices.

"Question 2. About how many words does McEwan write on a good day? Remember that he is a professional writer, and he has nothing else to do all day but write. So, is it A. 500, B. 1,000, C. 2,000, or D. 5,000?"

I asked to see a show of hands. What did they think? Mostly B. or C. for both questions. Maybe kids are conditioned to answer B. or C. when they don't know an answer.

"OK, thanks for playing. You'll find out the answers next week when we read the article," I said. This was met with groans. "What, you want to know right now?" They did. "Fine."

And so I pulled out a copy of the article and read the answer to question 1: "When McEwan was writing Atonement, he struggled for months with the Dunkirk section." And the answer to question 2: "For McEwan, a single 'dream of absorption' often yields just a few details worth fondling. Several hundred words is a good day."

"So," I said, "the answers are D. and A." Only one student had both answers correct, a girl who talked to me about McEwan after school on Monday. "Now," I said, "who can tell me why I had you try to answer these two questions?"

A kid got it right on the first try: "Because we always argue when you say that writers spend a lot of time on their novels, and that everything's in there for a reason."

"Exactly!" I said.

"Yeah, but," a skeptic said, "is this true for every writer? Or just about McEwan?"

"Well," I said, "every writer is different. Some struggle for weeks on just one sentence, trying to make it perfect. But whatever the case is, you need to believe me when I say that writing is an art."

Whine

Working at a k-12 boarding school with students and teachers from dozens of countries and cultures, simple daily interactions can be educational and rich in meaning. Random little moments with people I don't even know can make me shake my head in wonder and pontificate on "kids these days."

As I was talking to a couple of my eleventh graders after school in the quad today, a sixth grade girl walked by and shouted in her annoying little voice, "HelLO, Mr. PolKA!" I don't really know her; I don't teach her; but she shouts out my name whenever and wherever she sees me. It's kind of cute. Kind of rude.

Before I could respond to her, though, she saw one of the kids I was talking to, said something in Korean, and bowed low in a sign of respect.

"Wait a minute!" I shouted. "You bow to her--a student? But you don't bow to me?"

"Oh, sorry," the sixth grader said and gave me a quick, little bow before running off.

"What was that all about?" I asked my two kids.

"I don't know," the recipient of the bow said. "I guess she sees me as her respected elder."

"But not me?" I asked.

"I get the same thing from the younger Thai students," my other student said. "But I guess they just see you as a foreigner."

"So I don't get respect? I thought you came from cultures that respect teachers."

"Yeah," the Thai guy said, "but they see you as an American and act appropriately. They act the way American students would towards teachers."

There's something wrong with kids these days. Especially here, especially the good kids that come from good families, the ones that end up acting the way they think Americans are supposed to act. But maybe "wrong" is the wrong word. When you're in a situation where cultures mix, where identities and beliefs are formed, strange things happen. And strange conversations take place.

This morning, for example, I ate breakfast at school. Only one colleague was there, a French teacher, with his son, who is in the second grade. My colleague stepped away from the table, so I continued with some small talk with the small kid. We were on the topic of food, and he was saying how he prefers certain things back home in France.

"I bet you think everything is better in France," I said.

"No, not everything," he said. "I don't like the bananas in France. They get shipped all the way from Africa."

"Really," I said, and then we chatted about different foods that are better here in India. Eventually we ran out of different ingredients you can add to milk.

"You know," I told him, "when I visited France a couple of years ago, I liked something that you probably don't know much about. I really liked the wine."

"Oh, yeah, wine! Some wine, when you drink it, it makes you go," he said, making a strange, shuddering face. "Other wine makes you go," he continued, this time with a different face.

I was having a conversation about wine with a second grader! Or was I?

"Do you mean to tell me that you can differentiate between good wine and bad wine?" I asked.

"No," he said, "all wine is good. But I really like beer."

"Beer?" I laughed.

"Yeah! Apple beer."

"Do you mean cider?"

"Is that what it's called?"

"Where did you try cider? Does you father allow it?"

"No, at grandma's. I had two glasses!"

After school, after the bowing incident, I ran into the French teacher in the staff work room. I told him the story.

"Surely you're exaggerating," he said.

"No, that was the exact conversation we had this morning," I said.

He said I was trying to embarrass him in front of other colleagues, who were laughing away, especially when he said that his son had just been disqualified from the spelling bee for misspelling the word "wine."

"Which wine was it? The kind you drink, or the way kids talk?" I asked.

"Now you're really trying to embarrass me," he said.

Eventually the conversation returned to the wine you drink. He said he sometimes buys a local brand from this one shop at the top of the hill.

"How is it?" I asked. "Is it drinkable?"

"No," he said, "I wouldn't say it's drinkable."

"Really? What would your son say?"

Children

As I was heading home after school today, I ran into four girls in the quad. They looked like they could use a little cheering up, so I said, "Hmm, what do the four of you have in common?"

"Very funny," one of them said. "You know why we're in trouble."

I did know, and it turned out that they were waiting for the head of high school to personally hand deliver letters of apology. Over the weekend, they had been caught with a bottle of booze. "We just hope that you and the other teachers don't think any less of us because of this," one of the girls said.

"Don't worry," I smiled. "It's impossible for me to think any less of you than I already do."

"Ha ha. But seriously, you probably did worse things when you were in high school."

I wasn't about to admit it, so I switched the subject. "You know the trouble with getting older," I said, easing into lecture mode, "is that you become more conservative. And you worry about young people. And you try to protect them from the dangers of life."

One of their guy friends walked by, and I called him over. I asked him, "What do these four have in common?"

"I don't know," he said. "They're all beautiful?"

Smooth kid. Not bad for an eleventh grader. Of course he did know why they were in trouble, and he stuck around and chatted, talking about all the drinking he and his friends did in Delhi over the weekend.

"See how unfair all this is?" one of the girls said. "So many people do a lot worse than what we did."

"Yeah," I said, "but you got caught. Plus, you're girls." Eventually the conversation turned back to me. "Oh sure," I said, "you can try to ignore your crime by talking about a helpless older person. Or better yet, blame it on me and the book I assigned. You could say you were so influenced by Holden Caulfield that you wanted to see what drinking was all about."

I didn't stick around to see how their apology went. Probably they'll get dorm-gated. I'm not sure what that means, but I think it involves not letting them out of the dorms except to go to school.

I did tell them that eventually they'd laugh about this incident, but in the meantime, I would continue mocking them, just to make them feel bad enough not to be stupid in the future. I was tempted to tell them about my first drinking experiences, but I'm past trying to be cool in front of my students. I'm also past trying to be a bad influence. Plus, I'd have to go deep into my past to talk about my first drinking stories ...

In eighth grade, some girls used to have parties where we played games like "spin the bottle" and something called "catch and kiss." Of course there was always liquor around. Seems odd. When I look at eighth graders now, they seem so young and dumb, like such babies, and I can't imagine them drinking. But I clearly remember thinking I knew it all back then; plus, I remember kissing a girl named Vanessa in her basement, slightly buzzed from a couple of shots of vodka. I also remember how dirty this girl was, what she used to say she would do if she ever met the lead singer of Motley Crue.

I also think about the first time I got sick from drinking. Freshman year, over at Mike's house. A third guy--probably Mark--Mike and I drank a bottle of whiskey in about 20 minutes, then headed off to a nearby park to throw around a football. I started throwing up soon after we got to the park. Then, on the way home, just for good measure, I threw up all over the CTA bus.

Pretty disgusting. And stupid. But why is it that I'm supposed to act shocked when a group of eleventh grade girls quietly want to experiment in the safety of their dorm room? Is it because they are "good" girls? Because I see them as children?

At one point in our conversation, one of the girls said something about me not really understanding how any of this feels because I'm not a parent. "Yeah, thank God for that," I said. "But I'll tell you one thing. It seems to me that, from everyone my age that does have kids, the wilder they were when they were young, the stricter they are now. So watch out. Some day, if you have children, and they get busted for drinking or doing drugs or something, you will be the one that does not understand. You will punish your kids swiftly and severely."

Or, if they're really unlucky, they'll become teachers, lecturing teenagers about this kind of thing.

Dis honor

As my students walked into class yesterday, they were confronted with this message from their teacher in 300-point font on the projector screen:

Write and sign this pledge on your test (if you do not, I will not mark it):

On my honor, I pledge that I have neither given nor received improper assistance in completing this task.

"Are you kidding?" a few demanded.

"That's bullshit," a couple mumbled under their breaths.

"No, I'm not kidding," I said, "and I don't care what you think. We now have an honor code."

"What if I don't have honor?" one wiseguy wanted to know.

"Then this is completely meaningless to you," I said. "Just sign it and cheat. But if you get caught, there will be consequences."

A group of students had led the effort to start up an honor council at the school. This was after months--if not years--of seeing others getting away with cheating on exams and assignments. For my part, I was disturbed by the administration's failure to deal severely with an alleged cheater, someone that different teachers on different occasions had caught. So when the email came asking us to discuss the honor council and code with classes next week, I decided to start here and now. With four of my classes having quizzes yesterday, I had them write and sign the pledge on their papers. And I spent valuable class time responding to student complaints and anger about it.

I was a hero of honor! Or so I thought.

After school, the teacher-advisor of the honor council approached me, saying a couple of the kids were upset with me. Upset.

I tried to process. I rewound through the day, wondering what I might have said to offend.

Possibly: "So this means that from now on, you either don't cheat, or you cheat so well that you don't get caught." I did say that.

Or: "If you don't believe in honor, then why do you care? It's just one more thing you have to do, like go to chapel once a month."

Or: "You might as well get used to it. Most colleges and universities have some sort of honor code you sign, and if you're busted cheating, the consequences are more severe and more expensive than here."

I was feeling pretty good about how I had defended honor. But still. "What did I say?" I asked.

Apparently, two of the kids were upset that I had also said something about how this pledge does not apply to me, to "do as I say, not as I do." I don't remember saying it, but I probably did. My initial thought was to apologize for this dis of the honor code. But when I thought about it later, I decided I was right.

The student honor code absolutely does not apply to teachers. It's like anything else: There are rules that students must follow. Teachers may lead by example, but we shouldn't be held to the same standards.

Instead, teachers are held to a much higher standard. Or we should be. We are professionals, having been educated and then hired to fulfill a responsibility. If a student is caught cheating, he may get a zero on the assignment and possibly a one- or two-day suspension. A teacher, on the other hand, can lose his job for a transgression. So, saying that a teacher should sign the student honor code is a false analogy, comparing apples to oranges.

And speaking of, I need to remember to give extra credit to the kid that brings me an apple every day.