Lynn 1

Lynn wrote me a few weeks ago:
On Thursday one of my grade 9 boys came to me and said he wanted to transfer out. My heart stopped. I felt awful.  I’ve been asking him questions, he seems to be able to answer. I had no clue he wasn’t understanding  BECAUSE THAT’S PART OF WHAT I HAVEN”T BEEN DOING LATELY….well for over a month if I’m honest..and probably more than that if truth be known. I just haven’t been asking if they are with me. I repeat the phrases I pause and point. I’ve been going slowly. And I’ve been ignoring the sniff of boredom as I’ve been sticking doggedly to MY ideas and script… but I haven’t been stopping to check with everyone!…sigh….
I spoke to Jeff’s mother on the phone yesterday. She said he’s been struggling for weeks and I just felt awful. The thing is, I’ve been so struggling myself and stories have been bombing left right and center BECAUSE i’ve been telling the story.
ANYWAY….
The thing was…the universe conspired…I had a sub the other day and I left a number of options, turned out she chose her own worksheets and was met by my kids with a bit actually a lot of hostility. Apparently some of the students said that they didn’t understand her and she said they needed to pay closer attention. They told her that I say that if they don’t understand then it’s my fault. Well, you can imagine how that went over. She assigned her worksheets for homework and, true to form, the kids told her that they don’t have homework in my class. Gulp..I gather it wasn’t pretty. Some of the kids were sent out of the room, some to speak with administration…eep!The thing was, as I was speaking to Jeff’s mom and she was saying how he was feeling, I said that it was my fault.
“No,” she said.
“Oh yes”  I said “It is totally my fault if he doesn’t understand and I feel badly about it and I’d love to meet with both of you and try to make it better for him”… the thing was, I knew I let him down and I knew how much. I knew that I didn’t give him that feeling that Suzie gives where he was perfectly confident that I would never leave him behind. I got all wrapped up in the scripts, I left the personalizing behind, I shifted gears into the content … while i was trying to improve myself and left him behind in the process. Sigh. Anyway, we are meeting on Monday – Mom and Jeff and I – and I hope to convince him that he can learn and I will do a better job of helping him do that.