Thursday, October 18, 2007

Full Court Press

As I begin typing this, I'm sitting at my first high school basketball game at the school that I teach. It's between games right now, so don't worry. I'm not typing this during the game. I'll finish typing most of the post at home. I just watched the girls slaughter the opposing team and I'm kind of impressed. It's funny because every single one of the girls who played are students of mine. My students who work hard in the classroom, work hard on the court as well. I watched them hustle hustle hustle the entire game. I'm not sure how a parent instills that sort of determination and drive. From what I can tell, it's mostly intrinsic. I have a pair of sisters who are more or less the exact opposite as far as motivation goes. One of them busts her butt to get everything done while the other barely works at all.

I can't help but feel I am but a minor player in these students' lives. I see them for one hour a day, five days a week. I'm facilitating them in becoming the adults they will be, but most of these kids have a good framework built up already. Not all of them, but most of them. It's as if I'm helping to pass the baton, from one role model to the next. In some cases though, I might be the first adult to actually attempt to pick up the baton.

I really love this job. The small school is great for letting me get to know all of my students, not just a small portion of the population. Tonight I also got a chance to talk to some of the parents and for the most part I was able to tell them what great kids they had and what a good job their kid was doing in my classroom. That's a really good feeling actually. I then reminded them that they had parent teacher conferences next week and that I hoped to see them again. Tonight was a rewarding night, but jeez, I was at the school for over 13 hours. That's a long time to be hanging out in one place. It's almost the weekend and I'm looking forward to it. Next week is an abbreviated week. I only have class for three days really. Thursday is parent teacher conferences and Friday is a day off. I need to get to bed. I got another full day on track.

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