Teaching, Living, and Learning

Tuesday, April 07, 2009

"Cherry Blossoms in Silvery Light", oil on canvas, by Roxanne Steed

Teaching Journal

Day 119, April 7, 2009

For some reason, a refreshing feeling of assurance stayed with me through most of my classes today. Somehow I felt confident that everything was happening the way it was supposed to – that I didn’t have to do my usual fretting and fussing about how the lessons were going. I had a feeling of security, as if no words or behavior could possibly be out of place or imperil the peace of the classroom. I’m not sure where this feeling came from. (I’m never sure where ANY of my feelings come from.) Perhaps it arose because of some meditative reading I did this morning, or because of an especially nourishing breakfast, or because of the typically supportive spirit of my scholars, or simply because it was an hospitable, spring-like day. Wherever the feeling came from, it was much esteemed by this sometimes anxious and hesitant teacher.

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I found this quote (below) in Jane Austen's Mansfield Park. She's describing Fanny Price's home at Mansfield, but the words exactly remind me of the atmosphere I try to maintain in my classroom:
" ... no sounds of contention, no raised voice, no abrupt bursts, no tread of violence, was ever heard; all proceeded in a regular course of cheerful orderliness; everybody had their due importance; everybody's feelings were consulted."

...........

The following quote is from David Copperfield by Charles Dickens. I would like my classroom to be like Dr. Strong's school:

"Dr. Strong's was an excellent school...It was very gravely and decorously ordered, and on a sound system; with an appeal, in everything, to the honor and good faith of the [students], and an avowed intention to rely on their possession of these qualities unless they proved themselves unworthy of it, which worked wonders. We all felt that we had a share in the management of the place, and in sustaining its character and dignity."

If I replaced "agent" with "teacher", this passage from a short story might, I hope, describe me in my classroom:
"The agent spent his days in following what seemed to many observers to be only a dull routine, but all his steadiness of purpose, all his simple intentness, all his gifts of strategy and powers of foresight, and of turning an interruption into an opportunity, were brought to bear upon this dull routine with a keen pleasure."
-- from "The Gray Mills of Farley" by Sarah Orne Jewett