During a faculty meeting at the beginning of the school year, our principal gave us each a copy of
The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch. While I was interested in the book, it was the gift wrap that was most intriguing. It was red paper with three Chinese characters and their English translations beneath them. The three words were
Belief, Success, and Victory. I decided that this could be the theme of my year. I gently unwrapped the gift and displayed the wrapping paper above my desk. Eleven months later, a whirlwind of challenges and experiences have swept through me, but the paper is still in the exact spot above my desk. And it held true- it remains the theme of my first year of teaching.
BeliefI remember setting my classroom up during the first few teacher work days before school started. I had no idea what to do. I just started cutting paper and stapling it to the wall. It took forever. I didn't even know what an IEP looked like. My UH mentor told me I had three IEP deadlines approaching rapidly. I didn't even know where to start. The room was boiling hot.
Belief. I convinced myself that in weeks I'd be on my feet and taking my kids in the right direction at full speed.
I remember after about week 3 when the real behavior problems started to surface. ADHD. EBD. ODD. Acronyms I had read about and studied but had no idea how they could instantly destroy a lesson and set you and the rest of the class into panic mode. The class kept getting bigger. Sixteen kids. Eighteen. Twenty-one. Twenty-three. I called my mom one day on the way home from school and told her that there was NO POSSIBLE WAY to run a class with that many students with disabilities and only a teacher and an EA.
Belief. I called her back and told her that somehow, someway, I would get it done.
SuccessDon't be misled. There were many, many, many failures in my first year. But in them lied success. Taking each failure with a grain of salt and building on it. Waking up each morning and looking the failures, defeats, and shortcomings of the past straight in the face, and letting them know that I wasn't about to back down and give up.
I remember the second round of HSA quarterlies. I still wasn't a big fan of the test, and many of the students still struggled, but they did improve. I remember working with Matthew on
The Lorax and seeing how happy he was after reading it to the elementary school students. I remember hearing how well Patrick was doing in the general education language arts class. Most importantly, I remember watching so many of my students blossom in a new environment and share the joy of my classroom with me and each other.
Success.Victory
The truth is that the victory is yet to come. I still have at least one year to get there. I don't know if I ever will. Teaching is a complex cycle of belief, success, failure, and victory, spiraling on forever. It's more like paddling a river than climbing a mountain- we never get to the top because new challenges are always coming our way. And it's never the same course. That's why I like the job so much. No day is ever the same.
With that being said, the truest, most substantial victory of the year was the deep love, joy, and passion I developed for my students, the others working around me, and the new community surrounding me. Victory.
