Life of the ridiculous

It's only Tuesday but I've seen my fair share of the silliness and insanity that pretty much sums up what I do for a living. It ranges from the inappropriate ("Ms. Won, come sit on my lap and tell me all that's bothering you" said by a FEMALE student) to the downright bizarre ("I love my parents-I'm always cuddling with them, sometimes I even sleep in their bed!" exclaimed a male student). Maybe this is some elaborate plot planned by all of my students to drive me to the conviction that all seventh graders have lost their marbles. 

EXHIBIT A

Now I've seen students clumsily trying to write with one of those jumbo pencils before. Usually I give the disapproving eyebrow and tell that student to use a different writing instrument. But when I saw this particular goofball walking towards my class with this torpedo sized, 3 ft GIANT crayon, I gave 3 sharp finger snaps and said, "You better park that thing right in front of the door!"

"But Ms. Won," pleads goofball, "It's my piggy bank too! I can't just leave it out here!" 

"I said PARK IT!!!"

My only question is, if it's not for children under 3, then how did this student manage to get ahold of it?

Field Trip!

Last Monday while I was most fervently celebrating President's Day, I had the honor of taking a former student and her mother to a Korean market. It all started when she, a Hispanic student, surprised me by describing a Korean side dish of roasted seaweed speckled with salt. One day for lunch, I made 2 batches of rice and brought a whole packet of seaweed and we shared a lunch of seaweed "cigars". When I got a chance to talk to her and her mother after school, I enthusiastically offered to be their very own Korean tour guide to the market.

We met at the market and started in the produce aisle. I started off easy with unassuming lettuce, cucumbers, and then throwing in a packet of sesame leaf to wrap marinated meats in. Then I went in for the kill when I saw cute little Korean ladies offering samples of side dishes.

The first was RAW marinated squid in a spicy sauce-

Breath not bad enough? Try this spicy GARLIC stem!

When I saw this student reaching for packet of rice cakes, gushing, "Oh my gawd Ms. Won, I love these," my eyes glistened with pride. I told her that my mom would love her.

It was the most fun I had at a Korean market. The only problem was that she came to school next day, pale and frail, confessing how she felt sick from all the samples we tried. She went home early that day and threw up. And that was my first and last field trip to the Korean market.

Three Cups of Tea

You might've read, or seen this book at the best seller's section. Greg Mortenson's long journey to give the gift of education to the most impoverished regions of Pakistan and Afghanistan sheds new light on the value of education. He taught me that the power of learning can be greater than that of warfare, violence, and even money. It's a refreshing solution to the tragedies happening everyday in Haiti, Uganda, and countless other places. Here's an interesting insight into improving the general well being of struggling villages:

"Once you educate the boys, they tend to leave the villages and go search for work in the cities," Mortenson explains. "But the girls stay home, become leaders in the community, and pass on what they have learned. If you really want to change a culture, to empower women, improve basic hygiene, and healthcare, and fight high rates of infant mortality, the answer is to educate girls."

"If the girls can just get to a fifth-grade level," says Mortenson, "everything changes."

Point & Shoot

I've been suckered into running the LA marathon. Let me explain~

It all began when a teacher asked me if I wanted to run after school.

I thought sure, it's a gorgeous neighborhood to run in...

burn some calories...

but then, I started feeling the peace that comes with hearing the soft patter of rubber soles rhythmically hitting the cement.

It turned out to be the perfect antidote to erase the sting of a stressful school day.

Even with the cons of burning calves, wheezing lungs, and tender ankles...

the pros were well worth it. 

Aw~

"Hi Charlie!"

Who needs a therapist?

And if watching 13 year old girls complete 13 mile runs doesn't inspire me, nothing will. So the marathon it is...4 week countdown has begun. 

A lesson in love

"All you need is love"...I’d love to teach my students this but more importantly, model it by example. Instead, I far too often teach the laws of impersonal business-efficiency, deadlines, promotions, and consequences. Love becomes too costly, too taxing. Teach love on top of essay writing, reading comprehension, and critical thinking? I’m just one woman!

And then comes along just one woman who oozes love, even in the fails she stamps on her students’ papers. Her name is Scarlett and she has 3 beautiful children of her own, husband, in laws, and her own side of the family to take care of but that doesn’t exhaust her from being a maternal 6^th grade teacher to her “brats and punks”. She cracks me up with an imitation of one student who likes to sludge around as if her feet were made out of lead. But I know she does it out of love. How do I know? Because she’s contemplating taking in that student as a foster child. That means sharing her home, her income, and sprouting some extra grey hairs over a student that she could easily banish from her thoughts come June. She took the biggest brat in her classroom and instead of viewing her as another burden to bear, as I’m sure many in her life already have, she took it upon herself to love her. That type of love-the ever multiplying kind-overwhelms me with its fearsome and magnificent strength. 

Room to Breathe

We, the teachers, are now required to post our learning objectives on the board each day. The objective ranges from the kid friendly ("Students will understand today's story") to sophisticated ("Students will identify and support the recurring theme in two different works with sufficient amount of textual evidence"). When I walked into one teacher's classroom, I noticed her learning objective dove straight to the point and said, "BE QUIET AND STAY ON TASK".

I'm hard on the kids. I'm insulted when I see them lazily twirling around pages of book that took me ages to deem as challenging yet understandable. But micromanaging and hovering above their shoulders makes them into well, prisoners. So today, I sat at my desk, and announced, "I'm here and happy to help you if you need it, but you know what you need to get done today, so take care of business".

I tore my eyes away from the corner kids (the 4 kids placed strategically at each corner of the room and heavily buffered by the nicest kids) who, true to form, weren't doing anything. I shut out the giggles and hushed whispers that swirled around the air like buzzing flies. And then, a miracle occurred.

After the last twittering laugher died out, they got to work. I dared to look up and my heart swelled with pride as I saw 90% of the class bent over their books. They even asked questions that I was burning to answer even before they cared to ask. After showing them how to properly copy a quote from the book only because they wanted to know, Samantha actually thanked me. She thanked me for teaching her. That nearly killed me.

Reality Check

Unfortunately, it's not a coincidence that it's been a while since my last post. Truth be told, I'm weary. First I blamed my funk on post winter break depression, then I attributed it to the dreary weather, and finally, imagined illnesses. But I think it's in the nature of the job.

It's like excitedly volunteering to help a friend in need. And of course the help that this friend needs is in the shape or form that is never easy to give-money, time, and/or an endless well of patience. You realize that there is a pattern forming where it requires you to give more than you receive. And you have this sick feeling in the pit of your stomach that this friend will:

A) never ever change

B) suddenly shut you out

C) drain you till there isn't any more of you left

But you risk it because once you see your friend in a state of such vulnerability, there's no turning back. You jump, I jump.

Although they are my students, not friends, I am still dealing with real relationships with real human beings. And like the real world that they originate from, they're just as messed up as I am. I wonder how far we'll go with the blind leading the blind. There is more out of my control than in, and more that frustrates than placates.

Sometimes I want to dive into my imaginary world where all kids come to me with love-filled, happy hearts that overflows out into loving learning, each other, and their own accomplishments. There are fleeting moments when this magic happens and my heart swells with such happiness than I ever thought was possible from a "job". Meanwhile in this dry spell, I pray for strength because the last thing these kids need is another apathetic figure dimming into the darkness.