The Re-Education of Ms. G (Part 4)

I believe I have defiantly hit rock bottom. Wait...before we jump to such an extreme conclusion, let us define “rock bottom.”

Rock Bottom: n. Colloquialism for “gutter” or “hell.” A seemingly endless procession of HELLS a normal, intelligent woman finds herself surrounded by; of which, escape is as painful as ones decent to the, aforementioned, place.

Yes, I have hit rock bottom.

The seventh week of school began, much like those before, in a series of small let downs and circling conversations. I found myself becoming completely absorbed by the politics in education. “Dumb down lessons”... “Raise your standards”... “Follow the standards”... “Don't teach to the test”... “Teach to the test.” The signals were more convoluted than the current state of our economy.

I believe it was Voltaire who said “Madness is to think of too many things in succession too fast, or of one thing too exclusively.” Yeah, that sounds about right.

Frustrated by the abundance of F's on my most recent Unit Test, I left school with a feeling of despair in the pit of stomach on Wednesday. Why the hell are these kids not getting it????? How, pray tell, can they know the material on Monday, then turn around and fail the test on Tuesday? In what language do the words “You scored a 2 on the Unit Test...out of a possible 100 points” inspire feelings of euphoria among high school students? OH! I know! ENGLISH!!!!!! I would assume it were my teaching habits, had the minimal amount of A's and B's not come to fruition.

SAMPLE QUESTION:
Who Wrote “The Road not Taken”
a) Emily Dickinson b) Alice Walker c) Audre Lorde d) Robert Frost

Next week....we are coloring pictures of Langston Hughes...maybe, a Dot-to-Dot of William Shakespeare, I haven't decided yet.

So, 5 pm on Wednesday...I have a complete nervous break down. I am talking an all inclusive trip to the Emergency Room and a continues refill of Zanex. Let the good times roll!!!! Needless to say, Thursday was my first “Mental Health Day.”

After my retail therapy, I made a conscious (read as: semi-conscious) decision to draw a line in the sand. It seems my problem, or one of my problems, was that I was taking their failures personally. Perhaps, the hardest part was that I knew they understood the material. Their problems laid exclusively in the fact that they don't have the desire to pass. I took it personally when they did not do the reading. I took it personally when they slept through class. I took it personally when they refused to turn in assignments.

There is a fine line between the person and the occupation. I found these two persona beginning to merge. While I was a teacher at school and a mother at home, I began to bring to much of my “teacher self” into my private life. I was forgetting who Hayley was and becoming Ms. G, even to my own children. That's not good.

So, what does one do when they are faced with becoming completely absorbed by their occupation? I ran; and so begins the "survival" phase of my re-education!

Currently, there are 77 days until Christmas Break...I am counting every single one. I bought a special pen just for marking a big, black X on each day.