Chicken lady
3-16-19, 10:02am
So, some of you may have seen how excited I am about my English classes for next year in the work forum.
unfortunately I think my first and most important lesson is going to be “none of you are stupid.”
the attitude of my “fellow english teachers” (i’m Not an English teacher, i’m Just a teacher) seems to be that I am providing a place for kids who “can’t handle” the regular classes. They whisper when discussing putting kids in my classes and attempt to avoid letting the kid know we are discussing them.
I, on the other hand, snatched my handout back from a student I like, informing her in front of two kids who are taking my class, “this is not for you ‘power of the pen’ people, we are going to AVOID writing.”
When we avoid mentioning things, when we whisper, when we tell students “it’s ok to be different” or “xyz is nothing to be ashamed of” we are TEACHING them that there is something wrong, that there is something to be ashamed of.
i know a lot of the people who do that are trying to avoid passing on their own feelings, because they believe them to be wrong or harmful, or simply because they know they will be judged for them, but the method they choose just perpetuates the problem.
sometimes reality is that your writing skills suck, so you need to learn and be evaluated using other skills that donÂ’t suck. Play to your strengths! And enjoy it! Everybody canÂ’t be good at everything.
it’s like the “age is just a number” and “weight is just a number” people - it’s not just a number. It’s a number that means something. I’m 50. Based on family history, my life is at best half over. I do not have the potential for physical abilities that my students have (which doesn’t mean any of us will reach our full potential or that I can’t best some of them), my eyesight will never be 20/20 again even with correction. I will get no taller, only shorter. None of which changes if I hide being 50.
my weight is a number that affects other things - starting with my knees. (Not even because i’m 50. I was an overweight teenager with sore knees.) but on Friday, we weighed the baby goats. We had to use math, because they won’t stand still. So we wrote on the board “weight of [chicken lady] with goat - weight of [chicken lady] without goat = weight of goat.
i donÂ’t understand being embarrassed about your weight. If you are unhappy with your weight, try to change it. But what you actually weigh is just a data point. And itÂ’s only partly related to your appearance. The same weight looks completely different on different frames and in different shapes and with different composition. ItÂ’s not like we canÂ’t see you.
my kids are not writers. Forget “everybody is a writer” - baloney! They can accept that sometimes they are going to have to write, and they can learn to do it as well and painlessly as possible, but it will never be their thing. That doesn’t mean they aren’t story tellers, or explainers. I am not a runner. I will run for self preservation or if I am the fastest runner available. But I will hope that in an emergency, if someone who runs fast is needed, that person will be available. Or that there will be something I can drive. I’m not going to knock myself out training because one day I might have to run for help.
i donÂ’t think the answer to teaching kids not to be ashamed of differences is to tell them there is nothing wrong with being different. I think the answer is to ask them why, and to call bull on the bull.
unfortunately I think my first and most important lesson is going to be “none of you are stupid.”
the attitude of my “fellow english teachers” (i’m Not an English teacher, i’m Just a teacher) seems to be that I am providing a place for kids who “can’t handle” the regular classes. They whisper when discussing putting kids in my classes and attempt to avoid letting the kid know we are discussing them.
I, on the other hand, snatched my handout back from a student I like, informing her in front of two kids who are taking my class, “this is not for you ‘power of the pen’ people, we are going to AVOID writing.”
When we avoid mentioning things, when we whisper, when we tell students “it’s ok to be different” or “xyz is nothing to be ashamed of” we are TEACHING them that there is something wrong, that there is something to be ashamed of.
i know a lot of the people who do that are trying to avoid passing on their own feelings, because they believe them to be wrong or harmful, or simply because they know they will be judged for them, but the method they choose just perpetuates the problem.
sometimes reality is that your writing skills suck, so you need to learn and be evaluated using other skills that donÂ’t suck. Play to your strengths! And enjoy it! Everybody canÂ’t be good at everything.
it’s like the “age is just a number” and “weight is just a number” people - it’s not just a number. It’s a number that means something. I’m 50. Based on family history, my life is at best half over. I do not have the potential for physical abilities that my students have (which doesn’t mean any of us will reach our full potential or that I can’t best some of them), my eyesight will never be 20/20 again even with correction. I will get no taller, only shorter. None of which changes if I hide being 50.
my weight is a number that affects other things - starting with my knees. (Not even because i’m 50. I was an overweight teenager with sore knees.) but on Friday, we weighed the baby goats. We had to use math, because they won’t stand still. So we wrote on the board “weight of [chicken lady] with goat - weight of [chicken lady] without goat = weight of goat.
i donÂ’t understand being embarrassed about your weight. If you are unhappy with your weight, try to change it. But what you actually weigh is just a data point. And itÂ’s only partly related to your appearance. The same weight looks completely different on different frames and in different shapes and with different composition. ItÂ’s not like we canÂ’t see you.
my kids are not writers. Forget “everybody is a writer” - baloney! They can accept that sometimes they are going to have to write, and they can learn to do it as well and painlessly as possible, but it will never be their thing. That doesn’t mean they aren’t story tellers, or explainers. I am not a runner. I will run for self preservation or if I am the fastest runner available. But I will hope that in an emergency, if someone who runs fast is needed, that person will be available. Or that there will be something I can drive. I’m not going to knock myself out training because one day I might have to run for help.
i donÂ’t think the answer to teaching kids not to be ashamed of differences is to tell them there is nothing wrong with being different. I think the answer is to ask them why, and to call bull on the bull.