More Teaching: Then & Now

I teach English courses at a liberal arts university. As I buttoned up my tweed jacket for class the other day, I flashed back to my early years of teaching. I still like my job, don’t get me wrong, but I find my days (and nights) more and more consumed by standards and bureaucratic busywork, and less and less filled with “liberal” and the sheer joy of learning & teaching. So I thought I’d try and analyze the differences between then and now…

THEN: I wander into class 5 minutes late, and engage students in a 15-minute discussion of the relative merits of Joan Armatrading’s new CD. I play Joan’s new CD in class.

NOW: I get to class 10 minutes early. Before students ever arrive, I’ve got my perfectly organized outline of a research essay—with highlighting and occasional red type for emphasis—up on the overhead screen. I’ve got my 3 color-coded handouts laid out in neat piles on my desk, in the order in which they will be handed out. I start going over the outline—which includes detailed goals and outcomes—2 minutes before class should really begin.

THEN: I assign my students a brief essay about whether or not all government documents, especially those of the DMV, should be written in verse.

NOW: I assign my students 17 standardized exercises on comma splices and run-on sentences, in order to prep them for the twice-a-semester standardized grammar test.

THEN: I leave home wearing a navy blue thermal underwear shirt, a flowered chiffon knee-length skirt, white silk long john bottoms, purple wool socks, and Army surplus boots. I forget to look at my hair. I sit on the front of my desk in class, swinging my wee short legs. I can’t figure out why students are grinning all through class.

NOW: I leave home wearing neutral trousers, a neutral vest or sweater over a neutral blouse, black socks and black dress shoes, and my hair is washed, combed, and smoothed with product into a tidy conservative bob. I stand at a podium in class. I can’t figure out why students are sleeping all through class.

THEN: I take my students outside for class. Because we’re sitting on the ground, we spend the entire class reading poems that use the word “grass.”

NOW: I never take my students outside for class. It would wreak havoc on my piles of handouts, and there’s no overhead screen.

THEN: I hug my students. We sometimes hold class in a local coffee shop. A couple times a semester, I invite my students over for guac & chips.

NOW: I am deathly afraid of lawsuits and privacy/harassment/appropriate conduct violations. I avoid touching my students at all cost. I do not share anything about my personal life with students.

THEN: I have an office phone with no voice mail and no answering service, so students never call. I have no computer at home. Except for occasional “Guac Sundays,” students expect to see me in class. Period.

NOW: Students expect to see me in class. They expect to be able to reach me on my cell days, nights, weekends, and holidays. They email me at 3:42 a.m. on St. Patrick’s Day night and expect me to answer immediately. I can’t touch them, but they expect to be e-tethered to me 24/7. They are probably Google-satelliting my house as I type this.

THEN: I LOVE my job, my students do amazingly well, and my student evaluations are always glowing.

NOW: I often feel BURIED by my job, my students constantly struggle, and my student evaluations are mediocre, including occasional vicious, personal attacks.

I’m not sure what all this means, and yeah, some of it may be slightly exaggerated. But I think in my imaginary, perfect teaching world, there’s less measurement, accountability, and uniformity, and more Socratic dialogue, inspiration, and creativity. And hugs. Way more hugs.