The acorns are coming...the acorns are coming.
Once a year I am always startled by the acorns that fall from my huge oak tree and hit my roof. The first fall I lived in my house...I thought they were rats in my walls...because I would hear scurrying, then silence. This was the acorns rolling off my roof.
Late at night during a big wind gust it sounds like a bomb being dropped in my bedroom. I heard the first couple fall last night, but the acorns are coming.
So, I have developed a fear of acorns. Do you think that's called acornaphobia? (Don't confuse that with a cornacopia.
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Saturday, November 10, 2007
Life
Life lessons are hard to learn. In working with teenagers I seem to see students learn really hard life lessons. To be honest, it hurts my heart sometimes.
This week two students at my school died in a car accident. Didn't anyone tell those children that teenagers are not suppose to die? As I found out the news and found out they were in my co-worker's classes, my heart ached. The bell for first period rang and it was strange as I looked in my student's eyes; they were about to find out about the car accident and that two of their peers had died the night before. As the announcement was made, I couldn't look at my students...only an hour before had I found out the news I had mental pictures of all my students hoping that they weren't my students that had died.
It was surreal that after the announcement was made over the intercom, I was to start teaching physics. As I looked at my students I was hoping that an adult or professional would walk in the room and start telling us what to do. But wait, I was the adult and professional. I was to know what to say and how to say it. I was to be the role model of how to deal with this tragedy.
They don't train you for that in your education classes, only experience helps. I was haunted this week from the memory of my first year teaching. In May, after I taught Jason for 8 months in my first period physics class, he committed suicide. I found out from an email that said URGENT. The days that followed I will always remember. I was the one that emptied his locker. I was asked why I didn't see the red flags. As a friend drove me to the funeral, I barely could walk and had trouble dealing with the reality of Jason's death. This week brought a lot of those memories back. How do you get over the deaths of students?
You don't. You deal with the grief, and you move on with your life and your heart grows for your students. You get around losing students, but you never get over it. Teenagers are not suppose to die.
This week two students at my school died in a car accident. Didn't anyone tell those children that teenagers are not suppose to die? As I found out the news and found out they were in my co-worker's classes, my heart ached. The bell for first period rang and it was strange as I looked in my student's eyes; they were about to find out about the car accident and that two of their peers had died the night before. As the announcement was made, I couldn't look at my students...only an hour before had I found out the news I had mental pictures of all my students hoping that they weren't my students that had died.
It was surreal that after the announcement was made over the intercom, I was to start teaching physics. As I looked at my students I was hoping that an adult or professional would walk in the room and start telling us what to do. But wait, I was the adult and professional. I was to know what to say and how to say it. I was to be the role model of how to deal with this tragedy.
They don't train you for that in your education classes, only experience helps. I was haunted this week from the memory of my first year teaching. In May, after I taught Jason for 8 months in my first period physics class, he committed suicide. I found out from an email that said URGENT. The days that followed I will always remember. I was the one that emptied his locker. I was asked why I didn't see the red flags. As a friend drove me to the funeral, I barely could walk and had trouble dealing with the reality of Jason's death. This week brought a lot of those memories back. How do you get over the deaths of students?
You don't. You deal with the grief, and you move on with your life and your heart grows for your students. You get around losing students, but you never get over it. Teenagers are not suppose to die.
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