August, 2009
It’s 7:45 am in the early morning of my first day as an elementary school teacher.
It was chilly inside of my classroom, and my nerves were as taut as guitar strings, in addition to the butterflies that were fluttering around the inside of my stomach.
I was the only rookie teacher in the entire school. But I knew that I could not offer inexperience as an excuse for failure. During the first staff meeting of the year, the new principal — she’d been hired by the school district during the summer — wanted to make the situation clear.
“I reviewed the test scores from last year,” she had said. “They were not very good. If we don’t improve, then there will need to be changes that will be beyond my control.”
Every year, the school district — Aurora Public Schools in this case — set standards for growth and competence of its students. Last school year and the three years before that, Crawford Elementary School students were unable to display satisfactory academic growth. The areas in which we were most in need of improvement were reading and writing. However, raising the reading and writing scores of Crawford students would be difficult since ninety percent of our students were English Language Learners — English was the second language for these students.
The district’s response was to enact a plan that was similar to what took place with American car companies: place our school on a probation. If the educators at Crawford Elementary were unable to initiate measurable growth in students, the state would implement a restructuring of the school, which could mean the loss of teaching jobs for some people. I’d been thrown into the buzz saw; not an ideal situation for a recent graduate of a teaching university.
I’d heard of a restructuring plan that had been implemented at the high school across town. Its doors had been temporarily shuttered by the city in 2006, and the principal and long-standing teachers were replaced by new faculty and staff. That would be Crawford’s fate thenext year if we did not improve.
A few minutes before the bell was set to announce the beginning of a new school year, I grabbed copies of some worksheets, and then walked over to the room that housed the copy machines. As I entered, I caught the eye of a bespectacled first grade teacher that I hadn’t meet yet. She smiled and initiated a chat, and asked if I was ready to take on the new school year.
I pretended to perk up, though I felt the weight of expectation weighing me down. “I am ready to go,” I said.
“That’s great,” she said. “Have a great first day.” She placed documents onto the copy tray.
My heart was about to explode through my chest.
“I just hope that I don’t fail them,” I said under my breath.
She turned to respond. “What was that?”
Did I actually say that out loud?
“I said for you to have a great first day too!”
“Thanks!”
******
Standard practice was to greet the students as they entered the classroom. So, all of the teachers stood at the doorways, sporting bright smiles. Bright eyed students flooded through the front doors of the school and strode down the squeaky-clean hallway floor.
Crawford was the neighborhood school, situated two blocks north of east Colfax, a high crime area of the Aurora town ship. The vast majority of these kids had been attending school there for as long as they’d been going to school. The fifth graders — I was teaching fifth grade that year — knew exactly where their classes were located. Though extremely nervous, there was hope welling up within me like a spring. I broke into smile while greeting each student with a wave of the hand.
The students were so small, and quiet as mice. A few of them looked as if they belonged in the primary grades. I watched them as they prepared to take on the new school day. The kids were new to the fifth grade, but they were not new to the routine. They knew where to place their jackets and their backpacks. A few of their eyes roved over to the education wall — this is the wall where reference materials were kept for the students — which was still under construction. Good. I would not have to devote too much time to training them on the ancillary things.
Ring. Ring. Ring. Time for school to begin.
I took my position at the front of the classroom. Breathe, I thought, as the eyes of twenty-five young, impressionable children were staring up at me for guidance. “Good morning everybody,” I said in my best teacher voice. “I’m Mr. Ihenetu.”
*****
I didn’t know what a Smartboard was until I walked into my classroom for the first time a week before, and saw it mounted on the front wall. Smartboard is presentation software, used in conjunction with a laptop computer when delivering lessons to students. I knew my way around a computer and a smart phone, as I’d used both devices to complete assignments in college. Still, I’d grown up in the eighties, when Denver classroom teachers used chalk boards and dry erasers to teach students. And I hadn’t received lessons via the Smart Board when I was at the university.
I’d practiced using the Smartboard in the lead-up to the beginning of the school year, thinking that I’d made some measurable progress along the way. However, during my first few minutes as a teacher, I occasionally bumbled when trying to navigate through the first interaction of the day. The students didn’t seem to mind, except for the one brave and annoying soul.
“Do you like to work with technology Mr. Ihenetu?” asked Wendy, a rather portly ten year old girl who sat with four others at the back table.
The back of my neck was warm.
**********
The introduction of technology into the classroom infrastructure was only one of the notable changes to the life of the typical student. Children sat facing each other in groups of four, or five in some instances. Students were at various stages of scholastic development — overall proficiency ranged from first to sixth grade level. Therefore, this seating arrangement was encouraged, as the current zeitgeist called for students with diverging personalities and education levels to work together to solve problems; and perhaps the lower performing students could gain some skills from the higher performing ones. Students were also assigned jobs, a responsibility that all of the students embraced and relied upon. The kids loved to prove themselves through their execution of the job; and they were crucially important for those students who were not as competent, since lower performing students were given the opportunity to feel as essential as the stars.
The train was at full speed as it left the station. Learning in earnest had to begin on the first day.
I gathered all of the students in an area of the classroom, where I embedded a lesson on alliteration into a name game that was designed to encourage comity and familiarity. Then I sat them down in the same spot for a Number Talk — my favorite teaching activity — and followed that up with a math lesson via the Smart Board.
“Are there any questions?” I asked. “This is our first lesson together and I want to make sure that you guys have got it. Let me know and I will go over whatever it is you don’t understand.”
Hands shot into the air. I rushed to respond.
Thank god, I thought. Students were engaged.
I released the students to their tables to apply their new learning through a process called Investigations. I approached the students at their tables as they worked, asked questions, checked for understanding, and watched the clock. After twenty minutes elapsed, I allowed the students access to the classroom library situated just beyond the door that remained open at all times. The kids didn’t need my help with transitioning in between subjects, it was orderly and efficient. And my confidence began to grow. It was just the first day of school, but I suspected that I’d been gifted with a pretty good group of kids.
At mid-day the students lined up at the door for Specials Classes. Specials were treated as ancillary classes, important but not essential like reading, writing, science, and arithmetic. It was the favorite time of the day for the students though. Specials classes allowed students to utilize technology to learn core content, express themselves through art and music, and increase strength in gym classes. I escorted the train of students — a student was given the job as the train caboose — to the computer room, and then walked over to the affective needs room to meet Mr. D, one of the other three adult males present on that day. Mr. D was excited for the upcoming football season.
Specials were followed by lunch and recess. Recess provided students with opportunities to engage in some physical activity every single day while forging and solidifying friendships. It’s a damn shame, I thought. Gym class reduced to a one day per week activity when God knew that these kids needed the traditional five days a week of structured physical activity with a gym teacher. When guided by a qualified physical teacher, a student could improve their physical prowess over the span of one calendar year. And with more and more young people being classified as obese — and morbidly so — and with school lunches becoming calorie induced diabetes facilitators, increasing the amount of physical activity for children should have been of a more paramount concern.
When I went outside to collect my students, I was reminded of some aspects of the elementary school that I attended.
There was a black concrete area that was cracked and uneven in spots. Three metal poles had been spiked into the black top. Ropes with balls attached to the ends were being smacked around by two of my students. Oh my god! It’s tether ball! I felt the urge to rush out onto the blacktop and start swinging at the ball, but thought better of it. It wasn’t quite time yet. My eyes ventured further south to the grassy field area, where a great number of the older students had congregated. The primary aged children gravitated over to the west side of the field area, a sandy place where the playground equipment had been situated.
The bell rang, signaling the end of the recess. The children swarmed over to their waiting teachers. I ushered my students back to the classroom, gathered them onto a spot on the floor, turned off the lights, and spent the next twenty minutes struggling through a reading lesson. Next was more intensive reading instruction with groups of four or five students while the other students read books as they waited to be called for instruction. The kids saw the free reading period as an opportunity to read with a favored classmate. Of course I would have preferred that they remained stationed at their desks, but they were plaintive in their advocacy for free reading policies that were employed by the other teachers at the school. So, I acquiesced to their requests because these fifth-grade veterans of Crawford school knew more about the school procedures than I did, and I wanted to imbue them with some ownership.
Writing instruction was next. Before Crawford, I thought writing would be the easiest subject to teach. I was a good writer who’d received commendations on my craft from assorted professors at the graduate school. But on this day, a significant portion of the students offered bemused stares as I went through the lesson. My heart sank further as the minutes ticked by, the words, it’s my fault were running through my mind.
Some of my professors would have approved of my self-flagellation. “If students fail to learn, then teachers fail to teach,” said Professor Roberts, before a rapt class of teacher candidates. “You’ve got to get that into your head.” It was certainly inside of mine that day, flashing like a police siren.
I’ll have to be better tomorrow.
The remaining forty minutes of the school day would be spent with other teachers’ kiddos. When the bell chimed at 2:00 pm, students from every class exited their home rooms for those classrooms where they would receive additional instruction in English language development. Allowing every student in the school, ages six to eleven, to leave their home class at the same time led to traffic jams, crashes, and tomfoolery.
Although I wasn’t against the implementation of English Language Acquisition class, I’d felt like a trap had been sprung. I’d read theoretical explanations on language acquisition in graduate school, but I had no prior experience instructing students in the acquisition of the English language. And the class itself was a logistical nightmare. There were over forty children stuffed into my room, ranging from the third to fifth grade.
It was a big ask of teachers. Sorting through dozens of students for lessons, managing the behavior of children who were used to the disciplinary procedures of their home teachers, and learning to teach a new subject on the fly. I guess I was lucky that my students were mostly proficiently in English. Also, Elizabeth and Cynthia — Elizabeth and Cynthia were friends from graduate school — and I had been grouped into a cluster. So, we would be able to bounce ideas off of each other at the end of the day.
Students were released to their homerooms at the end of the language learning block, and immediately began packing their belongings in anticipation for the trip home. Once the students were corralled and settled into orderly lines, teachers exited their classrooms for the corridors, with their students trailing just behind them. We led our students down the south corridor of the school until we reached the doors, opened them, and stood back as the students ran onto the blacktopped area of the playground, where parents were awaiting the arrival of their children.
*******
I spent the next few hours at the kidney table, preparing lessons for the next school day. I spontaneously peeked at the clock, saw that it was a little past five, and sighed, knowing that there was still more work to do. I caught sight of Elizabeth in the hallway before she walked into my classroom. I put my pen down, and turned to greet her. There was always time for Elizabeth.
Elizabeth sat in the chair across from me, and we began to discuss how our first days went.
“We’ve been thrown into the wolves’ den,” I said. “It’s only the end of the first day and I’m already tired. This is going to be a psychotic amount of work.”
“I know,” said Elizabeth. “I’ve been going over my kid’s records, Eze.” She shook her head and chuckled.” Some of my kids are really behind. Oh Eze, they are so far behind!”
“Yeah.”
Elizabeth had drawn the proverbial short stick when it came to proficient fifth grade students, perhaps a consequence of being the last teacher hired at the school.
“What about you?” she asked. “How are you kids?”
My students existed all over the spectrum. Some were high. Some were low. Some straddled the middle. I was better off than Elizabeth for sure, but I had not been gifted with the best. The three experienced fifth grade teachers were awarded the lion’s share of the academic stars — the best readers, writers, and mathematicians.
“It’s going to be a lot of work,” I said. We’ll work together when we can though, right? To get through?”
“Yes, we will. We’ll get through.”
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