A whole costco sized bottle of advil later, the 2017-2018 school year comes to a close. I believe every school year gives teachers an opportunity to reflect, think, and hopefully, grow. Grow not only as a teacher, but as a human.
I have never been good at goodbyes. I hate the idea of never seeing someone again. Many of my students will be returning to me in late August, but I cannot help wondering what will happen in our time apart. And what about my seniors? I will not being seeing them come into my classroom, all sleepy-eyed and grumpy at 8:20am. Those are the kids I am thinking about the most.
I have one senior who has changed me in particular. When I first started at this school, I was warned about him. I was told to "be careful" and that he has "hit people in the past". The feeling I got from my colleagues was this kid was going to be my most challenging. And, holy bananas, they were right!
The first couple of weeks, this kid spent the majority of his time right outside of the classroom next to a garbage can. The garbage receptacle was large and had a flat top that you could sorta lean onto. Believe me, the metaphor here is not lost on me. He swore a lot. He barely came to class, and when he did, he'd tell me to fuck off and he'd stand in the corner until he left to go back to the garbage can in the hallway. He wandered the classroom a lot. Kids mostly avoided him. He didn't smile. This kid clearly learned a long time ago that no one would bother him if he was an asshole to everyone.
About 2 weeks in, I had finally decided this kid was going to be mine! I had to claim him as mine! I decided that he was going to know that he was mine and I was his teacher and that his bullshit wasn't going to work on me. When he told me to fuck off and he walked away, I followed him. He walked to another corner of the classroom. I wasn't intimidating or mean, I just walked with him to the corner. He looked at me, and I gently and quietly said "it's all good, we got a lot of time left together". "Fuck you" he said. My calm reply, "it's OK, I get paid to be here, and we can do this all day." He went quite, and I kept teaching from that corner of the room. He wandered around a bit, and I just stayed right next to him - it was maddening, and I am sure the other students wondered what the hell was going on. He was clearly testing me. And each and every other student was watching. The stakes were high. He walked into the hallway, and I reminded him of the classroom policy of calling security if he left the room without permission, and I followed through. Security brought him back in the room, where we continued our dance of "fuck off and wandering".
This dance lasted a few days. It was grueling. I wondered what I had set myself up for. I feared he was going to hate me more. I was terrified of not being able to convince him that I was there for him, I was there for each student that was watching. Then, the breakthrough happened. He stayed in class for 30 minutes. Then for 40 minutes, an hour... 70 minutes.... 80 minutes.... Each class a few more minutes... The kid stayed. He finally felt safe. This was March of last year (2017). We had a whole school year left together, and he was going to be a senior, and I was scared of this kid's incredible risk for drop out. His brother dropped out. His sister dropped out. He gave me a hug on the last day of school last year, and it made me cry, and his response, "stop fucking crying, Ms Angell!" of course, then I just laughed through my tears.
We began in the fall, as tradition holds. We started off as you'd imagine, testing the waters a bit. I held my ground, and he continued to blossom. I began to see and experience things with this kid that no one had before. He smiled. He fucking smiled! He said "Hello" and "good morning". He came into class right at the beginning of the day. He checked in with class during our morning check-in.
I don't want to give you the impression it was all butterflies and rainbows, because it wasn't! This kid had been practicing his fuckery for a long time, and he was damn good at it. He was hard to like, and teachers often complained to me about him. I didn't have a magic bullet, but I did learn that loving kids who are the hardest is the only thing that works, and it is the god damned hardest thing to do. I had to dig deep on some days, when he would just push, and push, and push his terrible at me. With his swearing and meanness and cruel comments spewed at me. Many days I just felt weary and depleted.
And just like when he began staying in class, he then began actively participating. This kid read out-loud for the first time. He completed independent work! He joked with the other adults. He got silly with his peers. We helped him peel away his layers of practiced avoidance and watched him begin trusting. He relaxed into being a teenager who was accepted. And while my classroom is only a pebble of space in his world, he was safe there. He was accepted. He was loved and cared for.
And last week, I got to watch him walk across that graduation stage. I saw him hold up his diploma, beaming with pride as he looked up at his parents in the audience.
And with that, this school year comes to a close. Love is the only thing that works every time.
