Kissing the classroom good-bye

I've been writing letters to my students, which is bittersweet.  Day after tomorrow they are presenting a puppet show and giving me a retirement party.  I guess it's my last hurrah.

As I write these letters, I focus on what I know of each child.  Despite my difficulties with teaching, it was never about the kids.  The children were the part of the job I loved.  I don't pretend to really know them, but I tried to interact with them as the individual people that they are, and always to keep in mind that they were somebody's baby.

So this letter-writing is tender.  I describe who I see them to be, and what I hope for them.  Some who have the most challenging behaviors, are the ones who tug at me the most. These are ones who need to be accepted just as they are, and they make that very difficult.  One boy is a voracious reader and remarkably original thinker.  He's a scientist or inventor in the making.  Another boy, who can never be still or quiet, is the most compassionate, forgiving child you could know.  A girl who came to me in first grade with a complicated reputation for defiance, is an extraordinary reader and writer, who wants to be seen and listened to on her own terms. One little harum-scarum girl reminds me of nothing so much as Pippi Longstocking, and that just makes me laugh.  I wish I could know what their life paths become. 

Each student has a story to tell, a life away from school, fears and hopes that may not even have words yet.  Each one will grow up to be somebody unique.  I hope my influence, how ever great or small, was a positive one.  I hope that something I have said or done or taught makes a difference to the very real human beings who have passed through my classroom.

And I think that's what teachers hope for.  It's not about curriculum or tests or homework or paychecks or unions or politics.  It's an individual teacher who has an effect on an individual child, for better or for worse.  I hope the balance in my case has tipped toward the better.