I hated English class. Even as a 9 yr old I thought, “Seriously, we gotta do the writing again?” This did not improve in the least through high school. By the time I reached college, my disengagement with English class resembled the relationship between the two Koreas. It had everything to do with a difference in expectations and goals. I wanted to go to play and the teachers wanted to talk to me about a language I felt I already knew and writing I was convinced I’d never need in the ‘real world’. Even as a teacher I’ve seen that strange dichotomy extended to my colleagues. Often we talk about ‘content’ courses such as Science or Math or Sociology where there is a long list of material that needs to be delivered. English is not treated as a ‘content’ course. Instead it is seen as some amorphous other where, in the absence of being defined as a ‘content’ course, it is by nature being defined as having no content whatsoever. Of course, English does have content and purpose. I didn’t figure it out myself until the first day I taught a class.
I remember that day clearly: I was shoved headlong into a classroom with a bunch of first year honors students, no script, and no idea what to tell them. So, I asked them for help. With that I learned a lot about how they felt, how I felt, and what was needed in order to create an environment that benefited us all. That is very important. I recognize that as the teacher I have to be there, but I believe that I have to want to be there in order to be effective for my students. The way I do that is by developing a theme for the class that makes it more relatable and valuable to the students. They are writing and learning about writing but in a way that allows them to develop the habit of writing, learn the process of writing, and take their writing wit them to be used later in their academic or professional lives.
The one thing I’ve figured out about life is that people have to be on the same page and heading in the same direction to work. If you’re not there then nothing else is going to matter. It is difficult to engage with a teacher if you feel they are only going to waste your time. It is equally difficult to engage with a student knowing they’re forced to be there and have no intention of participating willingly. Grades play a damaging role in this equation, because they reinforce the notions of control and limit the value of the experience. Grades become all the student wants out of the experience when learning should be the primary endgame.