Posted on by Laura Lee

I Won’t be Going “Back to School” in the Fall

        insprie teacher change     For the first time in 28 years, I won’t be going “back to school” in the fall. I need to take some time off to recover from an annoying injury, and I plan to return in the spring session.

To say I am disappointed is very true. This is the first time in my working life–going back to 1969!–I had to say, I cannot do this right now. Not there anyway, with the mile long parking lots and the super long walks to the classes. Not yet.

 I love teaching, and I will miss it a lot this fall term. 

So… if you hear my brains rattling or if you hear some whimpering on my part, give me a nudge and remind me there might be life outside of teaching.

Or just tell me to get to work getting better.

 

Posted on by Laura Lee

Changes, End of Terms–a Teacher’s Heart

img_2340    As this Fall term winds down at the college, I admit to feeling sad. Such big-hearted students! But it’s time for the term to end and all of us to move on, and I know that.   Still, as Robert Frost asks in “Reluctance”

Ah, when to the heart of man 
Was it ever less than a treason 
To go with the drift of things, 
To yield with a grace to reason, 
And bow and accept the end 
Of a love or a season?

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/53085/reluctance

Still, I have never yielded changes with grace but rather with sadness. As someone who has experienced a lot of trauma and loss, I believe that is normal.  Yet I know moving on is good, and I will embrace having some time to do more writing, more exercising, etc. until the spring term starts.

It’s still hard for THESE students won’t be in my class anymore, and I truly like them.  I am blessed to be in a career I have long loved; I love literacy and people.

Thanks for reading, and may all your changes be graceful ones.

 

 

 

 

 

Posted on by Laura Lee

Changing Seasons Type of Day

img_2303  Trying this blog entry from my cell phone–that’s risky! I am outside and just do not want to go INSIDE and log onto a computer… 

What an odd day, a day mixed with joy and sadness. 630 AM—still dark—road closed ten seconds before the intersection where I turn to get to work and a truck started pouring hot tar in two lanes. Semi ahead of me kept knocking down tree branches (too big for the small amount of the lane still open) and construction cones. I had to get out of the car in the dark to move the cones, but finally a construction worker let me through.

11 hours of work (part time !) Some middle school kids on the college campus today. So cute. So loud. Sipping their pumpkin spice sugared drinks waiting for the presentation they were here for.

Some students asked if I could teach them next term.

Drove home in the dark.

Sad loved one’s health news.

Two more poetry rejections.

Glad I’m part time. This won’t happen often. To work in the dark. Home in the dark.

Glad for modern medicine which may help family member.

And frogs! I’m sitting outside in the dark with my trusty tennis racquet (you know… in case of critters) and with a spotlight hearing LOUD FROGS. It’s that warm now!?!??!! Wind blowing off so many remaining leaves.

Love hearing those frogs. Thought I’d not hear them for months, until spring.

Truly a changing season type of day.

(Picture taken with my little camera phone while sitting in the dark, soft rain… back flashlight light on the bush. I’m such an adventurer.)

Thanks for reading; may your seasonal changing days change well, with kindness and hope.

Posted on by Laura Lee

Cry, Beloved America

img_1024     Many educators become pensive at the end of the summer; as we get ready to return to the classroom, we cannot help but think about how we won’t have much time to actually *think* for months at a time as we enter a whirlwind of teaching activity.  Think now! Think!

This summer I have been thinking about a novel I read long ago, Cry the Beloved Country, a novel published in 1948 and written by Alan Paton. (See more here: Cry the Beloved Country.)

While this novel is a renowned novel about South Africa, the urgency, sadness, and beauty of the country strikes me to this day and the title–Cry, the Beloved Country.  This is how I felt after seeing Spike Lee’s latest movie, The Blackkklansman.  Cry, beloved America. Is there hope for us? Is there? Can we reach across the years and miles and truly love and respect all Americans?

The news from Washington? Cry, cry, beloved America.

And then I think of returning to the classroom next week and I could weep again for other reasons.

I so strongly believe in the power of literacy to improve lives, and I am so very proud to always have been a teacher of literacy in a nation that educates all students. All students.  I am no longer teaching high school, but when I see my class rosters and check into the background of my students I feel very proud, happy, a bit scared, but mostly so very excited to be a reading instructor at the community college level.

My students, as they usually are, will be those for whom English is not a first language, or those whom struggle with reading and writing.

That’s why I am there, to help them. To create lessons that will invite them to the literacy table, a great strong table.

I so desperately believe in the great promise of educating all students and I so strongly feel pride in our community college system.

So come to class students; I am waiting eagerly to meet you and start our literacy journey together.

Thanks for reading.

 

 

Posted on by Laura Lee

Back to School, Educators?

Wishing all educators returning to school this week all the best! 👍🍀❤️.

For those not returning? 👍🍀❤️.

For adjuncts not knowing if we will have a paycheck or not but still need to prep? 😱

🙂

I love y’all !

Posted on by Laura Lee

Adjunct Anxiety

anxiety-clipart-canstock15563771           Checking those rosters, waiting to hear if I have a job even after working dozens of hours on syllabi and first week materials… I knew this when I took the job.  I wanted part time.  I agree the full time teachers should be full time.

It’s just very anxiety producing right now not knowing–paycheck or no paycheck. If a paycheck, how much, how many classes will I teach?

I was full time for decades. I don’t want that anymore; I am just suffering from AA, Adjunct Anxiety.

If I don’t end up teaching, I will have much more time for reading, writing, publishing, cleaning, cooking, etc. Pursue volunteering for causes I believe in. (I am already doing that, but could be more involved.)

I am just not ready for that yet.  I went from 70- 100 hours a week of work to part-time, and that’s taking getting used to. Yes, 70- 100 hours a week many weeks. Ask an English teacher.

Plus there is the issue of a paycheck.  I am just not ready to say good-bye to that paycheck yet.

I’m not aging gracefully, I can see.

Thanks for reading.