In the Beginning...

And so it starts; the blog that is. Rather, I guess I should say "restarts." To all of you whose calls, IMs, wallposts, and tweets I've ignored since I came to Phoenix, many apologies. Life has been a little busy, to say the least. And while I should have and would have loved to write about my Teach For America since Day 1, let's just say that I have very good reason as to why I'm writing the first post in Week 3 of Institute (or exactly 21 days since I came to Phoenix).

Teaching, thus far, has been THE most difficult thing I have ever committed myself to. And I'm only teaching for about an hour a day at a summer school! I have a deep appreciation for the teachers in my life who inspired me to work hard and really helped me develop to the place where I am right now. And for those who were not as effective, I now completely understand just how difficult the business of teaching is.

Yes, the business of teaching. I'd always seen a connection as to how the business skills that I'd gained in high school and college might benefit me in being a good manager for the classroom; however, I understand just how transactional the field of education really is. The initial investment that a teacher must make in his classroom, his students, his students' parents, his administration, his colleagues, and his community is something ridiculous. Even for a 4-week long summer school session, the amount of time required to plan lessons, get to know students, understand school culture, and everything else has been too much too count.

However, because of its transactional nature, education, when invested in heavily can result in very high returns. Even for one lesson, if I just happen not to script out everything I want to say (a no-no in the managerial communications context, which I had a hard time with it), I find myself struggling to find the words to explain odd and even numbers to my third graders. And, right now, my lesson plans are pretty sucky. The fact that 30 extra minutes spent writing down exactly what I want to say has such a big impact on my lesson is proof enough to me right now that the long hours, i.e, only 3-4 hours of sleep per night, might be the only way that I can really get this teaching thing down in 4 weeks.

And yes, to those of you wondering whether I'm surviving, I am. Not much more than mere survival, however. But it's definitely a weird situation. As much as I hate staying up late and though getting up at dawn each morning is a struggle, when I am actually in front of my class, regardless of whether my lesson is going well or it's going down the toilet, I have so much energy. Perhaps, that spontaneous energy is enough to convince me that teaching may, at least for the next two years, be what I was meant to do. I hate to say it, but my friend Sharon may have pinned me correctly when she said that I very much embodied the Teach For America ideals. I'm not saying that I'm the perfect teacher or an exemplary model for what a Teach For America corps member should be. If anything, I'm very much far from the ideal: I do not have a innate passion for educational inequality or an overflowing compassion for children; I'm impatient when students don't understand concepts and quick to become frustrated when my students don't listen. However, I can say that I feel very comfortable at the front of the classroom. I like it.

Just because I like it, however, doesn't mean that I will necessarily be successful. In two weeks, I have learned so much, but I've come to realize just how much I lack and the immense challenges that I will be facing over the next two years. While I'd like to say that I have the grit and the persistence to be able to push on through, I also no longer hold contempt for those few who have left TFA before completing their commitment. This whole thing is ridiculously challenging, trying, difficult. And, being here, I realize that success in the classroom really does not depend on your intelligence; you either have that X factor or you don't.

And, so, for those who are reading this long-winded post (that's not very coherent because I wrote it over the course of three days), I ask you for your encouragement and help. Believe it or not, the little "pep talks" that I've received from people over the past few weeks have encouraged me a lot because, in those moments, I realize that a lot of people are invested in what I'm doing.