Recently a Pennsylvania teacher has been suspended with pay for comments she wrote about students on her blog. If you don't know what I'm talking about read the story here. I'm all about 1st amendment rights. And I'm even more about exposing people to the fact that teachers are people too. We have piercings and tattoos, we use facebook, some of us like to have a drink once and a while and we frequent eating establishments just like the rest of the world does. Every time I go through a fast food drive through and a kid is at the window they look at me like I'm an animal out of the zoo or something.
So after this story broke, and I was scolded by my father for blogging about school stuff I started to investigate this whole situation more. Plainly put, this woman is a moron. I am very well aware that someone outside of my circle of friends could see this blog. I don't intend to write to be malicious or harsh. I want to share funny experiences that happen to me in the classroom, share how kids think these days, and maybe an article or two from the Huffington Post. Do some of my students irritate me? You betcha. Do I hate them because of it or wish them or their parents ill will? Absolutely not. THEY'RE TEENAGERS. They're supposed to be all full of hormones and angst. They're supposed to not like authority. I mean this woman was saying that she hates kids and suggesting some kids are stupid. I would never do that. I see potential in every single one of my students. Even the ones that get on my nerves once in a while (Who are actually the most intelligent I've always found out). And my kids know it too. I lovingly refer to them as "my little monsters" and they know I don't mean that in a bad way. Almost daily one of the kids who is being the biggest butthead of them all will come up to me at the end of class and say "Ms. N, you know you love us even though we don't deserve it a lot of times." And the truth is I do. I just have to remind myself of the situations these kids may be coming from. Their home lives might not be that outstanding, they might not have parents that care like mine did when I was their age. I might be the only positive role model they have. Because of all of this, despite being "the burnt out high school teacher" at the end of the day I love what I do. I think I just need a tropical vacation or something. So to the PA teacher, shame on you. Shame on you for being ignorant and not thinking anyone else would read something that you write that is on a PUBLIC website. We all get frustrated, we all get discouraged...but a public forum is no place to be down right cruel, rude and mean.
Amen.
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