Teaching is not my calling

I made it through the math teaching experience. The first day was terrifying as well as exhausting. It was also easier than I thought it would be. Some of the kids remembered me from subbing in their other classes. I heard some of them say, "Yes it's Ms. Mickie! She is my favorite sub." Sure, I love great feedback as much as the next person but, teaching is not my calling. The goal is not to get a full-time teaching job. It is well documented in the media that teachers are woefully underpaid, and a substitute teacher at an exclusive private prep school is not an exception.

On Monday morning the students filed in and the day began. We worked equations and talked about the PSATs. More than half of the sixth grade class had taken the PSATs at least twice already. I did not hear about the PSATs until I was in high school. Over the next few days we worked more problems. I heard about their lives. What time they went to sleep. What kept them up at night.Their trips to Disney, Jamaica and Montana over Spring Break. Some of my classes have quite a few big personalities. They are loud, rowdy and hard to control. I promised them an ice breaker if we worked some problems first. They wanted to know about me. They wanted to tell me about them. One girl told me about her two businesses. This was old news to her classmates. Others wanted to talk video games. An adult hall monitor came in to ask us to quiet down. She said she loved to hear the sounds of laughter, but we were distracting the other classes. We had two icebreaker sessions and made it through just over half of the problems.

The next class was another rowdy bunch, but we stayed on topic for the most part. Many of the students were eager to come up to the board and work the equations. Two boys in particular began to ridicule their friend's use of the zero. They called the zero useless and annoying. I wrote an equation using negative numbers and emphasized why the zero is important. They rest of the class took their revenge on the two naysayers with squeals of delight.

As I left for the day I began to think about how much fun I had, and what a privilege it is to spend time with these kids. The math was no longer scary. I was quite comfortable after the first day. I enjoyed the feel of authority and owning the room, and the room is a beautiful sun drenched space that overlooks a tree lined marsh. The thing is teaching is not my calling. I do not have the desire to "raise the next generation" or "be a role model to the youth." Those were never my aspirations.

But, the more I examine this opportunity the more I see this as an act of service. Giving is an important spiritual practice. With children involved it kicks the experience up a few notches. The time I spend with the kids is filled with joy. I am exhausted at the end of the day and it is not even a full day! I am working on a few other projects simultaneously, but none of them inject as much raw energy into my day as the kids. I am off for two weeks to help Ryan, and work on my other projects. I am grateful for the opportunity, but also looking to what is next, and it is going to be all that I prayed for and more.