If you asked me last year if I missed teaching, I would have said no.
Ask me today and I’ll tell you I do.
I had no plans to return to the classroom but a strange twist of fate brought me back to teaching and I find myself missing my students more than I ever imagined.
Three Fridays ago, I stood in my middle school classroom celebrating the end of a video game unit my 8th graders had just completed. Students circulated the room, playing each other’s video game projects, and completing peer feedback forms.
They knew our Governor announced a two-week coronavirus closure of Maryland schools the night before but that seemed to be in the back of their minds. They roamed the room, playing each other’s video games as productive chatter and laughter filled the space. It was just like any other day in my classroom.
When the bell rang, my students turned in their work and we said goodbye. It was like saying goodbye on any other Friday but yet it wasn’t.
What do you say when you don’t know when you won’t see your students again? Have a good weekend, stay safe, hope to see you soon?
I said all of those things as they filed into the hallway to lunch or their next class. I knew we weren’t going to see each other for two weeks but beyond that, the future was uncertain.
If I could rewind the clock, I’d take a few minutes back from the end of each period to tell them a few things:
- I love being your teacher
- You are wonderful
- I believe in you
- I am here for you
- We will get through this together
- I’ll miss you
Being at home away from my students for the past three weeks has given me more than enough time to go through the stages of grief and reflect. Like many, I miss the routines that were part of our pre-coronavirus lives but I miss the small things about being a teacher who saw her students every day.
- I miss the anticipation of walking in the classroom, not knowing exactly what each day would bring
- I miss the chaos in the hallways as students transitioned between classes
- I miss circulating the room and seeing their learning progress
- I miss kneeling down beside a student to help them troubleshoot a coding project
- I miss the reward of seeing that glimmer in a student’s eyes during that ah-ha moment of learning
- I miss the challenge of trying to coax a smile out of the student I knew who was most reluctant to smile
- I miss the interactions we had in class and next to messy lockers where contents threatened to spill out onto the floor
- I miss the joyful shouts from the teen boys who visited the computer lab regularly to play games with friends
- I miss trying to read their expressions to decipher their moods
- I miss hearing about their lives
- I miss their jokes, their faces, their honesty, and their energy
Today I’m holding a virtual class meeting on Zoom. It will be the first time my students and I will see each other since we said goodbye three weeks ago, but it won’t be the same.
A virtual classroom can’t exactly replicate the face to face interactions I had with my students for 45 minutes each day but it’s a start.
And when I see their faces today, I’ll be sure to tell them:
- I love being your teacher
- You are wonderful
- I believe in you
- I am here for you
- We will get through this together
- I miss you
