Two hours
If you're from around my era, you know the movie Better Off Dead revolves in part around the phrase "two dollars...." { As I type this, I realize it's one of those have-to-watch-it phenomena but I'll keep plowing through for the sake of a comparison I'm trying to make. But if you already know this about Better Off Dead, we need to be best friends.} The paperboy, back in the day when paperboys came to the door to collect their fees, haunts the main character in search of his two dollars. Everywhere he turns, there's the paperboy with his palm up and his demand for two dollars. You get the picture.
For me, it's
two hours. I am haunted by two measly hours out of the 168 hours I live and breath each week.
Mondays, 10-12, if you're wondering.
Those hours--the anticipation of them, the planning for them, the living through them, the possibilities for failing them, the replaying them later--follow me around all week long, palm up and saying (in italics, of course)
two hours.
And that is what I have to say about how I am enjoying teaching my first solo university class (thank you for asking and for your kind words). I am
passionate about the material (love it! Lifespan Human Development) and
overwhelmed by the enormity of the subject, doled out in a dozen or so two-hour doses. I am
daunted by the task of mastering the content deeply enough. And by the fact that these students will eventually go out, as social workers with master's degrees in hand, and help people using what they learn (no pressure there!)
But. I have been blessed with an inquisitive, engaged class who seem to be willing to overlook when I trail off at the end of the sentence (I do this all the time, not just teaching...). They comment, ask, challenge, laugh with me. They are diverse, from early 20s to 60s. I even {thank you serendipity) have a student who was in a class I TAed a few years ago--a friendly face in the crowd of newness. So it's good. I leave
exhilarated and charged.
And then the haunting begins again.
I really don't know how REAL teachers do it who teach every. single. day. Hats off.
"Teaching is the greatest act of optimism" ~ Colleen Wilcox
"...and the greatest act of insecurity, nervousness, and exhilaration" ~ Annie
photo via