Easiest Job...Ever.

"I think teaching would be pretty much the easiest job...ever". This is a direct quote from one of my 17 year old students who knows everything. I just smiled and said, "maybe one day you'll be a teacher, and get to find out". On the surface I thought it seemed like an innocent deflection of a thoughtless comment, but in reality, I wish that upon him.

I wish he could experience first hand, how "easy" teaching really is. I wish that he could know what it is like to have to be at school at an hour when most adults are still waiting for the alarm clock to go off every morning. And that instead of "clocking out" at five to head to dinner, he could go home most nights with armfuls of curriculum and papers. I would love to hear this thoughts at spending his "free time" at night grading and planning and having to say, "No, I think I better get some work done tonight", whenever some friends ask him to join them for dinner. I wish this audacious little man-child the "easy-breezy" life of PTF meetings, fundraisers, and sporting events (on school nights and weekends) that he has to go to in order to do his job well. He should get to experience the simple task of engaging the minds of students who are used to flashes of light and sound effects at every turn. Of course, that just touches on the easy part of teaching, the academic part.

Once we get the "hidden curriculum" involved it gets even more interesting. Teaching social skills, conflict resolution, goal setting, self esteem, self-acceptance, self-advocacy, respect, obedience, civic duty, and on and on. Easy? Maybe. And what about matters of the heart? When he might have to comfort a girl whose cousin commits suicide, or parents abuse her, or mother has been in jail for the past ten years...how easy will that be? When he has to figure out what to say to the boy that comes in between classes, and bursts into tears because he is new to the school, has no friends, and feels like if he doesn't bring his grades up that he will disappoint his mom. Will he think that is a walk in the park? I wish he could see, just once, how "easy" it is to sit in a meeting with a parent whose child is a nightmare on roller skates, and find two positive things to say for every concern. And to do all of that creative thinking even while knowing that these same parents have been nothing but critical, hateful, and derogatory toward every effort the teacher has made to help them educate their child.

Yeah, it's not very mature of me, but I wish all of that upon him. If not in reality, then at lest in an Ebeneezer Scrooge type experience one dark night. I think, mostly though, that I wish "The Ghost of High School Past" would show him how "easy" it is to put a smile on his face every day, and give his heart, soul, finances, time, and passion to a bunch of kids who think he has pretty much the easiest job...ever.