At the end of the last school year, I had some time to reflect on the two semesters of teaching and learning, progress and struggle. I wrote this list of 10 lessons to share with my students as a way to both congratulate those who passed and even excelled in my classes and to put in perspective the failures that many of my students received. It was a learning process for me to recall and make sense of the year in a simple list of 10 items. There was no difficulty coming up with the ideas, but what was challenging was to find the right way to express the thought. Some ideas had to be reworked so they were not personal, but could be seen in a broader perspective, not just my own. Judging from the responses of my students’ sober acknowledgment, the messages were clear.
1. Students read less today than their predecessors. In this world of fast, instant and convenient information, it is no surprise that young people in general take less time to sit down and read a book. Much of their time is spent devouring information by the by the gibabyte from the internet, chats, e-mail, television, music and other digital media. Who has time to slow down and flip through a 300 page book? This is not to say that the book and library is dead, but the reality is the books we assign must compete with so much more attention-grabbing, instant gratification. The sources of information are wide open as well. Books are not the authoritative source of knowledge as we used to believe. There are so many electronic services on the internet that unless we understand it as teachers and students, the lines between plagiarism and referencing will become obsolete.
2. Today’s students are capable of doing more challenging, real-world tasks. Despite performing poorly on tests and taking a lackadaisical attitude toward failure, students today are more savvy than we think. With access to the same tools that adults have, they are creating videos that they post online, they mix and sample music to create new songs, they maintain elaborate networks on their myspace sites, they blog about anything that interests them. And most importantly, they interact with online and offline games that challenge them to do anything from become leaders to play the guitar. What we are witnessing is a new generation who will have highly marketable skills regardless of whether or not they have a high school diploma.
3. Students like to express themselves (whether creatively, analytically, or emotionally). Whether the class clown or the wallflower, young people crave to express themselves and let themselves be known. We all want to be recognized in some way or form. This is especially critical at adolescence and as a young adult. They try on personas and take on beliefs and ideals and carry opinions that are changing faster than the world is spinning. That is all healthy, as is our promoting their individuality (or their belief in it). They may not always want to tell you or the class, but keep in mind that we as humans want to let it out when the time and place is right. And when it happens, that is one of the moments of teaching!
4. Students need to balance multiple responsibilities from different bases of knowledge. Imagine that you have 5 or 6 academic classes in a semester. Each teacher on any given night would assign separate homework due the next day. Some classes might have a quiz or test that you have to prepare for. Or worse yet, you may have to draft an essay or do research for a report due in less than a month. Any time for extra-curricular activities? A social life? Kids who can manage this daily grind prove themselves to be highly skilled, multi-tasked, well-balanced individuals whom many of us adults would envy.
5. Fact is scarier than fiction. Compared to what we’ve witnessed in the news over the year, the literature we’ve read and the movies that we’ve watched pale in comparison. The world that we live in is a scary one. Violence erupts out of nowhere. The innocent become victims. Diseases and corruption run free without a twitch from our government leaders. Families are broken faster than they are created. Children run wild without supervision or guidance. Kids pack guns to school. They sell drugs. They force females into having sex. They cheat and lie and back-stab. Who says school is removed from the real world? Unlike the books and movies, the events and situations our kids face have real consequences which are uglier, more shocking, and more painful than the worst fiction has to offer.
6. Technology is not the goal, but the environment (or world) in which we live/work. Whenever we talk about technology, we either resist it or get carried away in its wake and lose sight of the big picture. Technology has always been with us. The telephone changed communication. The television changed families. The internet changed how we get information. The cell phone makes us walking offices. All the technologies that are used for education are merely the tools that we use to further the greater agenda – learning. If it’s reading and writing that we are teaching, the computers, software, etc. are merely a reflection of the world in which our students engage with the media. It is part of the world in which we do our work, but it is not where we eventually want to go.
7. Nobody accepts failure unless they expect it. Many of my students did not pass my classes. It was just as painful for me dishing out the F’s as it must have been for them to receive them. Despite their cool attitude toward accepting their F’s, students earnestly do not want to fail. A lot of times, they realize midway into the school-year that it is easier to give up than catch up. Others see each successive failure as a fulfillment of criticisms that they’ve been getting all along – that they’re not smart, that they’re lazy, that they don’t care, etc. Why don’t they succeed is a good question, but perhaps what will make them succeed is better.
8. You have to enjoy what you’re doing – from that point, others will follow. No matter what you do, whether you are a teacher or student or parent, you have to love what you do in life. Otherwise, you will not respect yourself. And of course, others will not respect you. It is a matter of taking charge of your life, accepting your life and who you are. Young people will look up to you for keeping to your convictions, pursuing your passions. They would like to live a life like your own. They may not want to do what you specifically do, but they seek strong individuals to model their lives and behaviors after.
Oops, I came up 2 short! O well, there’s always next year.
Eric chow 