A Difficult Day

I think today was probably my hardest day so far, but not because of bad students or a demanding schedule. Today, as we all know, is September 10th (despite what blogspot says), and for the past 12 days or so I have been doing the same lesson over and over for each class that has not yet met me. Frankly, it has become extremely boring, and since this is a short week, I decided to change things up.

So when I came in this morning, I spent all of second period creating a power-point presentation about September 11th. As a trained historian, I am supposed to review the past objectively and without emotion. But I was not able to do so; I was revisiting events that I had long tried to put out of my mind. But the really strange thing was that the whole time I was putting together the presentation, the Music teacher who sits at the desk behind me, and doesn't speak a word of English, was singing the whole time, getting it ready for her next class. It was a somber, beautiful song. It was almost surreal the way our two activities coincided so perfectly.

I only have two classes today, and the first one is a class that my coteacher calls the worst she has ever had in six years of teaching. I was already reluctant to get up in front of a group of kids and talk about a subject as emotional as September 11th, and downright horrified at the prospect of doing it in front of this particular group. But as the hour wound down, and it came time to decide between talking about 9/11 and showing a short clip from a Disney movie, I decided to go with 9/11.

I made it through the presentation, but I have to admit that I did struggle at times to remain the steadfast teacher they all expected. And I'm sure they noticed it too. But for those ten minutes, their eyes remained fixed, their ears perked, their minds open and their mouths closed. For those ten minutes, they stopped caring about what the latest text message on their cell phone said, stopped trying to swat their friends across the back of the head... And I swear, they stopped all of the usual nonsense so that they could share in doing what all Americans do on this day of days: they remembered.

And so I learned something today. I learned that some events are more powerful than language barriers and maturity levels, able to tame even the most recalcitrant of children. And that no matter how hard they may be to talk about, we must always find the courage to do so.