The Things That Make an English Teacher Cry (Happy Tears) , Part 1

This week, I read 43 essays from my Juniors on what they believe the attributes of a hero are (no, that is not what made me cry...)   Most of the essays were insightful and well organized.   Most had the typical terms associated with heroes and heroic actions:  brave, courageous, a leader, humble, selfless, determination, love, etc.  They were very interesting to read.

When I got to one of my students who I taught as a Sophomore, I was prepared to see the typical writing I saw from him last year and I got ready to provide as much feedback as I could to strengthen his writing.  This student was not one of my stronger students when it came to writing.  And, in fact, towards the end of the year, he was having a hard time prioritizing all the things in his life, and got himself into a big hole in English class because of missed work.  I did not think he was getting out of this hole, but I promised to help him if he wanted to start climbing out.  He was determined and put in quite of bit of effort, but we were still not going to be sure if he was out of the hole until the final exam.  This story has a happy ending:  he passed and I have probably never been prouder of any of my student’s motivation in achieving this (nope, not what made me cry yet, either).

So, when I got to his essay this week, I was expecting a satisfactory essay at best.  However, I knew he was working hard on this essay even getting help from other teachers.  His essay was beautiful.  It was organized, focused, and full of thought, understanding, and well-developed paragraphs.   And I wanted to cry.  (Yes, now, cue crying).   

At first I wanted to cry because I egotistically thought, “wow, look at what I great teacher I am!  I single handedly improved his writing from C to A range!  I am super-teacher!”  Then, I wanted to cry because, I came down from my pedestal and thought, “Wow!  He really wants to write a good essay!  He really put a lot of effort into this.  He really is working on his writing skills!” 

And truly, there are many things that are probably factoring into the end result of a great essay.  And that makes me cry even more:  when the student has learned from the teacher and the teacher has learned from the student…well, it’s quite a beautiful thing.