~ We Teach to Reach ~
The Velveteen Rabbit Approach to Helping our Children's World Become Real
As teachers, we have so much to cover in so short a time that we can easily be filled with so much stress that we lose sight of why we teach.
We teach to reach.
Yet we wonder at the end of the year if we've reached any of our students or enough of them, or if you're crazy enough, all of them.
Robynique was one of these students. I tried and tried to get her to throw away her limiting beliefs, but she was one of the toughest students I've ever had and she fought me all year long to keep them.
I still remember the day 10 years ago when she stubbornly sat on a table in my 5th-grade class refusing to work. I gathered up all the love and belief I had inside for her and sent it out like the Sun shoots out a solar flare.
I think it will help all of us teachers and parents hold on even when we feel we're being worn away.
My insides were bigger than my outside and I blew a blood vessel in my nose that's still there today.
About a month ago I hurt my nose again by getting punched at a 7-11. I stepped in front of a father who was hitting his son. I told him he was bigger than me and could beat me to a pulp, but I could take it much more than his little boy could.
He told me to mind my own business and hit me again. I told him he was right but it was my business because if he beats his kid then his kid will beat his kids and that it didn't have to be this way.
He called me "smart guy" and hit me again. When I didn't move he asked me what he was supposed to do when his kid talked back. I told him I didn't know because I wasn't there, but giving him a consequence that made him grow stronger and smarter was better than giving him one that made him grow weaker and smaller and full of hate and anger.
His son had asked for a candy bar and when told "no", he mouthed off. I suggested he remind his son that he already had been told no, and now he doesn't get one the next time either. If he mouths off again then he doesn't get one the next four times, the next eight times, whatever.
But tell him you love him and know he's better than what he's being.
He said alright and that he'd try, then said, "You know, I could have really hurt you". I said, "I think you already have." He laughed and shook my hand and told me he was sorry.
When I got home and looked at my nose I began to feel sorry that I had done what I did because it looked like he had broken a few more blood vessels, and thought again about what I had done for Robynique and wondered what the hell I was doing with my life.
I didn't care so much about how I looked as I did thinking about how my ex was right. I go too far. I'm too unsafe. I don't know when to stop. I could get hurt, or worse, and that made her scared, and angry. I give too much to the point where I'm tired and wiped out and not the same happy, positive person she used to know.
This hurts, because I know she (and another girlfriend who left me for the same reasons 10 years ago) is right, and I wish I could behave, be less, be normal, be acceptable.
I just don't know how to be any different even though I've tried to improve. I don't go directly into abusive homes anymore because I promised someone I loved not to, and love lasts even if the relationship doesn't. She was the only one to get me to stop and I love her for that, so I keep the promise I made.
I also don't drink anymore to numb the pain instead of going to the hospital. I don't even drink at all because I need my wits to write the "Find the Hero in You!" books and lessons in hopes of helping us all find the hero in ourselves and become the big, great, real people we were meant to be.
I want to be real and this world to be real; full of real people filled with real power. The Socrates, Einsteins, and Edisons have done it, why can't we? If I wear myself out doing it then I become the Velveteen Rabbit being worn out from love.
I'll have to finish the rest tomorrow because it's time to go make people Real, but I want to share the message that Robynique sent me a few days ago.He told me to mind my own business and hit me again. I told him he was right but it was my business because if he beats his kid then his kid will beat his kids and that it didn't have to be this way.
He called me "smart guy" and hit me again. When I didn't move he asked me what he was supposed to do when his kid talked back. I told him I didn't know because I wasn't there, but giving him a consequence that made him grow stronger and smarter was better than giving him one that made him grow weaker and smaller and full of hate and anger.
His son had asked for a candy bar and when told "no", he mouthed off. I suggested he remind his son that he already had been told no, and now he doesn't get one the next time either. If he mouths off again then he doesn't get one the next four times, the next eight times, whatever.
But tell him you love him and know he's better than what he's being.
He said alright and that he'd try, then said, "You know, I could have really hurt you". I said, "I think you already have." He laughed and shook my hand and told me he was sorry.
When I got home and looked at my nose I began to feel sorry that I had done what I did because it looked like he had broken a few more blood vessels, and thought again about what I had done for Robynique and wondered what the hell I was doing with my life.
This hurts, because I know she (and another girlfriend who left me for the same reasons 10 years ago) is right, and I wish I could behave, be less, be normal, be acceptable.
I just don't know how to be any different even though I've tried to improve. I don't go directly into abusive homes anymore because I promised someone I loved not to, and love lasts even if the relationship doesn't. She was the only one to get me to stop and I love her for that, so I keep the promise I made.
I also don't drink anymore to numb the pain instead of going to the hospital. I don't even drink at all because I need my wits to write the "Find the Hero in You!" books and lessons in hopes of helping us all find the hero in ourselves and become the big, great, real people we were meant to be.
I want to be real and this world to be real; full of real people filled with real power. The Socrates, Einsteins, and Edisons have done it, why can't we? If I wear myself out doing it then I become the Velveteen Rabbit being worn out from love.
I think it will help all of us teachers and parents hold on even when we feel we're being worn away.
No comments:
Post a Comment