Week 13

Open reflection:

This week was the beginning of a new trimester for our middle school students, which meant that it was report-writing week for teachers. Since we don’t give letter grades, much of our reports are made up of anecdotal comments and narratives from class over the first trimester, so it took a long time even though I have a relatively small number of kids to write for (37). Even though the process was a little arduous, it was actually pretty fun because it meant I got to look back at my notes over the semester and think about where each of my students shows strength and progress. It helped me realize which of the kids I still don’t know very well yet, and in general it got me thinking about building relationships and how to build relationships in my one bigger class. It’s really easy to see a large class as a single entity and not see the individuals within them, and so to have to write reports about each individual person really helped me change my perspective for my 7th grade class. They had a really lovely class on Wednesday, where we got through a ton of repertoire and had time at the end to even be able to discuss how to improve some of our pieces, which allowed a number of individual voices to be heard. (They were then super rowdy Friday afternoon – so we are still growing!) But in general, I think the more I feel like I have positive, supportive relationships with individual students in the class, the more I feel like a good teacher in that class. And, building relationships takes a lot of time! I was thinking about some of the kids I work with outside of school, whom I have known for more than a year now, and there is a certain level of ease and comfort that comes when I work with them; we know each other well and they know what I expect from them but they also know we like to have a lot of fun together and that I care about them deeply. I think I already have that with some of my students who I met in September, but I need to be patient with myself in building relationships with the kids I haven’t connected super closely with yet.

However, with the kids I have really connected with, there is so much joy and depth and sharing in the learning process! In particular, there are a number of high school kids who have been really vulnerable with me in a lot of different ways. One student talks to me a lot about her faith and spirituality, and sometimes just stops by the chorus room to visit for a few minutes. Another student came in for a voice lesson this week with a new song to work on, and when she sang me the new piece, there was this huge explosion of hurt and anger that came out through the song she sang, so we had a moment to be together in that emotion. Another student let me in on the drama that is going on in her friend group, so that I would be aware of how it might affect our classes together. Two other students chose to come to work with me because they were feeling bad about their voices, and as we sang, I worked to name their strengths so that they could hear someone finally say positive things about their voices and work from a foundation of positivity. I love that part of teaching: the part where you get to be there for your students and be a person who listens and cares and brings light to them when they need it. There’s a lot of love in the chorus room, and I am working to keep building that in all of my classes!