Wednesday 29 June 2011

What I do

When it's not summer, I teach high school English.  I'm beginning my 16th year, and I love it just as much as I did when I began in 1996.  Yes, that just aged me. :)

This is my school.


Right at the right edge of the picture is where a window starts.  That's my classroom.  My school is considered one of the best performing small high schools in GA, which says a lot since most of our students are poor, and we don't get a lot of community support.  We do a lot with very few resources.

I teach Gifted American Lit, AP English Language, and this coming year, British Lit (not happy about this).  I LOVE American Literature.  Brits use too many words to say something, BUT, since I had no say so, and my principal's son will be a senior, I get to teach Brit Lit for the majority of my day this coming year.

 


When I was 17, I took a Teacher Cadet class in high school, and I knew that I had found what I was good at.  Add to that, I get to talk about my favorite subject all day long, and I'm a pretty happy person.  My students recognize this, and while they may not love literature the way I do, they at least appreciate that I know what I'm talking about and am passionate about it.

When people find out that I teach English, I usually get one of two responses:

Response 1:  Oh, so I need to watch my grammar around you.

Response 2:  So, what's your favorite book?

Response 1 earns an internal eye roll because I've heard it so often.

Response 2, I can't answer.  I have TONS of favorite books, usually depending on what period of my life I read them.  So, bear with me, here are a few:

The Secret Garden
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This is one of my favorite books from childhood.  I loved the idea of having a secret place that you tended to and that blossomed into beauty.

The Boxcar Children


My 3rd grade teacher, Mrs. Clark, read to us every day, and this is one of the books she read.  I fell in love with it.  My best friend and I used to play "boxcar children" in the bushes around her house.


The Return of the Native

I had a fantastic senior English teacher in high school, and because of him (and the slight crush I had on him), I fell in love with this book.  I wanted to be Eustacia Vye.  I'm not a huge Hardy fan, now, but I was then.


The Alchemist


I read The Alchemist for the first time when I was going through our IF journey, and the fable of following your dream really spoke to me.

And, if you really want to get me going, ask me about Emerson, Thoreau, Hawthorne, Faulkner, etc.

So, that's what I do for 10 months of the year.  I love my job.  And while I dream of opening a book store/fabric shop/shoe shop/ice cream parlor one day, this will do for now. ;)

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