Middles

Last Tuesday, my kids and I struggled together to conquer dimensional analysis. It was tough for all of us. My students were confused and frustrated, but they didn't give up. They kept asking the right questions and finding my (embarrassingly multiple) errors. My lesson plan was a flop, the method I had planned was a failure, and my kids didn't learn a thing that day.

I tried not to give up myself, and we went back over the objective on Wednesday. We spent over 30 minutes relearning what I failed to teach them the first time. I felt better about this admittedly difficult-to-teach objective by the end of the hour but still not sure if we were where we needed to be.


At the end of class, I gave them all teacher evaluation surveys. This is what they wrote:

"I always believe that I can and will achieve the goal for this class because Miss Cox is trying her best to teach me everything and in a short time and she's smart."

"I know my teacher cares about me because she have shown me and help me in class."

"She teach very good, always teaching happy."

"It's an AWSOME class!!!!!!!"
(This student whispered to his girlfriend, who is also in my class, to help him spell "awesome." Almost!)

I read and reread what my students wrote about me for over 10 minutes, smiling and laughing, maybe crying a little bit. Okay, yeah, crying. My students not only didn't give up on the content, but they didn't give up on me either.

Their trust in me has driven me to keep going. My students are the reason I teach. Even if I only have 6 of them (on most days).





Thank you to everyone for your kindness and support over the last week. I haven't felt alone for a second, and I don't think I'd be so positive right now without you. To my B'more family, my CMA group, and my family back in Kansas/Missouri... thank you. I love you.