Summer Is Over and That's Okay

Getting back to school is difficult. The allure of summer is strong. At the end of summer, I am in mourning for my freedom. I still have stacks of books to read, errands to run, and tons of tasks to accomplish. I am not ready to pick up the pace and leave my leisure.

Yet somehow, I drag myself into school, and set up my classroom. I put posters on the wall, and plan lessons. I go to meetings with colleagues,  and realize I have missed them.

Then the kids arrive. First, it is only the seniors who assist in the theatre classes. Then it is the big freshman orientation program. Finally, it’s the first day. And instead of summer, I am focused on my new students. I am calling their counselors and parents. I am redesigning all the plans I made at the end of the summer because Julie reads at a fifth grade level, and Steven needs will do better with a different topic!

By the end of the first week, I know their names and faces well enough to want to know more. We have exchanged letters and laughs, and we are ready to start the learning in earnest. Summer lingers over the Labor Day weekend, but it no longer has a hold on me. Give me a few months and I will long for winter break, but I am in the honeymoon now, and I want to see what we can learn together.

It is not as if summer is never coming back. Summer has taken a nine-month holiday, and when it returns we will all be different people. Being a teacher means embracing these cycles. Fighting them is a losing battle anyway.

At one of the many meals that sandwich our meetings, another teacher commented that, since the kids are always the same age, so are we. When you work with teenagers, you experience the illusion that time is standing still. I see my older students around town, at social gatherings, and on Facebook. Then I see their younger versions sitting eagerly in the classroom – and it does feel like time has not passed at all. My former students are teachers in our building, and parents in our community. They are better and bigger versions of the children I met many years ago – and so I am.

It is a special spiral. I am not teaching the same children nor the same subject each year. It appears that way, but that is an illusion. New technology, books, or tests are not what change the plans. It is all about the new students in front of me, meeting their needs, and bringing the learning to them. No class, lesson, or child is ever the same from one year (or sometimes from one day) to the next.

That is why this job never gets old. I may lose my hair, eyesight, and waistline, but I will never lose my love for learning with these kids. Summer is over; bring on the school year!