Acceptance

After a stressful week at work and on campus it was refreshing to see my students. Even though I don't get to see them as often as I would like I still enjoy the short time I have with my British Literature classes. I've noticed a few students opening up a bit more to myself and Miss Harrington. They seem to trust who we are as teachers in THEIR classroom. I guess that is what I appreciate most about them; their accepting two strangers in the middle of the quarter. I guess that's where week two has lead me; Acceptance. Friday's class revolved around chronology and the characters within the novel The Color of Water. The class was asked to split up into groups of two or three to produce character webs or a timeline. Both of the activities were to be presented as a poster to hang in the classroom. Shortly after they were settled into their groups they started work on the activity they were given. Each group was unique in their procedure for their poster. Some students needed to have every line perfectly straight. Other groups decided that the messy approach made sense due to the novels duel memoir feel. I was very impressed to see how each group not only produced fun posters but how well they worked together while doing the poster. No one was singled out and no one was left to do the work all on their own. Each group accepted their members. As I was walking around helping students with specific questions that were foggy to their understanding of the text, I noticed one group putting pictures on their poster. The girl who was drawing in the group was no artist but she didn't care. She wanted to make the poster look better by adding colorful flowers, a stick figure bride and groom, a passport, and a few other visuals for their timeline. When she was asked about the flowers she said they were there for color. When I looked at the way she had placed each flower on the timeline I couldn't help but offer an idea about them. I asked her if I could run a small idea by her group in hopes that the group would like my idea. The group accepted to listen to my small and far-fetched idea. I mentioned that because it was a timeline of a character's life that the flowers could represent the life aspect of the timeline. The character in the book faced many hardships but she never gave up in life. The flowers could easily represent the positive side of her timeline. To my surprise the group liked my idea. Even though they hadn't thought of the idea themselves they accepted my far-fetched idea with a smile and a few laughs. I couldn't help but feel proud that I opened their minds to a new thought. The acceptance of my idea just added to my outlook on acceptance in my classroom. It gives me hope that when I do teach them next week they won't shut me out for 85 minutes.