I never knew that I could be “poppin’” and “wallin’” all at the same time. I’ve had to learn many new vocabulary words just so I would be able to communicate with my Junior English class. If it’s one thing my juniors have taught me, it is that the world is against teenagers. At the risk of sounding cliché, this class changed my life.
The first day with them, I treated them like every other class. We were going to read The Great Gatsby and have a great time analyzing symbols and the American Dream. However, by the third day into the book, my class went from a size 34 to a size 14! Somewhere in between East and West Egg, I had lost them.
So I did some research. Turns out these kids should have been seniors a year ago. They hadn’t passed the Regents, despite this being the second, third or forth time taking this class. No wonder why the lives of these upper-class white folk didn’t relate to them at all. I knew that I had to take drastic action just to get them to start coming back to class.
I knew they wouldn’t pass the Regents if they didn’t improve their writing. They needed to write everyday. Thanks to the wonderment of Teacher’s Choice, I chose to buy brand-new journals for this class. Once I gave them out, they were shocked that someone had bought them something. They immediately gave me an inch of respect. Now, if only I could take that inch and turn it into a mile.
They began writing, taking pride in their brand-new books. At first, the entries were superficial. They would write about their day at school or about what they watched on TV last night. However, as they grew more comfortable, so did their writing. Soon, the class size was back up to 30. The low-stakes writing everyday had improved their ability to write formal essays. I didn’t believe it. I had won.
We were reading books they had picked and talking about issues that related to them: race, class, sexism, and ageism. I learned so much about their lives. These kids have seen death, murder and injustice. We talked a lot about police brutality, and they began to question if people who have authority tend to abuse their power. I decided the next step would be to bring in a visitor. I thought police officers could shed some light on the questions my students had and talk about quotas and racial profiling. They had questions that I just couldn’t answer — questions about gun laws and weapons training. Still, my students were very apprehensive. Most had bad experiences with these neighborhood cops. Many were absent the day that the officers came, showing me that they still weren’t ready to change. But aside from all of the donut jokes, I thought the kids appreciated the honesty of these cops and got to see them as people, too.
The struggle to get my students in the building and to class and to write is never ending. It will be worth it when they leave school having a better understanding of the world around them. I certainly have a better understanding of the lives of teenagers today growing up in South Brooklyn, but man, this class is wack.
