To all fellow first-year teachers,
What a year to be a first-year teacher! Your first year has been interrupted by a global, deadly pandemic in the Coronavirus, and you don't know how to feel.
Some part of you might be grateful. No matter the stress of being quarantined at home, socially isolated, and away from your students, the stress of a global and deadly pandemic is far less than the daily stress of going into the classroom. Especially if you're like me and you're teaching in a high risk, high poverty, and high teacher-turnover school and district, this probably feels like a vacation right now. And even if you do teach in high socio-economic status and wealthy district, if all your kids are reading and doing math on grade level, you're still probably grateful for the break you're getting right now.
You check in with your parents to make sure the kids are doing alright, but honestly, right now might feel like a necessary reprieve and rest you didn't know you needed. Don't feel bad for feeling this way. I currently see a lot of other teachers post on social media about how much they miss their kids, how much they're doing to facilitate a great online learning experience and reach out to their kids to make sure they're not falling behind on their learning during the Coronavirus.
Don't feel bad if you're not exactly doing all of these things either. Don't feel bad if you're binge watching Netflix, reading, taking up that hobby you've been neglecting, while not perhaps being the picturesque Coronavirus teacher.
Now is the time to reflect on your experience in the classroom and determine, at this pivotal point, whether being in the classroom is for you. A lot of you might feel conflicted. A lot of you might not feel like you have the support of your principals and administrators, and some of you might feel like you're terrible teachers. Each incident in the classroom that has required you to call someone for support or made you doubt your aptitude as an educator has also forced you to truly humble yourself and realize how much room you have to grow, and how much is really in your control.
You feel like an imposter because, to some extent, all teachers are imposters. No teacher out there is differentiating and scaffolding completely every period of every day. You feel like an imposter especially now because you perhaps aren't the best actor, and you don't have the experience of how to navigate school politics, and you don't know how to best manage a classroom because you haven't been in the classroom as much as your colleagues.
Don't feel bad for feeling the way you do. In fact, embrace your feelings. All of them. Worry about the kids, your school, and your parents, and do everything you can for them, but the most important person you can focus on right now is you. It doesn't matter if your school is slated to close a month or the whole school year, but the most important person you need to focus on is yourself. Look after your health and look after your family.
But also reflect and do the necessary thinking that you don't get to do in your daily chaotic schedule in the classroom. Take this time to not be so run down, but also to meditate on what you can do better for your kids and for yourself. Think about what would make your life easier once you do go back to the trenches. Think about all the teacher advice you get from your colleagues, and think about what works for you, and what doesn't.
If you're anything like me, a lot of district-mandated online learning efforts seem like checklist items. I have decked out and fully prepared my Google classroom, and reached out to parents about getting their kids on the platform. So far, only one of my kids has gotten onto the platform. If you're anything like me, you're worried about how your kids who are already six years below grade level in reading are going to catch up.
Don't try to do too much. As much as the cliches of self-care make you shake your head, they're more important than ever right now. To be successful as a first-year teacher doesn't mean scoring the best possible score on all your evaluations, or getting your kids on grade level on their assessments, or changing all your kids' lives of bad experiences with the education system.
The truth is, if you're anything like me, you have felt a lot more like the problem rather than the solution. You have seen how deeply-rooted some systemic problems are that society expects schools to be the panacea for. You wonder how much of a dent you can really make, how much of the students' lives you are actually in control of.
But despite all those meandering and suffering thoughts, the truth is that success as a first-year teacher means surviving. Make it to next year. Keep showing up, no matter how that looks right now. Know that this time, in the spring of 2020, will have an asterisk next to it for everyone.
Everything you are feeling right now is valid. Everything you're feeling is OK. That ranges from everyone who misses their kids and coming into the building every day, but that also includes first-year teachers like you or me that don't know how to feel, who may even be somewhat grateful for getting a break. That also includes those of you first-year teachers who are coming out of the Coronavirus with the feeling that "this isn't for me."
Teaching is not a profession that will grant too much extrinsic motivation. I will not get into the weeds or not of whether teachers are underpaid, but if you're a teacher, the chances are you can probably make the people in your life happier and make more money by doing something else.
To stay in teaching means being called to it, and loving it, even when that love looks complicated and more like a struggle.
To my fellow first-year teachers, take this time, no matter how long it lasts, to look after yourself and prioritize yourself. Reflect, relax, and feel. Whatever you're going through right now is OK.