Blog Reboot: Report 1

Report Number 1

Robot Number 2481632

Robot’s Location: The Depths of Endless and Meaningless Summer

Robot’s Next Location: Room 119

 

For this coming school year, my 13^th, I am introducing a radically different method in my teaching. This radical method was born of necessity and genius. As I blog about the integration of this radical method throughout the 2015-2016 school year, I think my belief that the necessity of this radical method is directly tied to my continued sanity and freedom from jails, prisons, and/or mental institutions. I’m all for doing for others, and I’ve sacrificed my time, money, and other precious things for my students, but you can’t look out for others if you’re not looking out for yourself. Sometimes cliché is the height of truth.

My radical method is this: I’m going to play make-believe.

Yes, I’m going to pretend.

Oh, it’s going to be fun.

I’m going to pretend I’m an advanced robot, one built by the best scientists in the world, an advancement in robot technology so close to the point of humanity. And I’m in charge of widgets.

That’s what I’ll pretend the kids are: widgets. So instead of looking down at my roster and seeing a lengthy list of names (many of which I can’t pronounce: sorry, kids), I’ll see a lengthy list of numbers. Widget 1, Widget 2, Widget 3, and so on.

As an advanced robot, as part of fulfilling one of my core objectives, I am able to recognize the worth of these widgets. These are not just ordinary widgets. These widgets are human beings, the most precious widget there is. And by the numbers it’s clear the widget business is booming. The thing about these widgets is that they’re so varied. Each one has such different needs, abilities, and operating systems. There’s no way one person can meet them all. So even though I recognize their ultimate worth as individual human beings, I am in service to my main objective.

My main objective is to provide a stellar education of such high quality to each widget in my classes. I have files and files of sub-objectives filed under this objective, but I will not print out all that. In order to meet this objective, there are certain programs that I have installed that allow me to do what a normal human being can’t do. One thing that humans have that I don’t, something that I can detect in them but can’t identify its exact source, something that I see in humans faces when I observe a human performing an action that according to my installed memory files could be an outworking of this motivation, is love. I cannot describe my understanding of this. I can describe it as beautiful, but that is not enough. I cannot love so I cannot feel that sort of elation. But one thing I’ve observed in humans regarding love that causes me to reprocess my former conclusions is that it often isn’t enough; or it’s used up too quickly; or it’s sold. It’s not as eternal as one could be led to believe it is. I also can’t feel the depths of this.

If I can’t feel the heights or depths of love, how can I feel the middle? I feel nothing. I rely only on my training, those files of inside and outside sources that make me who I am today. And that allows me to focus on the mission: providing an excellent education to each widget.

What this means is that if Widget 4 is a delightful widget, equipped with an infectious personality and a capacity for hard work and creative decision-making, then that is what she is, that is what I’ll observe, and that is what I’ll use as part of my evaluations of her as a widget in my classroom.

This also means that if Widget 19 is a shithead, perhaps poorly manufactured or at the beginning of a turbulent defect period, then I note that duly and ensure that I’m meeting the internal and external requirements of my job.

This also means, since I am such an advanced robot, that there are means of helping Widget 4 and 19 with their problems. Unfortunately, there are no means to solve their problems. This would make widget training immensely easier. Perhaps so much easier that a more inferior robot than I could be used to train the precious widgets.

So this is a reboot of this blog. We are now in the fourth week of school and there is much to report. I plan on bi-weekly reports regarding my attempts to educate the widgets of this world.

 

End Report

Blog Reboot; But I’m Keeping the Name…

Wow, it’s been a year since I’ve posted on here. Thankfully, I have been writing so it’s not like other years of my life that flew by with few words on the page. It’s been a year of change amidst a veneer of same-old. The aspect of my life most illustrative of that idea is my job. I’m still a 7th grade English teacher, but my attitudes and thoughts have changed. I’m excited to teach this year, and I’ve found fertile writing ground in exploring teaching and my lengthening career.

The following post will be my first in a series about teaching. I do not want to repeat here what will be in later posts, but the concept of the series is that I’m a robot built specifically to teach. Since I’m a robot, I do not experience human emotion, so educating the children in front of me is no different than fastening a bolt on an assembly line. But of course, teaching is much more than that.

It’s a strange time in American education. I’ve noticed that a cause-effect relationship from idea implementation to results is difficult to track. So I no longer try. It’s easy to get lost in Education. Our schools suffer from not enough buy-in from the local community, but as one who is in one of those that need involvement, when there is none, I don’t blame the people. I blame the people running the place.

I’m a part of American education. No matter how I look at it, it’s more than just a job. Some teachers are able to view it like that. I have no evidence that that attitude produces a poor teacher. But for me, I can’t flirt with that line. I’ve been teaching for 12 years, and in some ways, I have no idea if I’m a good teacher. I’m a microscopic organism in the the Pacific Ocean. But because I have children in front of me every day, I’m somehow an important microscopic organism. That’s fascinating to me. When I retire, I’ll look back and remember. But so much happens so quickly during any given day that I want to keep some kind of record. Some day I’ll write about this stuff for real. But for now, I’m still in it, processing what I can when I can, and looking forward to the day I can call it a career.

Feedback is always welcome. The surlier the better.