To be a teacher

Last August I took a job teaching music at an elementary school. It's been about four months since then, and I've discovered that teaching well is an extraordinarily difficult task and truthfully, I'm not very good at it. I've gotten better since that first terrifying day, but I haven't figured out the secret to it. I can make a decent lesson plan and I've learned how to deal with most of the problems first and second graders can come up with, but I haven't been able to make the leap from just going through the motions and being a teacher.

Then a few weeks ago, I was called to be in my ward's Primary presidency. Other than being slightly overwhelming because of the responsibility of the calling, I found it ironic that I'm being called to work with more children. I wonder, what am I supposed to be learning from all of this? Is it preparing me for my own kids, or is it an incentive to wait?

As I sat in Primary on Sunday and watched one of the younger kids yell through Sharing Time, it occurred to me that maybe the only lesson I will take from all this is patience. I have never been good at letting chaos go uncontrolled and kids really are the epitome of unpredictability. If I am going to survive the year and eventually be a good mom, I am going to need so much more patience than I currently possess.

I think the other thing I am going to learn, or at least I hope I will learn, is love. My sister-in-law Bekah is a fantastic teacher and she's given me lots of help and humor. She said on her blog the other day that as she's become a mom with a daughter to love, she's found more love for her students as well. When I read that, I realized that's one of the things I'm lacking. Most of the time, my students are out-of-control problems that need to be solved, shushed, corralled, and managed. I don't worry very much about whether or not they're having a good day, but rather whether or not I'm having a good day. And I think it's supposed to be the opposite.

I don't know if I'm going to get any better, but I've decided to give it a try (probably after Christmas break, let's be honest). I'm teaching 120 six-, seven-, and eight-year-olds how to read music notes and clap a beat and sing, but I want to teach them to be good people, to be excited about learning, and that I am an adult who cares about them. I don't know how to do it yet, but I'll let you know if I figure it out.