I had been at school for nearly three hours. Despite all that time, my to-do list was still daunting and mighty. Part of that time had been spent at a staff meeting where I was glad I didn’t have my microphone and camera hooked up to the computer. I was frustrated with items that were “not up for discussion” and felt that much of the rest could have been sent in an email.
I had just a few minutes until students arrived, so I went down the hall to speak with a colleague. I had asked several days before for some materials that the other two on my team must have used last year, but had not had any documents shared with me yet. After talking with my team for a moment or two, I ran back to my room to grab an example paper to share with them.
During the brief moment I was in my room, a different teacher stopped by to share something with me. I was already frustrated from the staff meeting, and felt rushed to get back to my team before students arrived, so I listened but not nearly as well as I should have.
Later that day, after the students had gone home, my entire grade level met. While we got a few things accomplished, I was frustrated again with this meeting but for different reasons than the one earlier in the day.
But while I was driving home, my mind flashed back to the conversation I had had with the other teacher who had stopped by my room, the one I all but brushed off in my haste to problem-solve.
She had stopped by because her daughter is in my classroom and during a virtual session, she overheard some of my lessons. She had stopped by to compliment me. A fellow teacher, a parent of a student, had stopped by to acknowledge that she had liked the way I had taught something and I had barely had the time to listen. I had nodded and muttered a quick thanks and had literally run down the hallway to resume the conversation I had been in the midst of.
Later that night, I spent a few minutes thinking about what this woman had shared with me. I let the weight of her compliment fall over me, shrouding me for a moment against all the stress and frustrations of the day. Why had I been so quick to dismiss that one positive interaction? Why had I not taken the time to savor her sentiments? Did I even hear all that she had said to me? These moments of positive feedback are so rare and so meaningful, I didn’t want it to just be a passing comment. I wanted it to be the moment that defined my day instead of stress and frustration.
The next morning, when I arrived at school, I took a moment to write myself a little note on a sticky pad. “Natalie thinks you do an amazing job of connecting with the kids,” I wrote. I stuck the note on the edge of my computer screen so I would see it several times that day. And each time I saw it, I took a deep breath and held that compliment near and dear to my heart.
Words matter. And they have weight. Both the good words and the bad. In this profession, as with many others, we get lots of negative feedback and lots of instruction on what we should be doing and lots of moments where we crap all over ourselves about a lesson gone poorly or a student we didn’t interact well with. But for this day, and for more to come I hope, I chose to savor, to reflect and to feel the weight of positive words. And to let that outweigh the rest of my day.
Teaching at 3am 