Preached at Urban Abbey on May 5, 2019
My name is Melanie Peltz, and I teach 7th grade English at King Science & Technology Magnet Center in Omaha, NE. Most of the time, when I say that, it’s met with applause...groans...sighs of “oh, bless your heart; you’re a saint.” My job includes working at a Title I school with G-A-T-E students and NJHS, students with IEPs and BIPs and MDTs, students with ADHD and RBF; students who always ask WTF and look at me like STFU. I sponsor S-t-u-C-o and SLA and teach ELA and H-ELA. I administer M-A-P and NSCAS tests. And, if you don’t know what any of this means – basically, I get to work with all the young humans from A to Z.
It’s a lot.
Us teachers, we’ve REALLY got to know why we do this in order to survive the noise and mess that surrounds education.
Some teachers have one powerful reason or a singular driving force for their answer to the call to teach. Boy, I wish that were me. Here are some examples of that ONE GREAT REASON...Teachers might say:
“I teach because I love kids” - mmm, that ain’t it for me. What if I don’t really love them all? Even, and especially, the one who said to me, “You’re lucky I even put up with you.” Well, then my reason for teaching has failed me, or I’ve failed teaching – and neither of those things work for me.
Or this one reason:
“I’ve always known I wanted to be a teacher.” Ummm, I started teaching when I was 39...that’s a long time to really want to do something and not do it. I’ve also always known that I really want Oprah’s job or to be Barack Obama’s personal assistant or to be a co-anchor with Robin Roberts on Good Morning America or to dance with Twitch on the daily. I guess I had decision anxiety for awhile.
“I teach English because I LOVE Shakespeare.” Um, who actually says that? Oh wait, some of my very best friends who are English teachers (and I say it, too).
“I teach English because I love being in a content area that gets to take standardized tests 4 times a year.” The only time tests have come in handy is when I lost my voice last week on a vacation with my sorority sisters, and the students were testing on the day I returned to the classroom.
“I teach English because I love reading, writing, speaking and listening.” We’re getting warmer.
But, don’t get it twisted – I do teach because I love kids, I also love imagining that I make a difference in the future of our community and world, I absolutely love reading, writing, speaking, listening, and yes, sometimes I even love Shakespeare. Perhaps the most compelling reason for me to teach is all of these reasons bundled into one...because I love.
And according to Martin Luther King, Jr., the most durable power is love. And I need a very durable reason to teach because any one reason could fail me or I it at any time.
So you can see...there are many, many layers to the reason I teach and the power that is within this noble profession. Bear with me as we peel the layers and layers of this teaching onion. The very stinky onion especially if you’re a middle school teacher.
Hopefully, you might hear yourself or the kids in your life in some of these stories.
Let’s start with “Why I Teach” and how I got here.
My whole life I’ve had a passion for school and learning and growth and development – spiritually and intellectually – I love to learn. I’ve loved school my whole life. Being a professional student would be a dream come true...next to having Oprah’s job, of course.
So this passion for all things that would help me and other people become better versions of ourselves drove me to stick around in a career in health care for more than a decade. But health care...not my jam. Leading adult humans...turns out it’s a lot like herding cats.
I lost the fire. I grew exhausted with the need to teach and reteach adults how to be respectful, act with integrity, be responsible and kind...well, I figured adults should already get that. I found my patience with adult brains dwindling.
At least with teenage brains... they’re undeveloped. They have legit reasons to fly off the handle from time to time. Or say things like “Ms. Peletz, this isdoin’ too much” or “that’s mines” or "the Eiffel Tower is in Paris, Italy, Ms. Pelps”; I can actually teach them that is wrong without (for the most part) them taking actual personal deep-seated offense to my coaching.
That was and is pretty interesting to me. And an unforeseen perk of teaching? Adolescent brains are full of intentional and unintentional comedy.
But since I’m not a parent, when I returned to school for my Masters in Teaching, I knew there was a lot for me to learn about working with adolescents (just because I’d been one doesn’t mean I knew how to interact well with them – and it’s been a few years since I was in that demographic)
I opened my mind to understanding.
Here’s an analogy for understanding adolescents that really helped me.
What is the first thing you do when you get on a roller coaster and the bar comes down in front of you that’s supposedly going to save you from imminent death as you’re hurdled through the air at hundreds of miles an hour? You test that thing. You shake it, you do your best to prove to God and everyone that this bar, this “seatbelt” is faulty. It cannot save you, it is broken, it will fail you. It doesn’t love you enough to save you, hold you or keep you safe.
Adolescents do the same thing to each other and the adults in their lives who profess to love them. You insert your life in theirs, whether by luck of the draw, or in scheduling or birth or zip code, and the adolescent tests you.
They shake you, do their best to prove to God and everyone that you are faulty, you do not love them enough to keep them safe and continue to love them through the test.
And, I’m pretty strong - I can handle the shaking - the kids sometimes call me (among the other incorrect pronunciations of Peltz) Mrs. Bodybuilder, so I figure I can take it.
Many adults in many of my students’ lives are not there to be the safety bar. Or those adults never had one in place themselves.
So, am I lucky that they even put up with me?
Yes.
Because the most durable power is love; and we are required, as members of our faith community, to do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly.
An example of doing all 3?
Do Justice: Ask students to work quietly so that everyone has a chance to be successful.
Kid yells back, “Ms. Pretzel! Stop yelling at us!”
Love Mercy: I showed compassion toward someone whom it is within my power to punish. And I smiled and let the silence take over.
Walk Humbly: Ummmm I feel like the student’s reaction is not about me.
These are my moments of gratitude for my faith journey. Without that spiritual guidance, who knows how I could have managed that situation.
And so we can walk right into a discussion about the power of teaching.
The power of teaching is as imbalanced, delicate and often as absent as my students.
My purpose - which has been written on my heart since my first day as a teacher – is:
“to empower, encourage, and educate the hearts and minds of 7th graders through the power of words - their own and others’”
And many believe that the teacher’s main power, most important task, significant contribution to society is in increasing his or her students’ test scores. This pressure on schools, teachers, students to perform on tests is the most twisted and deformed way to approach education.
Just ask any of the 30 very wealthy and powerful human beings who bought their kids’ ways to ivy league educations. My response to that is so visceral. It infuriates me. Sometimes you find your passion and power in the things that ignite you the fastest (and while I’m ignited quickly by people who cut me off while I’m driving or who put their weights back in the wrong place at the gym)
I get VERY fired up about access to high quality public education for all human beings in all zip codes and with all backgrounds and all hopes and all dreams and all challenges and all opportunities, and all families and all sizes and shapes…I think EVERYONE should have access! Should be taught! Should read and write and speak and listen to know their power - because they ALL have it!
Just because you have rich parents...that shouldn’t tip the scales. But it does, of course, everywhere and every day.
Another example, one of my sorority sisters told me last weekend about the school that her children attend. It’s a small, private school nestled in the wealthiest neighborhood in Dallas. They don’t have to take the Texas standardized state tests. Her 8th grader is doing Trigonometry. My friend said, “Melanie, you would love it! You could be so creative! You would have so much freedom!”
Is that the freedom and creativity this teacher seeks?
If my purpose is “to empower, encourage, and educate the hearts and minds of 7th graders through the power of words - their own and others’”
I can do that with or without state tests, in spite of OR because of state tests. With or without money pouring into my school. In any zip code with every kid who walks in my room ready (or not) to learn.
Teachers ignite and experience the power of others because:
You cannot buy this curiosity.
The innocent: What’s it like in an airplane? Do your ears pop? Is it scary?
The not-so-innocent: “Ms. Peltz, someone said Valentine’s Day is for kissing – is that true?” Another student, “Only if you grown.” (dramatic pause) “And I’m grown.”
The inexperience: “Why do we keep killing animals?”
“Um, hello, so we can eat”
“Not if you’re a vegetarian – like I am”
“WHAT?!? So that mean you don’t eat SPAGHETTI???!!!”
The intended: When the buzz in the classroom is almost unbearable because you can hear the 12-13 year old brains working on overdrive trying to figure out what Shakespeare meant when he said, “When most I wink, then do mine eyes best see.” The sheer overwhelm because they are engaged with the learning and realize they have NO idea but then that they DO have SOME idea and then that they GET it! Wow. Do you remember those moments as a learner? Do you still have those moments in life?
There is power in teaching because:
Stinky armpit
Antonyms for imaginary...”J Lo” what for it...cuz she’s real
Sometimes I put my sandwich in the microwave and make ghetto grilled cheese
Zombie Apocalypse - we want you with us
“James, sit down.” - “Melanie Peltz. I’m gonna say a prayer for you.”
Weirdest bucket list items: be in a food fight, get chased by alligators, do all the high roller coasters
There is power in teaching because:
You cannot buy this inspiration.
Student Council sponsorship and the potential of those who took a risk to apply – their own sliver of discovering why they do something and the power in who they are.
I think we should all be feminists.
I never try to control my emotions. I can only control my behavior.
Or on Wednesday, November 9, 2016, one of my black girls says, “Man, I wish I was white”
The durable power in teaching is:
You cannot buy this love.
Being gone on a field trip, and a student when I return...”Ms. Peltz! You’re back! We missed you!”
They know you love Wicked, so they send you pictures of their experience and the staging when they had a surprise trip to NYC. Sometimes it is so easy to forget how amazing your students are. To chalk up their experiences and what they share with you to normal everyday life. I mean. Life is good.
You can only imagine ... and sometimes you do not want to.
The power of teaching isn’t in teaching. It’s in being the student.
I thought my favorite professor at Austin College was lying to me (as if she would be my favorite AND a liar) when she said, “I always learn more from you than I could ever teach you.”
What could I possibly teach her?
Now that I’ve been teaching a couple years, it’s true. I learn more every year from my students than I could ever teach them.
I recognize that for many of my students, I am a member of the culture of power that does not represent them. Even still, I learn more from them than they could ever learn from this college-educated, white, middle class, homeowner teacher.
And so my most durable power as a teacher, and as it is for each of us, is to love.
“The most durable power is love.” - MLK
May we have the justice-seeking spirit of teachers who admonish us when we think we have it all figured out.
May we have the merciful spirit of teachers who embrace the holy in each human being.
May we have the humble spirit of teachers who admit there is always so much more to learn.
May we always exercise our most durable power...to love.
May it be so. Amen.
Or on Wednesday, November 9, 2016, one of my black girls says, “Man, I wish I was white”
The durable power in teaching is:
You cannot buy this love.
Being gone on a field trip, and a student when I return...”Ms. Peltz! You’re back! We missed you!”
They know you love Wicked, so they send you pictures of their experience and the staging when they had a surprise trip to NYC. Sometimes it is so easy to forget how amazing your students are. To chalk up their experiences and what they share with you to normal everyday life. I mean. Life is good.
You can only imagine ... and sometimes you do not want to.
The power of teaching isn’t in teaching. It’s in being the student.
I thought my favorite professor at Austin College was lying to me (as if she would be my favorite AND a liar) when she said, “I always learn more from you than I could ever teach you.”
What could I possibly teach her?
Now that I’ve been teaching a couple years, it’s true. I learn more every year from my students than I could ever teach them.
I recognize that for many of my students, I am a member of the culture of power that does not represent them. Even still, I learn more from them than they could ever learn from this college-educated, white, middle class, homeowner teacher.
And so my most durable power as a teacher, and as it is for each of us, is to love.
“The most durable power is love.” - MLK
May we have the justice-seeking spirit of teachers who admonish us when we think we have it all figured out.
May we have the merciful spirit of teachers who embrace the holy in each human being.
May we have the humble spirit of teachers who admit there is always so much more to learn.
May we always exercise our most durable power...to love.
May it be so. Amen.
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