getting inside their heads
Today was certainly an exercise in patience, but I suppose we need those kinds of days to balance the picture perfect ones (wait, picture perfect ones? Do those exist?). However, there is a lesson to be learned in everything – and I learned today that Mr. American Man is the favored hero of the class, and that Mr. American Man is awesome. (I am also still working on learning exactly who Mr American Man actually is…) Chris Farley, Minnie Me, Chuck Norris, Donald Trump, and a video game character named Makar are also up there on the list of heroes with my boys. But as much as the list didn’t quite include the kind of people I was envisioning, when we really discussed these favorite people and the attributes of their personalities or lives the boys found inspiring or attractive, they still managed to come up with a hoard of respectable answers. I think the kids even surprised themselves a bit, as they realized that many of their heroes were people who made others feel good, were people who gave of themselves and surpassed the expectations of those around them.
But apparently making lists of the “qualities of a hero” while talking about Napoleon and Beethoven wasn’t exactly enough to keep them quiet today, because at least every third word from my mouth was directed at trying to get one of the boys to stop talking, yelling, throwing things, making fun of someone else, crawling onto the table or under the chairs. More lessons of today: I need to find a better way to exercise authority as a teacher. I need to find another way to keep them quiet(er, at least) while I work individually with each student and the violin. (Which, by the way, is going better and better! Today we actually read music for the first time, while playing! They could do it! They hadn’t done it before! And I played little mini “duets” with each boy, thrilling them to no end. But then I proceeded to panic internally when I realized that open strings were one thing, and how I would get them from ‘A A E E’ to using their fingers was about as terrifying – and huge – as anything I could imagine…. More on the violin lessons coming next week.) Those music word searches, crossword puzzles, and hangman worksheets that I’ve been making for them have now worn off, and after circling “bassoon” and “timpani,” they are more interested in throwing their shoes at each other. (Lesson #4: bring a hard helmet to class?)
And I need to do a better job of planning a lesson that speaks to my kids on their level – but preserves a subject that I want to share with them. Of course, this has always been a goal of the class, but it turns out it is also a constant work-in-progress. I certainly don’t want to give up all of my own ideas about what I want them to learn this year, and cater entirely to their interests (a bit of this does happen every week as I plan the lesson, which I think is healthy? but I don’t want it to take over completely). Perhaps what I most need to work on is how to understand the mind of a 12-year-old. My roommate pointed out to me last night that, while I might find making a list of adjectives of the qualities of a hero fun (“But we were using different colors of markers!” I protested. “And they did think it was cool that parts of the 4-minute clip of ‘Eroica’ that we listened to could be described with those same adjectives!”), a 12-year-old boy wasn’t going to find it so fun. “You have to get inside their heads,” she counseled me. “Because my 12-year-old head tells me that I am not interested in adjectives and list-making. That sounds kind of boring, actually. My 12-year-old head needs something that is concrete, and something that is obviously relevant. Something that makes me engaged, too.” But I know this! I silently protest. That’s what I’m trying to do! “Maybe you could think about being less creative in your lesson plan material, and more creative in the presentation. If you want to talk about Beethoven, talk about Beethoven. But talk about him in a fun way.” [Insert a pained look from me here…] “And listing adjectives is not fun,” she insisted.
Right. So, lesson learned, and I think that next week we’ll be playing music jeopardy. (Anyone care to join?)