"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times."
As the first day of school gets closer, and the fact that I won’t be in China when it gets here becomes more and more real, I’ve been thinking a lot about my classes, my students and the overall experience of what the actual teaching part of my year in China was like:
Working in a Chinese grade 2 classroom was very exciting but also terrifying, fun but also not-so-fun. So, I guess some might just describe it as "rewarding".
Every class was different. And how the classes went seemed to depend on what day of the week it was, what time of day it was and, at some points it seemed that, even the weather had an affect on how smoothly classes ran. (Mostly because when it was so hot and humid, I had trouble functioning which may or may not have (but definitely did) caused the students to have more trouble functioning.) Some days the kids loved the activities and were really involved, other days I would hear “teacher, class over?” right when I walked in the door (the worst was when they would start chanting “new game, new game, new game” during a lesson that they didn’t particularly like). But no matter what happened in class, no matter how loudly I had to yell, no matter how many times they had to practice writing the word “vegetable”, and no matter how many “three minutes of silence” we had to endure, class always ended in hugs, “I love you, teacher”, and me being showered with candy snacks.
Unfortunately, I never knew just what kind of a class I was going to be walking into, so I always had to go in hoping for the best, prepared for the worst and, if those didn’t work, armed with a Loony Tunes episode that they hadn’t seen yet (I never lived down the times that I almost put on one that they had already seen).
Sometimes, the suspense was fun. I’d walk in expecting a difficult a class and halfway through I’d find myself thanking them for how good they were being and how much fun we were having. Other times, I’d start class by saying “I love how quiet it is in here” and end class by walking out in angry silence and the students screaming “no stamps, teacher?”, “teacher, me 1 or me zeroooooooo?” and “teacher, angry??”
Just thinking about those “worst of times”, the days where I didn’t have a co-teacher, or it was too hot to move, exhausts me all over again. But thinking about those “best of times” the days where the kids made jokes or we played a fun game, makes my heart start aching. It aches for those sweet voices that were as capable of filling the good days with laughter as they were the bad days with screaming. It aches for the little hugs that were just as capable of being warm and sweet as they were of being pushy and aggressive. It aches because no matter how difficult the day, I loved those pushy little hugs and their screaming laughter.
I’m so thankful for the good times because they were very good. I’m also thankful for the worst times because, while they were the worst, they made the good times that much better.
(Also, I have found that when my heart won't stop aching for those "best of times" I think of those "worst of times" and they usually do the trick!)
