Monday, August 22, 2005

Because You Do.

Background story: I work in a Middle School with emotionally disturbed children other wise known as “the bad kids” you know who they are the ones that no one wants. Most of my students are way behind academically and usually refuse to go to school and always seem to get in to trouble. Well those are my students. With the help of the district behavior specialist we have put together a program for them to help them get on track.

After school on Friday my co-teacher and I held an information session on our students with the rest of the staff. We were explain how our program work’s and what to expect out of our students.

During the whole meeting one topic kept coming up. “He/she loves to read, why is that?” I had no clue these are kids who hate to do any kind of schoolwork. Everyday we start the day out be reading silently for 30 minutes I find that it helps the kids out to have that quite time in the morning. We all sit down to read a book of our choice my co-teacher and myself included.

I know that a lot of our students complain and whine but in the end they end up doing what was asked. So I did not think that this was the reason why they love to read. After thinking about it and discussing it with my co-teacher we could not figure it out so I decided to ask my students. I asked them this morning why they loved to read so much.


After a few “I don’t know” and “ Cause we have to” I knew that they were not going to tell me so I dropped the subject and we kept going with our day. During silent reading one of my students brings me a piece of paper and walks away. On there it said, “ I like to read because you do.” Those were the only words on that sheet of paper. I sat at my desk in shock and also at that the same time trying not to cry in front of my students.

It is true what they say about leading by example who would have thought that a simple act like watching their teachers read would cause a few “bad kids” to like reading.
In my line of work there are many hard days but it is days like today, days where you realize that by doing the simplest thing you have help or changed someone’s life. It is days like today that makes all those bad days worthwhile.

4 comments:

Joanne said...

Awww, Karlita. That's such a great story. It's true, we learn by example. I love to read because I was always read to as a kid, my mom was always reading, my grandmother was always teaching... keep up the good work and you will reap the rewards!

Jessica R. said...

How awesome Karla...it's moments like that that really make your job really special. It's amazing how teachers make a difference but as they say - it only takes one person.

Caro said...

yay!

karla's awesome!

Karla said...

Joanne, Jessica and Caro: Thank you.

Singlegirl: None of the above i work At Mrachek :)

Janette: Yup my current boss asked me to stay until she could find a replacement for me. So i told her i would stay for three weeks and then i'm out.