Today is the last day of Spring Break. Come Monday, I’ll be back at school, bookfair driving me crazy, kids forgetting their books for the hundredth time, teachers demanding this and than and everything else. It’ll be like I never left.
But this time of year always brings up waves of deep emotional inquest for me. It’s not too surprising, when you think about it; you’ve been through the hardest part of the year, pulling day after day of meaningful learning out of 900 unwilling children, desperately applying booktape to everything (Please let this last copy of Naruto last for one more check out!) and scrapping for pennies to keep the library eking along. Blood out of stones, people; I’m telling you.
But while all these immediate issues keep you hopping along at quite a clip, you also being to realize that the year is wrapping up: your window to improve, create and implement the perfect library program that you so brilliantly envisioned is pretty much closed. Testing is imminent, discussions pop up about end of year activities and teaching assignments for next year, and kids begin to show up in their summer clothes (translation: uniforms are out the window).
This presents an entirely different set of thoughts to sort out, and these questions are much more personal and frankly, a little difficult. The thoughts sneak in, “Did I really do my best job teaching this year? Could I have put in better effort, taught more focused lessons, provided more collaboration? Do I make any difference at all? Is this credentialed Information Specialist really as valuable as she likes tell everyone she is?”
Well, the answer I’ve arrived at is “who knows.” When I taught English these same questions came up, but with the acceptance that you are dealing with way too many variables to determine if it’s you or not. You teach the best you can, adjust the best you can, and send ‘em off to seventh grade, crossing your fingers that they arrive at their new teacher’s class a little smarter that the first day of your class. You don’t beat yourself up over “should haves,” you just chalk it up to “will dos” for the next school year.
Maybe all librarians have trouble living up to their own high standards (or maybe it’s just me–completely possible). Maybe it’s because we plan and implement our own instruction; there’s no department head or curriculum guide to turn to. Maybe we feel the need to be so productive because we cost so damn much (not to mention the money that, if we’re any good at advocacy, gets spent on our libraries). Or maybe it’s because we sometimes feel like libraries are the last best hope for balanced literacy in public schools, but there’s a pretty high level of performance expected–realistically or not, self-imposed or not, I think now’s a good time to give myself a break.
Repeat after me, Crazy Expectation Teachers everywhere– “you are a competent teacher and a asset to your school. Expecting perfection is not going to work out so well. Just keep doing your best.”
2 Comments
Being in the library is definitely more naked than the classroom. Folks think they know what to expect of classroom teachers, so it feels like there’s more wiggle room there. Plus, it’s just you and your kids. But in the library? That’s supposed to be everyone’s classroom! You’re seeing them and they’re seeing you and if they don’t like what they see, they might never come back. Ack!
I get a lot of teachers who “know” what to expect from a school library, too, and 9 out of 10 they’re wrong. Having the talk about how my library works and why it’s totally different from how you think it should be is a huge source of stress, too.