And here I thought the week before last was exhausting. By Friday, I usually have my lessons down. Sorry to the students I only see Monday and Tuesday? Especially that first class, man. I got observed twice this week. Basically, I need to practice giving lessons on Sunday, so that on Monday, BAM! I’m ready and rehearsed. I’m pretty much at the point where I’ve got to do that, but that’s okay. Friday was my best teaching day. And I’ve only got one week left! Better late than never? I’m a slower learner sometimes, because I’m stubborn, probably. This morning, I woke up at 6am (when my alarm goes off on school days) and was thinking of all sorts of possibilities for the lesson plans I’m working on today (that I actually started Saturday!). What is going on, you ask? It’s about time my brain catches up with where I’m supposed to be at. I creatively think a lot in the mornings. Thus being the reason I keep a notebook by my bed. Sometimes I write when I can’t sleep, too, but that has NOT been a problem since school started, especially in recent weeks. Last week at the elementary school! I feel horrible that I don’t know names well yet. But, I’ve learned, if I hear a name numerous times or mess up a name and ask the student to correct me, I don’t forget their names as fast. I also know the names of these identical twin first grade girls, and I know which is which based on their classmates (I finally had this straightened out in my head LAST week). I am excited and nervous to be starting band the week after next. As Mr. Fode was talking to me about where his passion was in teaching these kids, I remembered the original reason I had decided that I wanted to teach beginning band: so that early on, the students would fall in love with their instruments and be taught CORRECTLY so that reasons to want to quit band minimize in number. I was a band geek, and one of the only ones when I was in high school, I think. I was that kid that stayed after school to practice a part on the xylophone and took lessons as much as I could. Mr. Fode said that teaching elementary music, he as the teacher is the catalyst for the kids’ love of music. His job is to share his love of music so that the kids will love music, too. “If they don’t do band or choir, that’s not on me,” he told me. Also, if they maybe don’t have the best teacher in years to come, they may stick with something simply because they love the music. Ah, the music. I know church and public schools are separated, but there is no sound quite like that of a horn playing “How Great Thou Art” or a flute playing “This is My Father’s World.” A low brass instrument playing “What Wondrous Love is This”? Perhaps this is where this came from:
If I had a totally ideal job, it would be beginning band and some general music. It would include arranging hymns for high school students to play for their congregations. It would include writing fiction, devos, and articles that help point people to the hope of Christ. And I love working one-on-one with a student and guiding their learning. Be it a lesson or a discipleship time, I have been discovering how much I love that, too. Last Sunday, we were talking about how God wired each of us differently and for a purpose. Why do I want to do so much? Will I have opportunity to do all of it? I want to build relationships and point others to Christ through my work and my actions. I want to praise God with music and writing and building others up as the New Testament says so often to do. 2 Thessalonians 2:16-17 says, “May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal encouragement and good hope, encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good deed and word.” Ah, his encouragement is the best ever.
I have suddenly (like, over this last week) been worried that it’s going to be a lot harder to find a job than I think it will be. After teaching a few years, I’ll be hirable—you know, a young teacher with experience, but not too much (you don’t want to have to pay them MORE). But how can I get experience if nobody will hire me? Anyway, I handed that over to God. I’m trusting that I’ll have an awesome first job teaching, and I’m asking in faith that it will be in the same town Dr. Wile E. Coyote goes to school in. Which, breaking news, might possibly be somewhere in Kentucky that I can’t show you on a map (because I myself haven’t google earthed it—I just take other people’s word on it). Yeah, that means he got accepted there! Pretty sure I was way more excited that he got accepted than he was. Smiley face. Kentucky is a long ways from home, though. But all things are possible with God—Paul writes in Philippians that he has learned to be content with nothing or with plenty. Whichever, it’s possible with God. So I am ready to be content with whatever God has in store for me next year. He’s got my back, and with him whatever is to come will be possible. I may have stopped making complete sense. Whatever. It’s the beginning of another real long week that will go to fast and busily by.
So, that’s an update and a lot of chatter. Maybe that will be my title for this post. If you recognize it, than I probably used it. Goodness. You know that “may have stopped making complete sense” thing? It’s been like that a lot lately. I’m “normal” in the classroom, but otherwise it’s been one of those to-busy months. So (that’s my comfort word, I’ve learned)…yeah.
Be blessed, everyone!
Anna
Anna E. Meyer 