Janie Slaven: THE TEACHER'S DESK: A lesson in humility

Jun. 22—I'm sitting here this early morning drinking coffee and staring at my Han Solo action figure just beyond my keyboard. He is all askew; his arms are bent in an unrespectable fashion, and Fox Mulder is simply missing.

My granddaughter likes to play "Office" at my desk, and she thinks those action figures are simple toys. She does not know that those plastic dolls are symbols for my heroes growing up.

But I think if it really bothered me, then I have not grown up (It bothers me a little bit).

Seriously, those figures can always be stood back up, despite a child's unadulterated actions. Actually, I always set them back up for her, so she can tear them down again. It is grandpa's desk. She has free reign.

Comparatively, there is an important concept in teaching that I had to learn through experience. I have found that patience has many platitudes and with students, "every day should be a new day." In other words, youthful wrongs, miscommunications, or write-ups should not tarnish the next time a teacher sees a student. The slate should be clean when they walk back into a teacher's classroom.

Now, teachers are only human, as are the students they teach, so this concept is sometimes hard to follow, especially with more serious infractions. However, like any practiced trait, this concept can become a habit. Students, and people in general, need to realize mistakes do not determine who they are -unless they keep making the same mistake, at which point it is a choice, not a mistake.

Of course nothing is absolute, but I think the concept is a good daily practice for the many transgressions teachers deal with. Sometimes students simply have a bad day and are rude, or they are rebellious because of problems at home, or they are defensive because they are suddenly insecure. And while teachers do not forget, they can forgive, and in forgiving, have a new day uninfringed by the stain of the previous day. In practicality, since a teacher is going to see the same students every single workday for a school year, this seems like a prudent approach to an everyday relationship.

Of course, as a sometimes-clumsy teacher, I would appreciate the same kind of forgiveness. I remember the time I took a student to the office for tobacco usage. He was sitting in the back of the class dipping, his lower lip protruding like it was pregnant. I was a new teacher, and I was slightly upset with his malfeasance. We had recently had a lot of problems with dipping tobacco, and I found it very disrespectful during class. However, to my own demise, I wouldn't even let him explain.

Instead, I walked him down to the office and blatantly told the vice principal he was dipping and walked off. When I returned to the classroom, my students stared at me with wide-eyed disbelief.

"What's wrong, class?" I asked them plainly, because it was clear by their demeanor that something was wrong beyond a rebellious student.

"Why did you take him to the office?" A student asked.

"That's between him and the Vice Principal, now."

"He wasn't dipping. He was eating a brownie. From breakfast."

"What? No, he wasn't. I saw it in his lip."

"He had some stuck there. He was trying to get it out," the student fervently retorted.

I scoffed, then walked back to the boy's hauntingly empty seat. There on the floor lay bits of brownie crumbs (seriously). I picked a crumb up and smelled that moist chocolate and felt my stomach tighten the way it does when you know you have done something horribly wrong.

Just then, the phone rang. It was the Vice Principal; he explained that while he trusted my new-teacher's intuition, he did not think the kid was lying about not dipping. I agreed and hung up.

I met the student in the hall on his way back to class and apologized. I then apologized to the class, and eventually the Vice Principal.

Maybe the concept of "every day should be a new day" is a practice in empathy. The daily dance between teacher and 20-30 students an hour is a precarious balance when it comes to implementing a sense of authority.

Needless to say, I brought brownies for everyone the next day.