The First Day of School!

For some reason every year, summer ends. I'm left with the startling realization that I have a job to return to, one filled with endless lesson plans and my sincere hope that the kids learn to love to read. Today was my first day, starting my TENTH year of teaching!

And while the classroom certainly feels different on the other side of the teacher's desk, I'm reminded of the hustle and bustle of my own high school career. It feels amazing to look at young people and help them in any way that I can. For some of my students I play parent more than they see at home. It's a privilege to stand at the front of my classroom and teach. 

I found a snippet from a 19th century magazine, one that inspires me to continue my career:

Godey's Lady's Book, February, 1859

One week later, Jessie awaited, with a fast-beating heart, the arrival of her first class. It was very small. One little girl only had summoned up courage to come. Her report was so favorable that, the next day, three little girls and two boys came; and, in the course of the month, the room was filled each day. There was something in the pale, pure face and slight frame of the teacher that awed the class at first, then won their respectful love. No profane word ever fell upon the ears of the young girl. Errors to correct she found in plenty; but, with a low, sweet voice, and that indescribable holiness that encircled her, she drove away all impiety, all profanity. Rough boys went home with their minds filled with higher ambition and purer thoughts than they had ever before felt. Girls bent to her, at their departure, with their mind, blessing the sweet, gentle teacher who had won them from ignorance, perhaps from vice. And so passed her life. Trials she had among her class; but, with gentle patience, she made rough places smooth. Some ingratitude, too, came to trouble her; but she never failed in her efforts. It is now thirty years since Jessie Harris fell down the quarry; and if, in passing through Snowdonville, you ask who is the most useful and best-beloved person in the village, they will point out a little cottage, and tell you its occupant, Jessie Harris, fills the place. Mrs. Harris is dead; George is a lawyer in the South; and Jessie lives alone, excepting her maid, one of her old scholars, who almost worships her mistress. Gentle, meek, and hopeful, she lives an example that none are so unfortunate that they can be of no use in the world.

I hope for a good school year for all students and educators. Good luck, and happy learning!

~Kristen