"So for my Special Needs Education course we have devotionals at the beginning of class given by students. Usually, to be honest, they’re some teachers-are-an-inspiration paragraph possibly also about God (because of “integration of faith in education” and whatnot). I didn’t want to do that. I wanted to point out the irony of stock words of inspiration we won’t remember because they’re trite and useless for a career that is yes very inspiring but also a massive daily-grind profession. I wanted to deflate the concept of inspiration for teaching when teaching realistically is demanding and often difficult and based in WHAT YOU DO rather than HOW YOU FEEL. So I took Neil Gaiman’s words on inspiration and writing—being, you have to write whether you are inspired or not. You have to write the scenes that don’t inspire you—and months after the fact, you won’t remember what days you were inspired and what days you were just plugging away because you needed to work at it. There will be days you are uninspired. Where you got three hours of sleep and your car is in the shop and you had to carpool with someone you didn’t want to and you’re barely prepared and your students are less prepared and even though you’re working and bringing it to class they’re putting their heads down and going to sleep because they have home lives that encroach on school performance too. And you still have to bring it, work at it, and perform. Whether you’re inspired or not. So. I’ll close here as I closed in class: Go forth, and be uninspired. (Because being uninspired is -not- a -bad- thing.)" insert-spooky-title-here.tumblr/post/63088732240/so-for-my-special-needs-education-course-we-have
Posted on: Sat, 05 Oct 2013 12:10:08 +0000
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