Writing and teaching are the two defining occupations in my life.  They are strongly connected with my identity, not only in that they classify me as one “writer” and two “teacher,” but also in that it is through writing and teaching that I have come to know myself and improve myself as a human being, first and foremost, in this beautiful struggle of conscious existence.  In essence, I teach for the same reason I write: to learn.

When I began teaching it was, quite honestly, because I did not know what else to do.  Teach Kentucky was recruiting at my university, and I contacted them because I simply thought, “That might work.” Naturally I sought certification in Language Arts (reading and writing), because as an English Literature and World Religions major, I was probably not qualified to teach much else.  I had no idea how much I would learn.

My writing began in a similar, in-opportunistic vein.  When I began writing as a young child, it was not for any reason other than pleasure.  I enjoyed it.  It felt good to write a story or poem then, and it still feels good to put something of my own on paper – to create out of nothing something of meaning, if for none other than myself. 

 Just as I wrote for pleasure, I read to explore.  I explored worlds, characters, ideas, and their expression.  I explored words and their interplay, their organization, their possibilities.  My interest in writing and reading were inseparable, and practice in both the act of reading and the act of writing led me to pursue the act of conscious, analytical thought.   

Quite effortlessly, and without realizing it, I grew from the processes of writing and reading.  The effortlessness and unconsciousness of my growth was never clearer to me than in my first year of teaching middle school.  Students came into my eighth grade classroom in August not knowing how to read or write meaningfully.  How could somebody not know by age thirteen?  And here was I, supposed teacher, without a clue on how one taught someone to read.  After first grade it just came naturally – didn’t it?

Because the pleasure of it all first drove me to read and write, I therefore try to make writing pleasurable for my students.  First, I find the appropriate book for their enjoyment.  The book must be a perfect fit for their skill and personal preference.  Then I seek to inspire.  From the spark of their inspiration I teach the skills that I hope will sustain their continued improvement in active and meaningful reading, writing, and thinking.

It is through these processes of reading, writing, and thinking that students become better readers, writers, and thinkers.  Likewise, it has been through the process of teaching that I have become not just a better teacher, but also a better human being.  Teaching has taught me to listen, it has sharpened my ear favorably toward diversity so that I now know appreciation of differences means listening with honest openness to opinions, perspectives and beliefs that starkly contradict my own. 

The difference can be noted in my reading tastes, writing styles, and philosophical perspectives.  In all three I have moved from a more Kantian normative perspective (think: post-Enlightenment European male colonist) to a more post-modern one (think: quiet, wizened grandmother who asks questions rather than proselytizing.)

Writing seeks to render not just a representation of reality for the reader, but a new, more accessible reality, where we can explore emotional, psychological, spiritual, and physical phenomena, fearlessly.  The written word helps us make sense of our lives, of the human experiences, and of existence in the more general sense.  It helps us organize and develop concepts and ideals that have yet to be realized.  It helps us define right from wrong, and strive for good in the development of personal moral code.  Then it helps us untangle that moral code from prejudice and normalization of situation.

To be able to teach this process is to give a student not a mere skill that can be tested to meet or fail against a standard, but rather to give that student the ability to reason his or her own way to happiness.  It is to give the student the ability express and share his or her own experiences with others in a way that can then lead to mutual understanding, connection, and bridge between strangers in this often very lonely world.

 Every day when I go in to teach I am hopeful that my thoughts will be clear and my words will be precise.  I hope to reach my students wherever they are.  I hope to refine my patience, to have the wisdom to take the appropriate action in every situation.  I hope to listen, and then, to really hear.  And through every success and failure they provide me, I continue to learn.