Kim Frencken: This teacher wants to be free from restrictions

I just want to teach. Not looking at a clock to see if I'm on schedule. Not fifteen minutes of warm up and thirty minutes of independent practice. Just teach. Without time ticking by. Teach not from a schedule, but from the heart.

If a light bulb has gone off, I don't want to flip the switch. I want it to burn brightly and illuminate the face of the one who finally got it. Let the light shine into every dark nook and cranny and show other kids that anything is possible.

If we're on a roll, then pick up speed and hang on. Let my kids catch the excitement and grab ahold. It can't be bottled. Or sold. Or produced. It is born in a classroom when the guard is down and the moments are real.

Teaching isn't manufactured. It is lived. It is felt. It is passed on. I want to hold on to the love of teaching and throw out the manual. The manual that puts our lessons on a strict timeline of events. The one that regulates what we say and do with our kids. The one that takes the spark out of learning. That steals the joy.

I'm tired of living with fear that I didn't teach this well enough or that long enough or that my kids are behind where the class was last year. It isn't a contest or a race or a comparison. It is about a bunch of variables that affect and are effected by living breathing kids.

The truth is... my kids will never be like your kids. The lesson will never go like it does in my mind. And that's okay. It doesn't have to be perfect. It just has to touch a place deep inside that fights to get out and keep learning. That's all.


P.S. I don't wear a watch. Never have. Never will.





(For more of Kim Frencken's writing and information about her educational products, check out her blog, Chocolate for the Teacher.)