I Wanna Be a Teacher: Part 1

I was 29 when I started my masters in education and licensure program. The first required course was a nine hour class that met every Monday, Tuesday and Thursday from 6:30 to 9:30. It was taught by a kindly retired public school administrator in his early seventies and was called something like foundations of education. There were probably 35 people in there when it started, ranging in age from early 20's to mid-50's. There were experienced teachers who were trying to move up on the pay scale, and military people who were close to retirement and looking for a second career, and people like me, who just thought teaching might be a good idea. In retrospect, that's a pretty broad audience, and I don't know how I would spin a lecture for that group, but Dr. Y did a pretty good job-- at least I remember thinking so at the time.

The first night, I took a seat in one of those one-piece chair-desk combos that so many classrooms are furnished with. My place was one from the front, next to the wall that the door was on. The room was stuffy, but not unpleasant; it had that chalk and textbook smell, although the only books in there were a couple of cracked dictionaries. New notebooks were arranged just so on each desktop, and there was the chirp of pens clicking nervously, like crickets, underneath quiet small talk as we waited for our class to begin. A tiny woman with long black hair sat behind me, and being the introvert that I am, I ignored her; in fact the only reason I know she was there is because later she told me so.