A lot of times when I write the words that I put on the page stem from hardship and struggle. I use the process of writing to find the silver lining in a taxing situation; I use them to find hope. Today is not one of those days.
Yes, today was a taxing day at work and as soon as I got home I was bombarded with requests for help with homework by all of the children. The good news I saw right away was that Lena, despite my dreadful example of parenting I wrote about in my previous entry, was eager and willing to ask for help. This is a huge milestone for her since she is FIERCELY independent and stubborn and for the longest time would either hide the fact that she needed help, or refuse to ask for help even though it was obvious that she didn’t understand what was going on. This has been a pretty regular occurrence and even though it is a tremendous effort for me to stay calm and composed while teaching, I have been making a real effort at being compassionate and understanding – even showing empathy – with my teaching. And the results showed today.
Lena’s science teacher is fantastic and regularly sends her home with assignments that require my attention. He then follows up via email on the same day to make sure that his kids don’t conveniently “forget” to tell their parents and that parents have a REALLY hard time being “too busy” to check up on their kids. Additionally, if the kids do poorly on a quiz or test then he sends the homework home to get a signature and will give the kids 5 bonus points if the parents sign and date. Altogether it keeps me, the busy parent, involved in teaching, keeps the kids engaged, and helps foster discussions in households where the dad fancies himself a lay-scientist. And today Lena came home with a quiz that needed signing.
She was slightly nervous about showing me the quiz and I could tell she was REALLY hoping that I would simply sign and date the sheet and let her go. So of course I started asking her questions about the answers she got wrong and I gently (for once) and carefully (no, really) tried to find out where the disconnect in her work was. But even though I was being gentle, and empathic, and patient Lena began to get very upset. Now, when Lena gets upset it is not a loud and violent kind of thing. Instead she literally clams up and will only mumble one-word responses. This type of response normally causes me to blow up and storm out of the room. As soon as she started this I had one of my few moments of clarity and quietly explained to her, as gently as I could, that I had to step away. In the past when I’ve done this I have blamed her for it. “I’m stepping away because you are mumbling. Maybe when you quit mumbling I’ll try to teach you again, but remember that if I don’t it is YOUR FAULT.” Thankfully that was not the case today.
I still stepped away from her for some time but I promised her that I would return once I calmed down. I also encouraged her to take a break while I wrote her teacher for a little more insight into the matter. A quick email to her teacher and my suspicions were confirmed: Lena had messed up the instructions. However I held off telling her until I could regain my own teaching spirit and when I finally did sit down and explain Lena was very receptive. I honestly believe that she understood the nature of her mistake and that is the first step in not making the same one again.
And that’s it. A relatively small success in most eyes but for once I have a bit of a longer perspective and can see my and Lena’s tiny triumph and embrace it in the moment. There was a struggle but there was no yelling. We both got upset but we both took the time off we needed and came back to help solve the problem. I turned for help to her teacher, and she turned for help to her knitting needles to help come down off her angry place. 1 Corinthians 13:13 talks about faith, hope, and love. Today I saw that my faith and hope that Jesus can teach me to teach was rewarded with the patience necessary to teach from a loving heart instead of from an angry one. A happier note, indeed.
