Day 1

Out on the blacktop, I shook hands with my new students, and it was no surprise they were all black; there were two latinos in the school, and zero whites. There something very odd about how black the students were and how white the teachers were. An uncle walked up to me and gave me three different phone numbers while trying to conceal a concerned look. “I’m Jerome’s uncle. He gets into a lot of trouble. Call me if he starts acting up. Here's my mom's number and her cell if I don't pick up. She lives real close, so she can just come and get him.”
"I'm sure that won't be necessary."
"Just call if you need to."
A woman with an oversized t-shirt and tight jeans turned to me, “I’m Sean’s mother. He is ADHD. I don’t have his medication yet.”
I smiled. They’ll be just fine; I’ll take care of your little babies, I thought. I didn’t know at the time they were less concerned about their kids, and more concerned about me. Too many teachers had come and gone, and now they had a young white guy in a suit with a handbook and a bright smile with little chance of staying past October. Colin was my smallest student and the Special Ed teacher was holding his hand. “He’s a little shy around new teachers; he’ll warm up to you.” Ahhh, I thought, poor little guy, I’ll make sure he has a great day.

When the students came in and took their seats, they were all looking at me intently, in complete silence. They were just staring, extremely carefully just like my old dog, Stoney, froze when he saw a turtle for the first time. Stoney didn’t know what to do - “What is this strange animal? Is it friendly or mean? Will it mind if I pounce on it? Let's find out.” He ended up jumping on it until I had to pull him away fearing he might just have killed it given the chance. My little friend Colin was the first to budge, and he started whispering to a neighbor, “Please be quiet,” I said in my best teacher voice, but it sounded more like a flight attendant. They both looked up and stopped,and I continued with my description of the nametags but then they started talking again. They must not have understood me, I thought. “Voices should be turned off,” I said; maybe a different phrasing would do the trick, fingers crossed. But they kept on talking without even a pause. Then it occurred to me, Oh! They must be bored with what I’m doing, let's hand out the crayons, and then they will be engaged. Engaged was the buzzword of my grad school; it was explained over and over again that almost all behavior issues could be solved by creating an engaging lesson. Their behavior didn't depend on me as a teacher, but it depended upon the lesson that I had written up the night before. It wasn't like they saw me as a young, white, 1st year teacher who happened to be smiling more than their previous teachers. It was more like they were eagerly awaiting my engaging nametag activity. At least, that was what grad school had taught me.