You’re so vain, I bet you think this blog is about you

Reminiscent of a radio-editing exercise I had to do at Williams in which I spent 45 unbroken minutes talking steadily into a recorder about whatever it was that came to mind, the first reaction I had to seeing/hearing myself in the video taken while teaching a lesson plan earlier this week was that I really cannot stand the sound of my own voice. I sound like I picked a handful of soy beans from the side of the road on my way to work and shoved them all straight up my nostrils. Talk less, listen more. Some people talk too fast, I talk too much.

In general, I’ve got a lot that I need to work on and a long way to go. It’s easy to be critical of others until it’s you under the microscope (judge not, less ye shall be judged). The same criticisms I had for my peers, I could just as easily flip around onto myself – be louder, clearer, more energetic and enthusiastic when in front of the classroom. Instead of singing the songs of pedagogy with a smile and a clever hook, my passion was passive and harmonized by the lethargic hum of the overhead projector. I could see the two hours of sleep I got the night prior in my slug-like reflexes and shadowy raccoon-esque eyes, the double espresso with whip cream in my nervous twitch, and the last minute lesson plan screaming smoke and mirrors from every corner of the room .... standing up there with my monotone delivery and paisley tie, I was exposed for the perceptive Lilliputians to read like a simple Dr. Seuss story book. It’s Halloween every day and I’m dressing up like a teacher (only for this perverted holiday I have to be the one always shelling out the candy), or I’m back up on stage and auditioning for the lead role of idealistic educator .... how does my hair look? And I thought I was slick.

Other, more concrete notes: Probably shouldn’t have drawn on that sleeping student's head with a dry-erase pen; or spent five minutes of my class shooting notebook paper balls into the trash basket; I need to get some new ties; I tend to laugh a lot – sometimes at the students, mostly at myself; I need to tuck my shirt in and shave (I can hear my mother now, ‘Daniel Joseph, you need to be more professional. You look like a street person!’); zip fly.

Also, I recently read something about the Rosenwald Schools in Mississippi and thought I’d post a little reference link about them (Rosenwald Schools). The schools take their name from Julius Rosenwald, early chairman and partner in Sears, Roebuck & Co. and a prominent philanthropist. The Rosenwald rural school building program was a major effort to improve the quality of public education for African-Americans in the South in the early 1900s.