Today was the last day of school. Can I get an AMEN? The year was overall really good; great students, fabulous peers, lots of laughs, but it had some really difficult moments that I feel could have played out a lot better. I'm reflecting a little tonight because I don't have any papers to grade. I might even read a book later.
I guess I don't really want to talk about what was bad about the year because it seems very pointed and critical. It is very pointed and critical and is directed at a handful of very specific people. Now criticism is not always necessary, or nice, and it seems that there are many channels on the cable that use criticism, finger-pointing and general cranky-pantsness to make other people less so the criticizers can be more. I didn't have those motives when I pointed out some easy, fixable problems (read: weaknesses) to certain people (read: not students) but the thing that gets me is that once the criticism/areas of weakness were highlighted in detail (read: v. v. delicately) and data was provided to support my criticism, nothing changed. Absolutely nothing.
I don't like receiving criticism. I'm kinda sensitive about that. If I have spinach in my teeth, I'd rather you keep it to yourself. I guess I don't like the fact that I have to rectify, reform, or amend what I've made wrong. I'm right, dammit. But in my self-righteous huffinpuffing, I have to realize that I'd rather make it right than live in ignorance. My sophomores finished the year reading Oedipus Rex, and I asked them what they thought the lesson was. It isn't reaaaaalllly about a guy who marries his mom, it is more about how this Greek guy lived in his arrested development which prevented him from actually seeing the truth. And once he learns the whole truth, he gouges out his own eyeballs because he has to atone for this blind, arrogant ignorance.
So back to the criticism thing. What I took away from this school year is that it is important to admit when you're wrong, PARTICULARLY if you are a leader, president or guide. It has been my personal experience that when I admit I am wrong, I feel better, people trust me, and mutual respect is established. My classroom benefits from my ownership of the truth that I am not the I Ching of the universe and occasionally (very occasionally) I make mistakes. I enter grades wrong, I forget names, I'm only human. If you think that not owning your shit makes you a better, loftier, more righteous person, then you are delusional. Everybody poops.
1 comment:
What you have described is true. Criticism is hard to hear, but how do we learn from our mistakes if we never realize we make them. That realization can take many forms, but is hardest to hear and easiest to deny when it comes from outside ourselves - from others. So how do you get others to see themselves honestly????? Good question. The old "Be the other person's mirror - hold up the mirror and reflect back what you see" psychological speak seems to work IF the other person is willing to look in the mirror. If the person who needs to change is in denial and refuses to look in mirrors then there is not much hope for change. Love, Mom
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