Not Getting It Right

 I was talking to my friend Chuck the other day in between classes and I shared one of those strange realizations that I've had recently as I countdown my final year. When you're a teacher (or, more broadly anyone, I guess) and you're facing down retirement, you have these moments when you walk out of class and realize that you'll never teach that subject or film or chapter from Crime and Punishment again - and that you still didn't get it right. If you're a sincere and dedicated teacher - or you have more than your fair share of pride or ego - you always think that with a few tweaks you'll hit the bullseye next time. Like most teachers I write up notes to myself, not at the end of every entire class, but after each individual class period, with things that went right and wrong, and proposed changes for next year, hoping that next year everything will come together brilliantly at long last. Because of the nature of Champlain I suppose the chances of us ever getting it right are fairly inconsequential, mainly because our curriculum in the Core is interdisciplinary and seems to be torn apart and rebuilt every five years or so. Essentially, I don't have thirty-five straight opportunities to get that lecture on the Persians right (although it was already really good when I stopped teaching world civilization). Still, you would think that five times through would be enough for you to get it all sorted out. Of course, that's not the way it works, because teaching is not a one way street. Every course, and every class period for that matter, is organic: who are the students who signed up for that sections, and which ones showed up that day (did one of the two bright kids take the day off? did three of the ten who shouldn't actually be in college take the day off? how does that impact the chemistry?). For some time now I've believed that if you have four classes in a semester you normally have one you really like, two you can abide, and one that is borderline painful to meet. You never want your bad class to be the last one you meet with that week, because then you go into the weekend believing that you're actually a lousy teacher. Following that logic, I hope my last class in the spring is a great one, so that I don't go into retirement convinced that I had spent four decades as a lousy teacher. Maybe on that last day I'll do the roll, take a quick read of that day's chemical makeup of the room, and just send them home if I think they'll ruin my retirement.