Miss Francis

     When people ask me what I am going to teach and I tell them high school English, I generally get the same reaction from everyone: something along the lines of “Oh. . . I hated my English class” or “The only thing I liked was sentence diagramming.” It amazes me to hear these types of answers because I believe that Language Arts is the basis for all other forms of education. It is because of the English language and, consequently, the processes we learn from that language that we are able to understand other subjects. Students can understand their history textbooks because they can use their critical thinking skills, vocabulary, and knowledge about sentence and paragraph structure that they learned in English class. A chemist is able to publish his findings in journal articles for others to read and learn because of the writing techniques he learned. People watch TV shows every day that, whether they realize it or not, started on paper in the form of a script. The music that we listen to has lyrics that were written down and put into place using conventions of poetry. Government officials, business men, entrepreneurs, and many others use communication skills that being in the English classroom. It’s not just about the material that the average language arts teacher presents: It’s about how he or she uses it to teach broader themes, ideas, and skills to his or her students.

 

     English is a very wide area and encompasses many topics: literature, poetry, writing, grammar, vocabulary, etc. These things can form the basis for much of our knowledge about other subjects, as I mentioned before, and they can also further our love for things beyond the tactile, factual world. English gives us the tools we need to learn about other things, but it also gives life “flavor.” English, unlike some other subjects, has the ability to be practical and imaginative; creative and realistic. It allows for emotion to come through in a very serious topic. It can also permit solemnity to show in a somewhat humorous issue. Literature itself shows us where society has come from: the history of man, his feelings, his consciousness, and relationships. In other words, it allows us to become more than a statistic. Literature (and poetry) is a lasting memory of those who have come before us and a dream of what is yet to come, as William Shakespeare notes in Sonnet 55.

 

     I believe that to teach English, others need to be willing to learn what I have to teach. This is one of the biggest roles of the English teacher: to teach others to have an appreciation and respect for the art that the English language can be. The Brazilian educational philosopher, Paulo Freire, emphasizes the act of “working together” in education. There can’t be one receiving party in any type of education, including English. Students and teachers must work together to reach new understandings. Teachers can educate students and vice versa: there must be an atmosphere of sharing within the classroom. Information isn’t meant to be stored in one person and then doled out as seen fit: it should be interactive and practiced. I also believe that a Language Arts class does not need to be confined to reading from books and learning through lecture. Creativity in the form of projects, group-work, and using technology must also be utilized. This is what makes a Language Arts classroom so special: you can find language’s art and creativity in everything, but it is up to the teacher to utilize what is best for his/her students to teach them.

 

     My goal as an English teacher is to teach my students to have an understanding and appreciation of the arts (including literature and poetry), knowledge of the mechanics of reading and writing so they will be able to perform well in other areas of their academic and non-academic lives, and hopefully a more open mind in regards to creativity. In this regard, I hope to teach them more than English, because the truth is, I’m not just an English teacher. I am a teacher of students. I have the opportunity to shape young minds for the better and to instill in them a passion for good. It is my goal as a quality teacher to instill a desire for learning in all of my students and to prepare them as young adults to take on the challenges of the world honorably.