7 What We Learned from Student Teaching
Cameron sat in the back of the classroom, waiting for his turn to teach. Today will be a full day at the school, and it was dragging on miserably. Yesterday went fast because he was only at the school for a half day with his station meeting in the morning. Cameron laughed to himself about his Jack Tripper moment of pulling Christine out of the hallway while her boyfriend was with another girl in the room next to her head. He felt bad for Christine, but he would feel even worse for them if they actually got married. He decided then that no matter what, he couldn't cover or avert Craig's cheating anymore.
Part of Cameron's dread was the next class, 9th grade Language Arts. He was happy not to deal with them yesterday. Cameron was pretty sure that Tyler Jenkins, a ripe little bastard, had keyed his car last week. The crazy thing is Cameron tried to relate to him, but the kid did it just to do it. Cameron knew that dealing with over and under medicated entitled kids that were raised by successful illiterates that show up wearing crocs shoes, football jerseys, baseball hats, with adult backpacks stuffed with divorce papers to PTA meetings was part of the job. He even enjoyed the idea of kids that challenge teachers, you have to when you are a new teacher, but Tyler Jenkins was too difficult for it to be even fun or challenging. Not only would Tyler show up every day with a six dollar Starbucks coffee, he would make sure to 'accidentally' dump half of it in the garbage can every morning, stinking up the classroom for the rest of the day. Cameron found him insufferable.
Ninth grade Language Arts started like any other class. Ben took roll and had the kids begin a short writing assignment while Cameron prepared his lesson on theme in Nothing But the Truth. Things were going fine until Cameron spotted Tyler making the 'licking the v' obscene gesture at a special needs girl to make Buffy Bartlett laugh. Buffy didn’t take the bait and kind of looked at Tyler with scorn, but it did work on Cameron when he saw red and immediately pulled Tyler out into the hall. Sure, when he was younger he and his friends made fun of the retarded kids too, but Tyler should know better. This wasn't the late 80s anymore. Tyler lived in the politically correct almost 21st century, doesn't he know that every time he makes fun of a minority or special need person a feminist sociology professor will weep gently in the arms of her transgendered lover?
Tyler stared defiantly at Cameron. This was not new; he had been pulled out of innumerable classes to be talked to and 'settled down' by teachers since the first grade. Cameron knew talking to this sociopath wouldn't do any good, but it would be good practice for the future when he didn't have to deal with kids that were rumored to have smeared dog feces on their walls.
"What?"
"Tyler, you can't make obscene gestures in class, you know that."
"What? No, I didn't do anything."
"Yes you were doing this." Cameron mimicked the 'licking the v' gesture. Tyler's eyes lit up. This was going to be a great punchline later at lunch to mock Cameron to his friends with.
"That's not obscene."
"C'mon Tyler, you know what it means."
"I swear on my life that is not obscene," Tyler lied. "It means that I'm hungry," Tyler fabricated. "I swear you teachers just want to pick on me. I never do anything wrong,” Tyler boldly misrepresented. Cameron did all that he could not to laugh at the little creep. He wished that Jimmy was there to call him "Tits on a Unicorn;" he really did have a way with words that Cameron lacked.
"I know you can lie like this to teachers because society says that if they call you out on it your parents will run to your side and cause headaches for the entire county, but I don't care man. Leave that girl alone and quit doing that before you get into real trouble."
"Yeah right, I'm going to tell my Mom about what you said."
"Go ahead tough guy. Go tell your Mommy." Cameron knew that he shouldn't sink to Tyler's level, but the kid was definitely gifted in the ancient art of aggravation.
"Tough guy, huh? You’re just jealous of me. I'm better looking. I've got more money. And I've got more girlfriends than you. All you have is some stupid radio show that none of my friends listen to because you suck and a faint whiskey smell every morning but Wednesdays." Only alcoholics drink on Tuesday nights thought Cameron.
"Tyler, what are you going to do? You're a smart enough kid. But you have almost no work ethic. I mean you could go to college and do fine, but you would end up fist fighting your professors and getting kicked out. You have got to learn to work harder and to get along with people, or you will fail. Who is going to hire a lazy person that argues with everyone?" Cameron didn't think this would work; Tyler was like any other ninth grader in the world. The future was this weekend.
"I don't have to worry about money after school. My dad said he was going to give me money, so I don't have to worry about school or money." Never mind the complete disregard for others and their belongings, or accusing Ben of cheating on his pregnant wife, to Cameron this was actually probably the most disgusting thing that Tyler had ever said. Cameron knew that itching, tearing, aggravating, rash that is entitlement; he himself had felt it at times. It was practically par for the course at the University. How else could you feel okay about taking your parents money to sit through self-indulgent poetry readings in a creative writing course by a male junior about female masturbation and take it seriously? How else could you major in philosophy and not feel like a bandit? Because in college you believe you deserve to drink yourself into oblivion and occasionally attend classes, but in reality your parents are happy just to get you out of the house for a few years, because teenagers are unicorns with tits and best sent off to small college towns, away from the rest of society. Of course Cameron thought he was entitled too.
Cameron knew that there wasn't much he could say to Tyler; he was probably just in his most rotten period of his life. Of course, there was a fairly good chance that he would be a rotten sandy butthole the rest of his life, but kids are at their worst in the eighth and ninth grades. They are mutants.
"Well, good luck with that Bro." Cameron said dejectedly.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean good luck with your Daddy giving you money. You are very fortunate to not have to work hard in life." Cameron hated this. He hated not being able to smack sense into this kid. Childhood is wasted on kids. Cameron thought the world would be better if everyone aged 13-24 should have to go to work camps and not be allowed to attend school until they were old enough to appreciate it. At least he thought that until he realized that he would still have 3 years left in the camps too, so forget that.
"Whatever."
"Alright, so go back in there and leave that girl alone."
"Whatever, thanks cool guy," mumbled Tyler. Cameron was so glad that he was able to enlighten and help Tyler improve his outlook on life. It warmed Cameron to make such a profound difference in the life of others. He was just like Michelle Pfeifer in that movie where she saved a bunch of ghetto kids from gang warfare or Jennifer Garner where she saved all of those other ghetto kids in that other movie that showed how white teachers can help ghetto kids through the power of teaching Bob Dylan and Tupac lyrics. Hollywood always gets it right.
Except Cameron wasn't teaching misunderstood urban youth with tough exteriors that secured true hearts of gold. He was student teaching privileged suburban white kids that spent more on cell phone cases last year than he had on tuition.
The rest of the day was a typical Friday of student teaching for Cameron. He waited patiently during each period so that he could give his twenty minute lecture that he had so carefully crafted in three minutes on the drive to the school. That was one of the benefits of his brief radio background; Cameron was pretty good at making things up on the fly. Which was helpful with teaching, but what it really did was free up Cameron for his true calling in life, drunk ne'er do well. How could he sit around a radio station making fun of his friends if he was actually going to plan lessons? Inconceivable.
While waiting for his turn to say something that won't be listened to because he was a student teacher and anything he said would probably not be on the test because Ben Rogers wrote his test eight years ago and saw no reason to update them if he didn't have to, Cameron looked at Ben and wondered if that was his future. If so, it could be worse. Sure Ben looked like a beaten exhausted train bum in class most days, but he did have a career, wife, and a kid coming soon. Cameron didn't know how the family thing worked for Ben, but surely he was happier there than he had seemed at school. Cameron wondered if there was a way for people to be happy. Most people seem to want to just tolerate most of their day, but Cameron wasn't so sure he could do that. What was there to look forward to in life? Well, there was that party tonight.