My family has always been a Full House family, and my youngest brother is no exception. He's ten now, and when I was home for Thanksgiving, we watched bunches of DVRed episodes. They were the really old ones, from when the Olsen twins were babies, and everyone's problems were still pretty tame. (Did the problems on Full House ever stop being tame? Probably not.) Anyway, just in case your family didn't happen to be a Full House family, here's how every episode goes: Things start off okay, but someone invariably tries to skip school/ wishes his music career would take off/ doesn't get a part in the play/ has a fight with a friend, and things look pretty grim for a few minutes. Luckily, the episode always ends with a touching heart-to-heart in which Bob Saget lays down little nuggets of problem-solving wisdom.
I came home today emotional and frustrated. I love a lot of things about being a co-teacher (getting to pee when I need to, not having to plan every subject, the variety of students, learning from another teacher, another adult to look at, etc etc), but I also spend a lot of time wondering whether or not I am actually valuable in the classroom. Are my kids actually learning anything they wouldn't if I wasn't there? It's a double-edged sword. If I pull my kids out or pay too much attention to them, I'm doing that bad-teacher thing where I embarrass "my" kids or make them obvious to the rest of the class. If I leave them alone, why bother hiring me? A lot of the time I feel like one of my kids. I'll be the one who raises his hand halfway through a worksheet and says, "I forgot how to do this. I know I was just doing it but I forget. I think I'm doing it wrong." I can't even put my finger on what exactly I don't understand; I just feel unsettled.
So I keep waiting for Danny Tanner to come in here and drop a wisdom nugget on me. I can't imagine what's keeping him.
