you all said this would get easier

dispatches from a second-year teacher

[maxandallthat-blog]

well ok fuck you too barnes and noble

I had a really shitty experience with a cashier tonight - not the overt transphobia that people tend to share about, but just the kind of low-level crappiness that sometimes really gets under my skin. I was trying to use my teacher discount at barnes and noble and the cashier asked to see my ID - which has literally never happened (I always just give phone number and they take it.) I showed it to him and showed how the last name matched and the address matched. 

"But it is a membership for Max." "Max is me. I'm Max." "No, you're not. This says you're [redacted, a name that starts with the same letter]" "I'm transgender." (this usually makes people clam up when I say it forcefully, but not this fucker!) "You should fix it in the computer system." "My school ID is the one I used to set up the membership, and it says Max." "Well you need to fix the error or this is going to happen every time you come in." "You're literally the first person to ever ask for ID." the kicker: "Ah, yes, but that's because I'm the head cashier! I believe in doing things right." [delivered with an incredibly smug shit-eating grin]

[maxandallthat-blog]

kids are pretty smart about trans stuff

4th Grader: *points to button on my chest* “H - E...” He? Your button says he. 

Me: Yeah, it says He. 

Kiddo: Why does it say “he?” 

Me: Because - 

Kiddo: Oh, wait, is it because you prefer “he?” Like you are wearing it because you are a person who prefers “he” so you are a “he” and that tells people? 

Me: Uh, yup, that’s pretty much - 

Kiddo: That makes sense. 

Kiddo: *wanders away to get his snack* 

[maxandallthat-blog]

sometimes kids are a lot smarter than adults

One of my students wrote this in my creative writing class today: 

“Ideas are everything. Good ideas, dumb ideas, bad ideas, risky ideas, and even impossible ideas. You could grab an idea and hold it tight or let your idea loose and never make it happen. The choice is yours. 

...Good ideas, such as making a new cure to cancer, are made to help people. Dumb ideas, such as making legs to attach to your food, are made to attempt to make life easier. Risky ideas, such as bungee jumping off of the grand canyon, are made for people who like to take risks. 

On top of all that, impossible ideas, such as making a girl turn into a boy, are for people who dare to dream. 

Inventing something takes a lot of hard work, but the final result is all worth it. ...Some ideas thake years and years to be proven such as the arrangement of the outer space. Some people thought the earth was in the middle of the solar system and some people disagreed. "

[maxandallthat-blog]

fuck pinterest

I thought that when I stopped presenting as female I would stop feeling so much pressure to conform to other people’s beauty standards, but then I remembered that I am an elementary school teacher and my bulletin boards will never look as cute as everyone else’s. 

[maxandallthat-blog]

just sending scary emails

I wish I knew how to explain to cis people how hard and scary it is to ask for time off from work for transition-related medical needs. 

The time off I am requesting should be treated like any other medical time off or surgery. And in all likelihood, mine will be treated that way, because I am lucky enough to work for an employer who supports and embraces me. 

AND EVEN IN THIS RELATIVELY SAFE BUBBLE, IT IS TERRIFYING. Just to ask for it. 

Nothing profound here in the slightest, just... even when you are doing your transition “on easy mode” or “in a progressive bubble” it is still really friggen hard and I wish people wouldn’t belittle it. 

[maxandallthat-blog]

teachers are still learning

I’ve been reading a lot of books about whiteness and anti-racist praxis recently, and one lesson from White Fragility has really stood out to me: 

White progressives (that includes me!) are often hyper-concerned with not appearing racist, often devoting great attention, effort, and energy to cultivating this public persona. Since time and energy are both finite resources, this means that rather than really engaging in the working, growing, learning, and changing that needs to happen, white progressives instead begin to put all their (our) work into this appearance rather into engaging with the painful parts of the work. 

This has been eye opening to me to say the least, and while I think it is ultimately for the best that I consider the questions the book raises, I am struggling with a major loss of confidence in myself as an educator or leader of children. 

I’ve had questions like these swirling around in my head - 

“What if everything that you thought mattered or helped was wrong? What if it was not only not best practice, but actively harmful?” 

“What if the tools you learned in academia not only didn’t equip you to make effective change, but also taught you to uphold and recreate the structural racism that exists now?” 

Suddenly I am having to see that not only have I not been helping - I’ve been making things worse.

Over the years, I’ve talked big talk about how learning is uncomfortable, how we need to approach subjects that make us feel uncertain in order to expand our knowledge... but I am coming to see that it was disingenuous. I repeatedly positioned myself in those conversations as a “facilitator” or “leader,” a way of relating both to the group and to the subject itself that somehow implied that I had completed my learning. But truly, so much of the time, when reading books about systemic racism, it is easy to except myself from the narrative of broad, society-level issues. “That’s about other people,” or “Yes, but I know better now.” I stopped looking for new lessons. 

Now that the lessons are in front of me, I am grateful for the growth in equal measure as ashamed for my arrogance. In a little over a month, I will be back in my classroom, trying to help diverse learners to make sense of the world around them and their place in it. I know I’m unlikely to ever really feel “ready,” but I feel particularly unready right now.

[maxandallthat-blog]

who even are you and other nonsense

I’m an elementary school science teacher going into my second year of full-time lead teaching. 

Things that I’m excited about: having a better understanding of how my curriculum fits together, getting to improve on curriculum that I wrote as a first draft (and on the fly!) last year to make it more refined and standards-aligned.

Things that I’m not excited about: being afraid that I’m a bad teacher rather than just a new teacher, feeling like I don’t have the training I need to support some students who have difficulties, feeling tired all the time and not feeling lifted after summer. I had a lot more energy this time last year.

I also have some challenges that other teachers don’t. Namely, I am transgender! This year I am continuing with my medical transition, and that is hard and scary for me, especially because it is hard to know when is the “best time” for me to have top surgery to reconstruct my chest, among other steps.