Assigned Blog Cuatro (Free-Form)

It's been all of two or three days that we've been back in Oxford for our summer classes, and it's been all of six hours since we've started working with the first years, but already I can foresee some awesomeness in the works. It does need to be said that this whole summer teaching deal is going to be much more fun than we all believed at first - designing our own curriculum in small groups gives us so much freedom to be creative and constructive, and it's obvious that our whole group is manifesting the dedication, work ethic, and imagination we know we have inside us but have been more or less unable to express fully at Ole Miss. It's the whole potentiality/actuality dichotomy of which I'm so fond. Oftentimes I and my colleagues feel chained and restrained by the constrictions of our coursework at Ole Miss, and now that we've been given all the latitude in the world we're flowering beautifully. Our group is like a fine wine, aged for so long and appreciated and loved, but now at least the cork has been removed and the summer school children will become drunk with the subtleties each of us individually brings to the whole.

Okay, so I'm no poet or expert with metaphor, but still, I think that we all share a similar feelign of hope and renewal that is a direct result of having finished the dreaded first year of teaching, taking the new first years under our wings, and being permitted a liberty with this summer school project at Holly Springs that nobody saw coming. It's simply refreshing, and it's permeated the air - I've been working hard all day the last few days and it's as if I could not possibly run out of energy despite my long commute and general lack of sleep.

Maybe it will all change, but I don't think so. I'm particularly excited about enrichment project assigned to me and Jake - although I know I am no Teacher Corps standout and probably wasn't the immediate choice to work on such a unique project, I'm lucky to have fallen into it. We work extremely well together in many ways from brainstorming innovative ideas with our license to do anything with our kids this summer to making those ideas transpire to putting on the necessary face to dealing with the mundane work we need do to placate the Ole Miss powers that be. Jake is one of if not the best teachers we have, and it's fantastic that I have the chance to raise myself up to his level and try to become an excellent teacher rather than an adequate one.