A Kindness Teacher

When I was growing up, I was always very careful to never let people do too much for me because I felt that I owed them.  I am sure that is because whenever my mother did something for me, I did owe her. I knew that being the giver was the power position.  But of late, I find that people want to do things for me and I am starting to be okay with letting them.  I don't always have to be the strong, in charge one, the "I can do it myself" one.  I kind of like that I am softening up a little bit in that area.

So, along that line, I have a terrific boss.  He does do little things for me and doesn't mention it.  For example, we get student evaluations, for the last four years, my boss has taught all the classes in our department (yes, one guy) until I came along.  So, I get student evaluations, that are for the most part helpful and since I am new to teaching I try to see how I can apply what they say.  Well, this last semester I was hearing a lot of we would rather have your boss teaching the class and I teasingly told him that they love him.  He has been super supportive telling me that they are just testing me, that he got the same sorts of comments when he first came.  He also had me compare the grades I was giving the students with the grades that he was giving the same students in the classes he still teaches.  He said he wanted to do that so that I would see that I am not being any harder on them than he is.

So, student evaluations arrived in an envelope over Christmas vacation.  I was alone in the office and decided to read what was written since I was pretty sure I was going to get creamed in that class.  There was one in particular that said I shouldn't be teaching the class that anyone else would be better (anyone else being my boss).  So, I put the evaluations back in the envelope and figured I'd get them when he handed them out.  So, today they came to me from my bosses hands and guess what...that comment was mysteriously gone from the evaluations (they are hand written and then copied on to one sheet of paper).  He actually went in and got rid of that comment, which would have required some cutting and pasting with scissors.  I think that is terribly sweet, kind and thoughtful and in my recent past, I am not sure I would have appreciated it as much as I do now.  The even kinder part is that he doesn't know that I know, so I can't/won't thank him.

Now another semester has arrived and I am again teaching a class that he used to teach.  One of my students came in on one matter and we ended up discussing the class, afterwards, my boss asked me if we had discussed the matter she came in for originally and I said yes but we had also discussed the class that I was teaching.  He said that he thought that I would be giving her exactly what she had been looking for in that class. He says he thinks I will do a better job of teaching it than he did.

I said when I started this blog that I would be looking for good teachers on how to be a swan.  I think I've found one!