Nobody Said You Couldn’t
This was my first class at Michigan State University. I was enrolled in the post-baccalaureate Teacher Preparation program while finishing up my undergrad at The University of Michigan. I can’t remember the title of the class. I can’t even remember the teacher’s name. What I do remember was that I was primed for a change.
I had just left a stable, although unfulfilling, job at the YMCA. I had just re-enrolled at UofM to finish the remaining 10 credits I needed to complete my degree in Psychology. And I had just enrolled at MSU, seeking to find a new path, a new career, a new purpose. And because of this new purpose, a sense of empowerment smoldered within me. But it wasn’t until this first Teacher Preparation class that the empowerment ignited into a blazing bonfire.
The first assignment — the only assignment — in this first class was to write an autobiography of our learning experiences. I remember reading the assignment details as the teacher describe them. I remember listening to question after clarifying question from my classmates. I remember the tone of frustration and despair in that classroom as adults struggled to make sense of an extremely open-ended task. And I remember thinking that this was just what I needed.
That night, as I sat in front of a blank word processor’s screen, I battled for the perfect subject for “My Earliest Learning Memory”, the first chapter in my autobiography. Earlier that summer as I was preparing to move out of my parent’s house — for the second time — I found my Kindergarten class picture. What struck me was that I was the only white student. All around me were African American five and six year olds. Even my teachers were black. When I showed the photograph to my mom, even she was shocked. This lead to other memories of growing up in Detroit, in mostly African American working-class neighborhoods, recalling my all of my friends of color. Never once had it occurred to me that I was any different from my classmates and neighbors.
This had to be the subject of my first chapter. But because I was on this newly found path of a career change and a sense of empowerment (although I had no idea of it at the time), I decided a narrative would be too easy. So I wrote a poem. Probably the first poem I’d written since some sappy love poem for a high school sweetheart. ‘
Later that week when we met as a class again, I read my poem to the class. The reaction from my classmates was quite unexpected. One person, not directing the comments to be but to the teacher, griped “I didn’t know we could write a poem.” Other people started chiming in. The room seemed to be divided. All the comments were directed to the format, not the content of my writing.
After what seemed like hours of arguing the merit of my style, the teacher simply said, “I never said you couldn’t write a poem.” He then asked the next person to read his or her story and left it at that.
His words, while directed at my peers, were intended for me. He looked right at me, smiling, approving, acknowledging, encouraging. Each chapter after that became a challenge for me. Some were narratives. Others were fictional. And the last chapter was a poem, circling back to where I had started. After all, the purpose of the assignment was a personal reflection on learning memories. It was about me. About my journey. Shouldn’t I be the one who decided not only the content, but the format and style? Yes and yes!
It has always been this singular experience shapes the decisions I make with students. Empowering them to make sense of their learning. This particular teacher encouraged me to take risks. Certainly I’m not going to be the one to tell my students that can’t do something that enhances learning.
Nobody said I couldn’t, so I didn’t.
