Little Monster

**** I thought I hit post last week but it looks like I hit save LOL. So I will post a new update soon!
Hello friends,

I think my empathy might be broken. The emotion necessary to do my job can be a bit draining at times. Thankfully my energy is renewed by my students and their eagerness to learn and help. I tried a new format for my class last night and I am very encouraged. Prior to last night the level of class participation was dismal at best. Initial I thought maybe it was that they had not done the material and therefore could not contribute to the discussion, so I decided to do a pop quiz to find out. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the overwhelming majority aced the test so lack of preparation was not the problem. It seems that they are just really afraid to speak up. They seem to prefer to let me talk the entire time.

One of the assignments for the class is to write a question based on the assigned reading to be turned in at the start of class. So, last night instead of lecturing, I decided to use the question cards. Some I posed to the class as a whole and called on individuals for others. I was so happy to finally have some engagement and exchange of ideas. I did not get to cover everything that I wanted to, but was very pleased with the results over all. This was even more amazing because I returned their first research papers. The scores were a bit lower than either I or the students expected, but the average score was 80%. After quite a bit of internal debate I decided that there was fault on both sides as there were things that I did not explain clearly enough and the students failed to ask questions. I offered an optional extra credit assignment. Those that would like to improve their scores will have an extra assignment and I will have another assignment to grade.

Teaching has been an amazing experience, especially with his group of first year students learning the basic tenants of my profession. It reminds of why I decided on this career in the first place. It helps to reignite the passion for my work. Social workers are nothing if not passionate.  The work we do is often shunned by others. We will never be famous, rich, acknowledged or  even appreciated most of the time, but we do what we do because we just cannot imagine doing anything else. I love my job even when I hate it. I know that many of my clients will never think of our interaction again, but just knowing that I have done all that I can to help that person is enough. When I started out in social work I was once told that if I wanted to be underpaid, overworked and under appreciated then I was in the right place. I never imagined how true that would prove to be, but I still cannot imagine myself doing anything else. Sure I would like to have to the status (and salary) allotted to any other graduate level professional, but all in all I can't complain. How many people have the opportunity to impact another persons life in the way that I can. It is an amazing experience every single time. I will never get tired of that.

Of course I have to tell you about Gizmo. I came home from a long day at work and at school and it turns out he was pissed! Literally and figuratively. I get home tired, but happy to see my puppy. He follows me into the bedroom while I change out of my work clothes and immediately lifts his leg and pees all over my bedspread. As I stripped the bed I thought Oh well, accidents happen. I took him out for a walk and a little one on one time. So then I go into the living room to watch a little TV before bed. Gizmo jumps into Cheryl's lap and immediately pees in her lap. I laughed my ass off, but Cheryl was less than pleased. Then as I laid on the couch watching TV I realized that Gizmo had been quite for a long time. I looked down on the floor and see that he had been very busy chewing through my cell phone charger. That was the last straw, somebody went to bed earlier before I became an abusive parent. He might be a little monster, but he is my little monster!

Well, thanks for listening. Talk to you again soon!