Apologies for the 3-year hiatus. I had every intention of keeping up to date with my blog when I started at my new school, but then the pandemic happened and continued to happen and then life happened and before I knew it, apparently my calendar says it’s April 2023. How though?! I still have to think oh so carefully (the same kind of careful thinking I do every time I have to spell Wednesday and find myself sounding it out like Wed-nes-day!) every time I write the date because I can’t seem to understand how I blinked and I’m now in my 4th year at my new school. Unbelievable. Implausible, even. By the way - can I even still call it a new school? Probably not. One can probably only get away claiming their workplace is ‘new’ for 1 year….2 years max. I guess it’s just my school now – neither old nor new. Confirmed by the fact that the daily monotony has set in – same carpark, same classroom, same preferred toilet cubical, same coffee mug….
I’m not sure how to cram three years of classroom happenings into one post, but I think sharing some insight into the type of school I’m working at now would be a start to set the scene for further posts. After 8 years in a high school in a lower socio-economic area, with one of the highest unemployment and crime areas in the state, I had a bit of culture shock adjusting to my new school – a primary school in a lovely, modern, middle-income area, closer to the city.
I have been umming and ahhing about whether ‘culture shock’ applies to changing workplaces, and I have come to the conclusion that yes, of course it bloody does. Culture shock describes the impact of moving from a familiar culture (my old school) to one that is unfamiliar (my new school). It includes the shock of a new environment (new campus, new classroom, new staffroom), meeting new people (new colleagues) and learning new ways (new systems). All appropriate, in my opinion, to starting a new job. Culture shock is feeling uncomfortable and sometimes lonely when you are in a new place –more than apt to the feeling you get when you start a new job.
One of the first moments where I experienced culture shock, was on the very first day of the school year. I had been in my classroom all of 10 minutes, when I realised that I would have some adjusting to do and that my new environment was quite diverse to my comfortable environment where I had spent the last 8 years of my working life.
I always like to start the day asking the students a question when I do the roll, to get to know them better and start to connect. I knew things were different to what I was used to when I asked ‘What was the highlight of your Christmas holiday?’ and the students answered with – ‘went skiing in Canada’, ‘went on a cruise in Greece’, ‘road tripped around New Zealand’, ‘went to Thailand’, ‘we went to Japan and South Korea, ‘we went to Disneyland’, ‘I went to all of the theme parks and watched Mum and Dad jump out of a plane and then we got a designer puppy’…..you get the picture. These kids are 10/11 years old and already well- travelled. I had many students when I worked at high school, who were 14-15 years old and had never been to the beach or never been to ‘The City’ (which is only 50 minutes away) or had never even seen a farm animal, let alone travelled overseas - some of them didn’t have the internet at home to have the ability to even research these luxuries and dream about experiencing them one day. It both blew my mind and taught me a valuable lesson - to never assume the experiences that my students have had, no matter how ordinary you think they are.
What I did learn from working in the lower socio-economic school was that often it is the people who don’t have much at all who are the most grateful.
I’ll never forget the amount of students who thanked me after every lesson, or cried when I turned up with lollypops or pencils for them and gave me gifts that they made or one that still makes me tear up when I think about it – it was a half used notebook with a butterfly on the front that the student had carefully torn out the pages they had used, wrapped it up in lined paper from an exercise book and gave it to me along with a hand-picked flower with a broken petal. A reminder that some of the most beautiful things are a little broken. Again, a learning experience and a lesson I have held on to tightly ever since. I am forever grateful for getting to spend 8 years of my career at such a great school that equipped me with valuable skills early in my career that I don’t think I could have acquired elsewhere and it’s these skills and attributes that I learnt from these students that I aspire to instil in all of my students to make them the kindest, most empathetic and grateful humans possible.
The students at my current school are beautiful, awesome, well-mannered and super keen learners, but I think they have lived a little more and experienced more adventures in life than I was used to and this has come with some adjustments on my end. Materialistic things seem to be of higher priority and a lot of things are intentionally or unintentionally taken for granted. I hope that when they grow up and life throws challenges at them, I’ve helped equip them at least a little bit, with some of the skills they need to overcome difficulties, be resilient and try again. The roll call on the first day was just the beginning for me of realising I was dealing with a different kettle of fish than I was used to and I needed to adapt.
I have loved every moment of having my own class all day. Fulfilling my childhood dream was everything I had hoped, plus more. I thought the connections made at high school were strong but when you have 180 students and you only see them a few hours a week compared to having 30 students you see for 25+ hours a week, the connections are different – deeper and more genuine. Once I worked my way through the 5 stages of culture shock – and overcame the frustration and adaptation phase – and made it to the acceptance stage, things got a heck of a lot easier; I became comfortable and familiar in my new environment and learnt what I needed to do and not to do to thrive and survive in my new school.
Well-travelled kids are curious kids, keen to learn more about the world around them. They have their own travel stories to share, they have their own travel dreams, they have a strong desire to hear all about my travels – past and future (or maybe they have learnt that this is a fabulous way to distract Mrs Devine from the Maths lesson....) and I think that is what I love best. I am a Hodophle – (one who loves to travel) and it brings me joy to be able to share this part of me with my students.
I guess we all had to take a break from overseas travel during the pandemic, but it is well and truly back for me and my students. I’ve booked 4 weeks of Long Service Leave in October to travel to Japan. I have students going to the USA, Italy, Japan, Indonesia, France, New Zealand, Pakistan, South Africa and Canada this year. So many beautiful travel stories to be written and shared. I always think that travelling is the best way to learn. You learn about different cultures, get to experience different foods, landscapes and activities and most importantly you learn about acceptance, an invaluable skill that you cannot learn so authentically in a book.
Here's a lesson starter activity I got to share with my students recently. Who can work out the most countries that Mrs Devine has travelled to from the flags? Bonus points if you can guess the country I have been to 10 times and the one I have been to 5 times?! Of course this was followed by some awesome travel stories. #myfavourite
Here's my little holiday countdown, which is getting me through the tough days this year.
I am looking forward to sharing more posts again and keeping you up to date with middle school shenanigans.