What direction to choose?

   Its not a school day, but I'm still recovering from the overwhelmed feelings from teaching.  My classes are so huge, hovering around 40 students/ class.  I have tried for three days to show a movie, "El Norte", which is a beautiful story about a brother and sister from Guatemala who must leave their home and seek a new life in "the north".  There are so many important lessons about undocumented workers and the life they seek... and find when coming to the U.S.  But my projector's bulb is not bright enough for some of the classrooms with no blinds, and I cannot drag a large TV cart through the overcrowded halls with my regular teaching cart to each classroom.  So its a no-go.  My last hour of the day is located in a particularly uncomfortable room, with a teacher that using two desks, one on either side of the room.  He does not teach my class but since it is his room he uses it for his prep hour, wandering back and forth across the area where I try to give instruction, looking for his papers and shifting his belongings.  It is distracting for me on top of the loud and somewhat vulgar conversations between a quarter of the students during the lesson.

My voice is drowned out by them and the quiet students strain to hear me, their eyebrows furrowed as they strain to hear the lesson from amid the obnoxious behavior of their peers.  Every once in awhile, a disruptive and disrespectful student demands that I repeat something so they can learn.  Once they "get it" they go back to their crudeness: eating (hiding it in desks), picture sharing on phones (under their bags) and jokes about dancing, or who's gay.  If I move on with the lesson without their "consent" they gang up on me  and say I'm a bad teacher.  If I call them out on being too loud or disrupting the lesson they pretend to be interested in the lesson, often a verbal conjugation or constructing/deconstructing the syntax of the language, and promptly go back to their group-talk.  Often enough, they refute my accusation about being disruptive by saying other people are talking too and proceed to challenge me with insults to my teaching.

  
Along with this "dance" of sorts, between teaching the students who want to learn and ignoring/managing the rude students, there are random interruptions: an announcement from the assistant principal, other students entering the class just to say "hi" to other students, or students sent by counseling staff to retrieve a student.  Once, a student was called out then returned with a newspaper article which mentioned her.  She had no intention of going back to the lesson and shared her article with all the peering eyes that accompanied a newspaper photos and captions.  I also have football players, some of whom are being recruited for college.  They come late to class, talk loudly or act silly, then ask to go to their counselor for things of great importance.  Meanwhile I'm writing passes and not teaching.  I have tried to say "no" but they become more belligerent, so I've learned to let them go... Its easier to continue teaching.  Most students who are difficult for teachers know this, and do not request to leave but demand it.  I only have so much energy.  I feel beaten down by the end of the day.

 
 As I drive home from this town bordering Detroit, where most of the establishments are liquor stores, gentlemen's clubs, used car lots or fast food, I pass the boarded up buildings, the apartments with tarps over their roofs, the psychiatric hospital, the tire and rim shops and get on I-94 west.  The semis spray salty road mist over my car and I watch for beaten up cars with reckless drivers.  The nastier the car the less they have to lose in an accident.  I dodge tire tread near the break-down lanes and exit the expressway to Michigan Ave. From there its a series of slow lights and cheap but newer subdivisions, until I enter my little town.  My street looks so humble yet so welcoming.  As soon as I pull into the driveway I begin to think about my children and their homework situation, if they are getting along, and what their needs are.  I drag my heavy bag upstairs to the main floor and deposit it near my desk, where I  leave it until the anxiety of teaching inspires me to open it.  I take deep breaths and smile at my children and dog.  They are my reason for all of this.  God give me the strength for tomorrow.