Inspired to reflect on why I became a teacher from #EDUin30W5 started by George Couros on Twitter, I am revisiting a grad address I gave in 2005.
In my second year at the high school, the grade 12 class selected me as the grad speaker despite the school policy that speakers were not to be chosen from current staff. They insisted.
I became a teacher because I wanted to make a difference in the lives of others. I had teachers who made me feel like I existed, that I was a valuable and unique individual. I wanted to create the same feeling of "I matter" for others.
Here's the grad address. (Student names are changed.)
You Are
![]()
You should know from the outset the foundational belief of this group:
Mediocrity is our motto and we plan on achieving it—sort of, well maybe, yeah whatever.
Thank you graduates for the honour of letting me get the last word. You know I won’t be able to resist ranting a bit, but, let my rant be a chant for you, a rallying cry against the feeling that you’ve often gotten the short end of the stick.
In ELA when we identify a form of writing or speaking, like a grad address, we also want to identify the audience, the purpose of the text and the main idea to be communicated. If we defined the components of a grad address—depending on whether it was the author or the audience (is he done yet?)—we might define the main content as some helpful advice and the purpose as to provide an emerging adult with the tools necessary to be successful on their own. But many grads, however, told me they didn’t want to hear about blah and blah they said, “talk about us.” I’ll try both. And in this context, a little roasting is also in order.
I’ll start with some advice. Okay, I put this in here so I could quote some Shakespeare, but it works. In Hamlet, Polonius offers this advice to his departing son:
Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,
Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel;
I think you’ve got that. I’ve seen some strong bonds and certainly a lot of hugging, good wholesome, I-like-you-my-friend hugging.
Beware
Of entrance to a quarrel, but being in,
Bear't that the opposed may beware of thee.
Rita, you sure know how to make your opposed beware.
Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice (Rosie?)
Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment. (Robert)
Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, (some good advice for Rhea, Tiana--it means buy the nicest clothes you can afford, not buy many purses.)
I suppose the idea of giving advice is built on the idea of entering the “real world.”
You’ve always been in the “real world,” at least the world that has been constructed for you, socially engineered by one group or another. You are leaving the confined freedom of school to enter the free confinement of the jungle of work. All the worlds are real and you, each of you can help create that world, that society—you need not just be a part of it, a cog in a wheel where someone else is turning you and you know not why or wherefore. The “real world” is about taking and accepting responsibility. The real world is about acting and doing and being and questioning.
Philosopher Bertrand Russell noted that innovators are seen as subverters, anarchists upsetting the balance created through tradition and ritual—deadly habits that are formed in school institutions that can become victims of a train engine on tracks that lead nowhere.
And yes, innovators are met with hostility for upsetting the status quo, but it’s the innovators that we often respect in hindsight. Menno Simons, Miriam Toews. (note: large Mennonite community)
Let me tell you a bit about this class. Last year was my first year here, and I was led to believe that this was a group of underachievers. They actually prefer, masters of mediocrity or successfully mediocre but I’m not convinced that I buy that. Sure less than 50% of the class would hand assignments in on time (or at all) and we teachers would rant and rave and scratch our heads and wonder what was wrong with “those kids.” This was a class that lived in the shadow of a class that succeeded in getting high marks, high marks that we equate with intelligence and motivation. And then many chuckled as half the class marched off to make windows at Loewen Windows. And that is neither odd nor sad nor “shouldn’t be.”
We have a problem with our construct, our idea of intelligence, of “being smart” and how we value or respond to those individuals accordingly. The negative effects of “poor academic achievement” are lasting.
But I wonder. Set aside the fact that most of us are “lazy”—we want to get the most pleasure out of life, doing what we love to do most and we procrastinate doing those things that we don’t think are “important” but have to be done. Maybe this group here—some anyway—were simply not willing to do mindless work, mindless memorizing of facts they’d forget the next day just so they could achieve a percent that failed to reflect authentic learning, learning that lasts, learning that motivates further inquiry, learning that says something about who they are.
So I asked the graduates to reflect on their 13 years in school and was not surprised at their insight into their own learning.
While these thoughts may criticize some of our teaching practices, I want to include them to show that these students are critical thinkers. Focus on praising the insight:
On the lighter side:
One of the most painful comments was this:
On the positive side, one student wrote of a middle school teacher:
You guys have certainly made me think and question how I teach.
As I’ve struggled to figure you guys out, I have reflected greatly on what my role as a “teacher” is in getting students to learn, to want to learn or even knowing what they should learn.
Last year, with one English class, we decided to create a class magazine, a collection of stories, drawings, articles, advertisements. The students were put in control: a team of editors read, selected and edited submitted texts, handing them back and suggesting improvement. I stood back in wonder at the energy and focus and listened to the, “Is the class over already?” comments.
Our challenge as educators is to listen to our students and to let them be actively involved in the learning process, in making choices about what they want to learn within the choices of a curriculum.
Graduates, you will create a belief system that works for you. Like your parents and their parents before them, you will take what you have learned from your parents, grandparents and teachers and mix that with what you’ve learned from your friends, from your popular culture and end up with your way of interpreting what you perceive. You may learn the hard way, testing your views with actions and consequences concluding what is “good” and what is “bad.”
Certainly things are uncertain. But take with you the certainty that you can create meaning.
I have challenged you in and out of class to travel your inner geography, to explore the “you,” the “I am.”
I’ve challenged you to ask questions, to think about family and what constitutes family, to think about the social structures and the power interests that maintain them, how to think about being active or passive participants in the goings on of your life.
So what will you put into life, into living?
Shakespeare wrote that “Man is a giddy thing” (he must have known Ron).
Here’s your final assignment. You’ll have to create the learning outcomes, though, and the rubrics, and do the assessment, often.
Life is a narrative, a story. Your story. You, be the author. Be creative. And yes, your story needs a title.
In my second year at the high school, the grade 12 class selected me as the grad speaker despite the school policy that speakers were not to be chosen from current staff. They insisted.
I became a teacher because I wanted to make a difference in the lives of others. I had teachers who made me feel like I existed, that I was a valuable and unique individual. I wanted to create the same feeling of "I matter" for others.
Here's the grad address. (Student names are changed.)
You Are
You should know from the outset the foundational belief of this group:Mediocrity is our motto and we plan on achieving it—sort of, well maybe, yeah whatever.
Thank you graduates for the honour of letting me get the last word. You know I won’t be able to resist ranting a bit, but, let my rant be a chant for you, a rallying cry against the feeling that you’ve often gotten the short end of the stick.
In ELA when we identify a form of writing or speaking, like a grad address, we also want to identify the audience, the purpose of the text and the main idea to be communicated. If we defined the components of a grad address—depending on whether it was the author or the audience (is he done yet?)—we might define the main content as some helpful advice and the purpose as to provide an emerging adult with the tools necessary to be successful on their own. But many grads, however, told me they didn’t want to hear about blah and blah they said, “talk about us.” I’ll try both. And in this context, a little roasting is also in order.
I’ll start with some advice. Okay, I put this in here so I could quote some Shakespeare, but it works. In Hamlet, Polonius offers this advice to his departing son:
Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,
Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel;
I think you’ve got that. I’ve seen some strong bonds and certainly a lot of hugging, good wholesome, I-like-you-my-friend hugging.
Beware
Of entrance to a quarrel, but being in,
Bear't that the opposed may beware of thee.
Rita, you sure know how to make your opposed beware.
Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice (Rosie?)
Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment. (Robert)
Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, (some good advice for Rhea, Tiana--it means buy the nicest clothes you can afford, not buy many purses.)
I suppose the idea of giving advice is built on the idea of entering the “real world.”
You’ve always been in the “real world,” at least the world that has been constructed for you, socially engineered by one group or another. You are leaving the confined freedom of school to enter the free confinement of the jungle of work. All the worlds are real and you, each of you can help create that world, that society—you need not just be a part of it, a cog in a wheel where someone else is turning you and you know not why or wherefore. The “real world” is about taking and accepting responsibility. The real world is about acting and doing and being and questioning.
Philosopher Bertrand Russell noted that innovators are seen as subverters, anarchists upsetting the balance created through tradition and ritual—deadly habits that are formed in school institutions that can become victims of a train engine on tracks that lead nowhere.
And yes, innovators are met with hostility for upsetting the status quo, but it’s the innovators that we often respect in hindsight. Menno Simons, Miriam Toews. (note: large Mennonite community)
Let me tell you a bit about this class. Last year was my first year here, and I was led to believe that this was a group of underachievers. They actually prefer, masters of mediocrity or successfully mediocre but I’m not convinced that I buy that. Sure less than 50% of the class would hand assignments in on time (or at all) and we teachers would rant and rave and scratch our heads and wonder what was wrong with “those kids.” This was a class that lived in the shadow of a class that succeeded in getting high marks, high marks that we equate with intelligence and motivation. And then many chuckled as half the class marched off to make windows at Loewen Windows. And that is neither odd nor sad nor “shouldn’t be.”
We have a problem with our construct, our idea of intelligence, of “being smart” and how we value or respond to those individuals accordingly. The negative effects of “poor academic achievement” are lasting.
But I wonder. Set aside the fact that most of us are “lazy”—we want to get the most pleasure out of life, doing what we love to do most and we procrastinate doing those things that we don’t think are “important” but have to be done. Maybe this group here—some anyway—were simply not willing to do mindless work, mindless memorizing of facts they’d forget the next day just so they could achieve a percent that failed to reflect authentic learning, learning that lasts, learning that motivates further inquiry, learning that says something about who they are.
So I asked the graduates to reflect on their 13 years in school and was not surprised at their insight into their own learning.
While these thoughts may criticize some of our teaching practices, I want to include them to show that these students are critical thinkers. Focus on praising the insight:
- "Hand in all 12 assignments or you won’t pass the class, finish this assignment by Wednesday or you get the 'gift of time.'" This attitude causes people to loathe authority and deadlines rather than embrace challenges and responsibilities.
- "I feel that if someone somewhere had said, 'Name, you’re a dynamic individual with great creativity, why don’t you channel that energy, into this project on the hibernation patterns of the spotted lemur,' it would have given me the push to realize that I can succeed with my own abilities if I’m willing to learn and adapt. Not everyone has the gift of self-motivation, so I feel the emphasis should be placed on instilling that sense of pride and individuality, which leads the individual to drive on to success.
On the lighter side:
- "I still have no career decisions, just the knowledge that throwing balls at kids in gym class was a lot funner than balancing chemical equations in science."
One of the most painful comments was this:
- “When did they give up on us and when did we give up on ourselves?”
On the positive side, one student wrote of a middle school teacher:
- “Teachers like him make school a place where kids want to be, because someone actually wants them there, to learn real life, and to connect with...he treated his students like they were human beings, and friends."
You guys have certainly made me think and question how I teach.
As I’ve struggled to figure you guys out, I have reflected greatly on what my role as a “teacher” is in getting students to learn, to want to learn or even knowing what they should learn.
Last year, with one English class, we decided to create a class magazine, a collection of stories, drawings, articles, advertisements. The students were put in control: a team of editors read, selected and edited submitted texts, handing them back and suggesting improvement. I stood back in wonder at the energy and focus and listened to the, “Is the class over already?” comments.
Our challenge as educators is to listen to our students and to let them be actively involved in the learning process, in making choices about what they want to learn within the choices of a curriculum.
Graduates, you will create a belief system that works for you. Like your parents and their parents before them, you will take what you have learned from your parents, grandparents and teachers and mix that with what you’ve learned from your friends, from your popular culture and end up with your way of interpreting what you perceive. You may learn the hard way, testing your views with actions and consequences concluding what is “good” and what is “bad.”
Certainly things are uncertain. But take with you the certainty that you can create meaning.
I have challenged you in and out of class to travel your inner geography, to explore the “you,” the “I am.”
I’ve challenged you to ask questions, to think about family and what constitutes family, to think about the social structures and the power interests that maintain them, how to think about being active or passive participants in the goings on of your life.
So what will you put into life, into living?
Shakespeare wrote that “Man is a giddy thing” (he must have known Ron).
Here’s your final assignment. You’ll have to create the learning outcomes, though, and the rubrics, and do the assessment, often.
Life is a narrative, a story. Your story. You, be the author. Be creative. And yes, your story needs a title.