Mrs. Clark, You’re Beautiful, BUT You’re NOT Beautiful!

At one point in the last school year, I had three roles.

• part time online grade 4 teacher (students from three different schools),
• in person part time learning coach
• in person acting assistant principal (for a little over two months)

To keep my mind straight, I wore different outfits depending on my role each day.

I dressed fancy for Assistant Principal, less fancy for Learning Coach and much more casual for online learning.

One day I welcomed my online students, wearing… lipstick.

I heard a gasp.

“Mrs. Clark, you’re beautiful!  BUT…you’re NOT beautiful?”

In his defense, he usually saw my online teacher outfit. I laughed. I knew exactly what he meant. I had glammed up, even subtly. How was it possible I could look this nice?

This was the theme of last year- confusing and full of contrasts.

In person – working in a school – it was full of temporary situations. At any time, someone or some class could be sent home.

Online – life just continued, unchanged.

It was my online world – although more work than you can imagine – that kept me grounded and joyful.

My online students were so patient, resilient, and funny!

On days when I had in person practice fire drills, my students would ask, “Should we practice too? Line up outside of our homes?” 

Some would pretend to pass me snacks through the web cam.

One student decided to show us sledding in her backyard – live on TEAMS.

They all tried to have perfect attendance – tuning in from other places, such as their cars – going to pick up a parent at work and even tuning in “live” from the mountains on a quick family get away.

We made the best of virtual classroom experience. Always making time for jokes, riddles and sharing.

One week, when I was teaching from home, the students met my Pug. “Mrs. Clark, he snores louder than my dad!”

It was, as I said, my joy, my constant.

When school was done for the year at noon, most students left the TEAMS chat, but a few remained.

Unexpectedly, a student who, until recently had been more reserved expressed his emotions in such a beautiful way.

“Mrs. Clark, my eyes are wet. Is it allergies? Or am I sad? Maybe it’s both?”

“Yah,” I said, “both.”

As I write this, I miss all of them. Our experience was something special. Something that we all worked together to make work and thrive. At the start of last September, I never thought I would make it through, it was so different. But I learned more than I ever imagined, and these kids stole my heart.