It's not that I don't try every day to impact my students. My standing on tables to demonstrate nouns and verbs, acting like a vj on a podcast to encourage critical thinking about Transcendentalism, and conferencing with students about their writing before I've had my coffee can attest to that. But it's not always that I know for certain that what I've done has left an impression.
Today, however, I know it to be true. How? It was something simple, something quick and likely seemingly innocuous to the individual responsible for bestowing this truth upon me, but right before fifth period started, as I was standing outside my classroom door, partly because I have hall duty but mostly because I had already started the Guns N Roses music video "November Rain" in my room and wanted to see my students' facial expressions as they strolled into what they falsely assumed to be a typical day in Composition, it was then that one young man turned to me ever-so-slightly and proclaimed, "I was told to look forward to this class today."
That's it. That's all it took. I had made the list. Heck, if Facebook and cell phones were allowed at school, I'd likely have been someone's status by lunch. At least, I'd like to think so. I had made such an impression that now I was circulating around the school, and not because I'd had yet another bad hair day.
And for the next ninety minutes those fifth period students engaged in learning so sneaky they probably still don't know just how much brain power they used today. They read, re-read, analyzed, identified facts, pointed out motifs, asked questions, analyzed, broke down, collaborated, synthesized, conferred, theorized, supported, argued, and evaluated. And all with a nine-minute music video.
That's the power of YouTube and Hard Rock.
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