While I was teaching today, I asked a visiting actor to remind me what the title of a script was. He showed me the page and pointed to the title, which of course I couldn't read. But, at that moment, I remembered what the title was, said it out loud, and thanked him as if I had been able to read it.
So, was this a lie, or was I just being expedient? Do I owe everyone the truth of the moment? I really don't know.
The fact that I'm sort-of-blind came up later in the class, when I said that I didn't know the name of someone who had handed me a nameless script the week before. This, I contend, could have happened just as easily to a fully sighted teacher -- I only see these students briefly, twice a week -- but it was a good excuse.
If we miss the point, the point's too small.
2 comments:
Fib, I don't know... I have done it too. Especially when I was in school. Like at judo class, if I need to read my sheet of techniques to see what XYZ student needs to learn for the rank.
Though my students know I have bad eyesight, and I now take my cane to class. I often feel "strange" wen I need to read something in-front of them, because, the paper is at my nose. - I consider it even more now, that I got my nifty new laptop (17" MacBook Pro)...
Like showing a client photos... I can't really see the screen back-a ways, and they can't see the photos if my big head is in the way reading something.
There are two basic answers here.
One is that your goal was to remember the name of the script. You recalling it in that moment was the same, effectively, as you reading it off the page. So to make a big deal out of the fact that you couldn't actually read it (but had remembered it anyway, so no harm done) would have been distracting.
On the other hand, it was also a teachable moment, but only if you knew the student knew that you were legally blind. In that case, his gesture wasn't exactly rude, but it was thoughtless, and could be a platform for speaking about gestures and words that we don't consider rude/thoughtless as we do them, but actually are, when viewed from other perspectives (or not viewed, ha ha). If you really wanted to go there, and the kids were up to talking about it, it's very much like calling something or somebody "gay" to mean "lame" or "stupid" -- an association many kids trade in without realizing its dehumanizing potential.
Again, though, processing this has the potential to derail the discussion, which may or may not be worth it in the context of the class.
In any case, it wasn't "wrong" to let the moment pass, on a moral level. On an educational level, it either was or wasn't a missed opportunity, and in any case could be returned to in the future.
Post a Comment