The Cogen - A Life of Its Own

Last Friday, my school laptop broke, in the middle of teaching. I was devastated. Part of my anxiety is the need to please others and not disappoint anyone, so this was a big moment for me. I held it all in until I finally spoke to the guy in charge and then a full on panic attack ensued.

I finally gathered myself enough to walk back into my room, not caring at that point that my face was bright red and my eyes were fully puffy, and not caring that I was about 3 minutes late to class, expecting to find my class chit chatting and waiting for me. However...

When I walked into the room, I saw the kids of my cogen group leading the class in our five minute check-in. They'd taken it upon themselves to set a phone timer and start class without me. Those few extra minutes let me calm down even more, get class ready, and get to just exist and watch my kids build the community we'd been working for all year. I nearly started crying again, but out of gratitude.

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Fast forward to Thursday (today). We had an unexpected snow day on Tuesday, so we postponed our cogen meeting until Thursday. I picked up a variety of donuts for our meeting and I admit I was starting to feel a little more confident about this whole thing.

Like clockwork, students started filing in. They grabbed some breakfast and joined each other in the circle, catching up on life's events. Eventually, I joined and we checked in with each other and how things were going.

I thanked them for their help last Friday and those who took a more passive role in it thanked those who were actively leading. They all said they noticed my stress level and decided to just help out. I reiterated how helpful it actually was.

The question today was moreso what we could all do to keep each other and the students engaged. What they discussed was how Latin time is helpful, especially when I ask direct questions and hold them accountable. I appreciated this feedback, and admitted I was also looking for something they could do to help each other. We decided to continue the conversation next week.

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At this point, we'll be starting phase 2 of the cogen. I asked the group who would like to invite someone from the class to our meeting. They were to be someone from our class who was not already involved. We talked about how this person (who invited them) would then phase out of the cogen and have a job in the classroom. One of the girls volunteered to take on this role.

Next week, we'll meet and we'll start this first round of transitions.

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Update: Today, I came into 3rd period to find our computer guy waiting for me. He and I were talking and I watched the same students start the check in again. The Cogen officially has a life of its own.


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Resources:

1. For White Folks Who Teach in the Hood... and the Rest of Y'all Too
2. Christopher Emdin's Twitter
3. Bob Patrick's Twitter
4. Bob Patrick's first blog post in his series
5. Bob Patrick's second blog post in his series
6. My first post in this series
7. My second post in this series