On my last day of teaching at the Scheiber Sandor School in Budapest, I have asked my 7th year students to do what many adults find impossible – reveal their truth. Perhaps because they are in the thick of their most intensive year of English language study, these students quickly grasp the difference between telling the truth and telling their truth, understanding that I want them to do nothing less than to define themselves for me. In a sense, everything we have done in our last three class sessions has led to this moment when they will take the pieces of their brainstorming lists, journal entries and first person stories, weave them into a tapestry of their values and beliefs and present them like a gift to their departing American teacher.
We define the terms objective and subjective, and I try to simplify the concepts by explaining that an objective observation is not usually up for debate while the subjective can be rife with opinion. One young man casually observes that “I am a boy” is an objective truth unless “you are a girl hiding inside of a boy,” and I am reminded that nothing involving adolescents is ever simple. I model for them by attempting to write my own truths on the board.
My truth is that I am a teacher. My truth is that I am kind. My truth is that I care about others.
I write the statements that I work each day to make into truths. I have brought these goals with me to Budapest and hope that my students and partner teachers have found these truths in me.
My students write their truths with great concentration in the journals I have brought to them from my school in America: “My truth is that I love animals.” “My truth is that I play sports.” “My truth is that I feel free when I paint.” “My truth is that I am emotional, but I feel better after I cry.” Their responses reflect their different levels of maturity and insight, their reluctance or willingness to open up to their classmates, to me, to themselves. They are responses I would find in my classroom in America as well, and, again, I am reminded of the universal nature of students.
I am still thinking about our truths as I go to my next class, the last one of the day before I will pack up and say goodbye to the host teachers who have opened their classrooms, minds and hearts to us this week. My next group, a small class of six 12th year students, waits for me with hopeful expectation. They have enjoyed writing about their thoughts and feelings, exploring their ideas in a journal as a way to practice their English writing and speaking skills. One student writes that as a young child learning that her mother was going to have a baby “all of my body parts inside me danced around, and I could not sit still.” A boy who reminds me of a young John Lennon writes of the day that “I met the guitar I was meant to have.” They had grasped the concept of figurative language in English, a foreign language, and I watch in wonder as they share with me the pivotal moments in their lives.
At the end of this last day at Scheiber Sandor our partner teachers gather us together for a farewell party. They thank us with trays of food, gifts of Scheiber Sandor tee shirts and bottles of wine and their genuine heartfelt thanks. We have taken only the first step on our journey with these new colleagues and friends as we create our truths together.
