One day I'm going to miss this.

a reminder-to-self entering 2025 as a teacher

For some time now, I’ve abandoned the tempting (and understandable) strategy that some English teachers fall into of scheduling essay due dates right before holiday breaks.

It kind of makes sense, though? As opposed to the near-impossibility of trying to give well-considered, authentic feedback to student writing amidst the already-too-full regular week of teaching during the school year, there is something alluring about the idea of finding a quiet space within the dreary weather of Winter Break to cuddle up with a cup of coffee and a hundred or so essays to grade?

(Yes, it should be acknowledged: being an English teacher gets you to a pretty skewed way of seeing things.)

Anyhow, that’s not me anymore—with one exception: I love to schedule the due date for one of my favorite assignments of the year, our narrative poem project, right before Winter Break begins. This allows me to spread out my reading and reflecting on these poems across the break so I can individually appreciate and respond to all the incredible things students come up with in their writing.

Reading five or so original narrative poems a day from students?

A really nice, reaffirming part of my Winter Break for several years now.

I know, too, that this won’t always be a thing.

My first reflection of 2024 was on how the classroom can be enough, and I’m entering 2025 with a doubled-down conviction on that same idea: a firm belief in the potential of what the classroom can be—and also, walking hand-in-hand with that belief, a sincere and foundational gratitude for my role as a classroom teacher.

Because I know one day, inevitably, I won’t be, and there will be so many things, such as reading narrative poems from students, that I am going to miss.

While I hope that “one day” is many, many days from now, I wanted to begin 2025 by naming those things I love about being in the classroom right now, those things that I never want to take for granted, no matter how many other challenges surround the work of being a classroom teacher.

Today’s post? Three things, one day, that I think I’ll miss most about being a classroom teacher.

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One day I’m going to miss reading student writing that makes me want to shout to the world how incredible students can be.

Yes, it takes a considerable amount of time to grade essays and, yes, I recognize the temptation to find alternatives.

But every year there are countless joys in seeing where students can arrive with their words—especially when you get to witness the journey they take to arrive there.

Example: in the excerpt of the essay pictured above, a student broke through in a remarkable way with their interpretation of Shakespeare’s King Lear by pairing it with the poem “Good Bones” by Maggie Smith and reaching a conclusion that left me, quite honestly, floored:

That is what this book teaches us, to see through the liars of the world, and trust those who are worthy. Because those who are worthy of our blind love, truly can make the world a beautiful place.

Inevitably, I read to the end of an essay like this in my empty classroom or office and I realize that no one else in that moment is aware of what this student has achieved with their words and I realize just how much of a gift it is to be the reader of these words and the witness of the journey that led to arranging them in this magnificent way.

I know there are inevitably many more essays ahead of me—inevitably with many moments of wanting to shout to the world about how incredible the words of these students happen to be—yet I also know that one day that gift of reading the incredible writing of incredible students will come to an end.

I don’t for a second intend to take for granted the privilege of getting a front-row seat to the writing journeys of students. It is a gift, a thousand times over.

Oh, and speaking of gifts?

In this particular case I was able to reach out to the legendary Maggie Smith herself to share the essay and get some generous feedback to share back with this student—which then led to me getting the joy of reading this end-of-unit reflection from the same student upon receiving feedback not only from me but one of the best poets of our current moment:

A gift to behold, a thousand times over, indeed.

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One day I’m going to miss that moment where I am adrift in the classroom with all groups abuzz with conversation, leaving me to wander around and appreciate the work it took to get there.

Similar to students with their writing, every classroom takes its own journey each year, often beginning with lots of tentative muttering or off-track commotion early in the year when we first shift into student-driven conversations with their groups.

Each September, I take a deep breath and remind myself that both the mutterings and the commotions are part of this journey, and that somehow we will find our way forward—each classroom destined to trek and trudge its own path at its own pace.

Then eventually (often after many, many deep breaths) we get to the moments like the one I posted about on Bluesky: the entire classroom becomes lost within their group discussions to the point that they are turning me away when I try to offer support.

Just like when reading the end of an incredible essay, these moments of being rebuffed offer me a chance to pause and consider those deep breaths in September and to take pride in how far we have come as a classroom community—and to deepen my conviction in the value of the classroom journey itself each year.

There is something powerful in not being somewhere in a space and then eventually being somewhere; something powerful for students to experience for themselves, too, individually and collectively; and something powerfully reaffirming as a teacher with a front-row seat to watch it take place.

So I will miss these moments, too, when one day I no longer have a classroom community to journey alongside towards this type of collaborative learning environment.

To be a part of that journey is no small thing.

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One day I’m going to miss that exhaustion at the end of a semester, a well-earned exhaustion, and the knock on the door with the student saying thank you for what you’ve invested in them.

There are few things like end-of-the-semester exhausted, when everything is graded and you have arranged the desk for yourself to come back to after a well-earned break. That silence of the empty classroom can be something worth sitting in for awhile.

Until the knock.

The head poking in.

“Mr. Luther,” a student from last year’s class says, “I just wanted to give you something.”

In this case last month, that something? A hand-drawn octopus, meticulously shaded, with a transcription of my favorite poem (“Paul Robeson” by Gwendolyn Brooks) that I leave students with at the end of each year.

If there’s anything that beats the end-of-semester silence, it’s the end-of-semester thank you from yet-another incredible student.

An anecdote, yes, but what is life if not a series of anecdotes worth remembering?

Every teacher has their own collection of favorite anecdotes within so many other positive ones, across school years and school decades and careers, even. And thinking about how much I cherish each and every one of these anecdotes, I keep in mind that they all begin with what happens in the classroom—which at some point will be a place I no longer am in.

For me? That helps me be even more grateful for each moment in the classroom and the potential anecdotes that can emerge from this incredible space.

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Don’t get me wrong: I’ll continue to be the first to express concern both with where we are and where we are going. I’ll continue to name the myriad problems in the current landscape of education, many of which stem from the inability and/or—or better yet, both/and—refusal to support the teaching profession. And I’ll continue to be mindful of how education fails to meet the needs and aspirations of the students we are charged with serving and supporting.

Yet more frequently than ever these days, I remind myself that these days in the classroom are ultimately temporary. Including the good in these days.

Especially that good.

So as I begin 2025 and finish up reading yet another incredible collection of narrative poems from yet another incredible community of students, I’m not going to take the privilege it is to read these poems for granted.

Not for a second.

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Several other things that bring me joy entering 2025

Before signing off on this initial post of 2025, I wanted to share out a handful of others places I’m finding joy and learning as an educator in this moment:

• To close out what has been a rewarding journey with our slow-read of Becoming an Everyday Changemaker by

  Alex Shevrin Venet
  ,
  Adrian Neibauer
  and I had a wonderful conversation with Alex (!!!), which will be shared out this weekend. Every step of this book study has been valuable for me personally, but this conversation is one I’m not going to forget for some time.

• Speaking of Adrian, I found a ton of value in his sharing out of John Spencer’s “The SLIME Method” of resolutions for the year ahead—as he was generous enough to share his own five-part set of goals using this structure. Highly recommend reading Adrian’s and then giving it a go yourself!

• Particularly as an ELA teacher, a new Substack that I can’t get enough of has been Trevor Aleo’s Becoming Literary, which has been pushing my own thinking not just with the how of what we can do in the classroom but the why behind that how. (And yes, this was the same Trevor Aleo we had a chance to talk with last summer!)

• Having now completed the full year of a slow-read of War and Peace, I can say with finality that it was one of the coolest reading experiences I’ve ever been a part of—ending with a delightful Google Meet-up with readers from all over the world for the final chapter this past week! All of this was possible as a result of

  Simon Haisell
  and his Substack Footnotes and Tangents, which offers several different slow-reading experiences for 2025. (Jump aboard!)

One of my own goals going into 2025: continue prioritizing two C’s—curiosity and community. I want to keep learning and, as much as possible, to do so in community. The Broken Copier is central to both of these C’s, of course, so I want to end by thanking everyone who has become a part of this community, too.

Feel free to respond today with what you will one day miss about the classroom or your current role in education, too, and as always to share The Broken Copier out with anyone else who you think would help make this an even better community going forward!

Take care of yourselves and I hope you have a wonderful beginning of the journey that 2025 will inevitably become.