Fancy Monkeys?

This week has been a difficult week. Starting a new semester is often quite challenging. I have a lot more students this semester, and no student teacher to help me prepare for General Science (a class I have never taught) this time. Thankfully, the other teacher who is teaching the class has agreed to share some of his material with me. That will save a ton of time!

General Science is made up of a wide variety of students. Many of them have been placed in that class because it is considered to be the “lowest” level of science. As a result, I have a lot of students with learning disabilities, and a lot of what would be considered “at risk” students. Needless to say, they are the most difficult ones to reach, and yet the ones who need to be reached the most. Of course, the needs go beyond just those two classes. Between my 5 classes this year, I have at least two students who currently have a parent who is dying, one student who is pregnant, one student who left to go to jail, one student who just got put in jail, one student who’s been in rehab, one student who’s been caught with drugs, one student who beat someone up, one student who’s afraid she is going to get beat up, and one student who tells me, “Mr. Robinson, you sound just like my therapist!” Almost every single student seems to have major problems in their life.

This past week I taught the unit on Evolution. All across public schools, and sometimes from the time children are very young, we teach them Darwinian evolution. Part of that theory (which has become more of a doctrine) teaches our kids that they are the product of random mutation and natural selection. It leaves them without purpose, and teaches them that they are nothing more than an animal. Although I kept mostly to the textbook, I made it a point to explain to students that they are, in fact, more than a “fancy monkey.” We had a bit of a discussion in the classroom, and it was very apparent that some students wanted to believe they were more, but have never really been treated any better. They have rarely, if ever, been told that they matter in this world. How sad. We wonder why our prisons are full, and that suicide accounts for so many deaths among young people. I wonder, when will things change? What else can I do to help these kids?

The fact of the matter is, they DO matter. We live in a fallen world. This accounts for all the suffering and pain. But we still have a choice as to how we live. This is why we are more, so much more, than fancy monkeys!