An Un-Desked Prayer

My classroom is a mess. I’ve not been in it very much over the past two weeks, and when I have been there it’s been for testing—which means that I’ve not been able to do anything to tidy it.

My desk was a mess before testing began. But now the whole room is in shambles.

So that my students have optimum room for movement, I don’t usually keep student desks in the room. But for testing, student desks were required. After last week’s Reading EOG, the group that I was testing left the desks in place but left puzzles scattered all over the room. After last week’s Math EOG, the group that I was testing decided to use the desks as improvised Minecraft blocks and rearranged them—over and over again. Then they scattered puzzles around the room, too, and they stayed there until the custodian came to sweep the floor…at which point he put the puzzles on the tables, the chairs on the rugs, and stacked the desks against the wall.

Currently, the carpets are dirty from the chairs sitting on them. To minimize noise from the chairs, I make the chair legs wear tennis balls as shoes. These shoes gather dust bunnies very well. Dust bunnies willingly come off on the carpet when tennis balls walk on them.

So, yes. My classroom is a mess.

Yet in the midst of the mess today, I stumbled across a prayer that had been hidden by my computer for most of the year. (My computer was in the gym for the end of year awards programs that I’ve been assisting with when not testing.)

Here is the prayer that I’ve had taped to my desk all year:

Almighty God, you have blessed me with the joy and care of children: Give me calm strength and patient wisdom as I work with them, that I my teach them to love what is just and true and good, following the example of the love. Children these days are growing up in an unsteady and confusing world, God. Show them that doing right gives more life than doing wrong and that goodness and light have the power to overcome the dark. Help them to take heartache and failure not as a measure of their worth but as chances for a new start. Grant each of us, students and teachers alike, in all of our doubts and uncertainties, the grace to do what you would have us do. Give us wisdom. Surround us with grace. And fill me with love that is contagious. Amen.

When I un-desked this prayer today, I was testing one student in the center of my dirty room—although she was sitting in a spot where she didn’t have to see all of the chaos. She was using all of her test taking skills yet she couldn’t hide her consternation as she worked. I watched her positive attitude turn to what looked like defeat and I read the words, “Help them to take heartache and failure not as a measure of their worth but as chances for a new start…”

I think maybe I need to move my computer next year and remember to pray this prayer each day.