reflections of teaching

One day after class (soldering basics), which ended at 5pm - i was packing up as i needed to be downstairs at the vendor event going on. the event was from 5-7. i'm not one to just rush out, but on that night, i knew that other vendors and friends had already been watching my booth and making sales for me while i was teaching, so i was anxious to get down there as of course, i felt bad that they were having to be responsible for my stuff. anyway, right as i was heading out the door, a student came up to me with her piece and she just had this look of fret and dismay on her face. she handed the piece to me and the top part of it was in ruins. the last thing for us to do on our project was to add our jumprings which she did. but then she found that they were crooked and had tried to pull them off instead of soldering them off (classic mistake by the way). this ended up ripping up the soldered tape we foiled around the edges. so i sat down with her and we proceeded to do our best to salvage her project. i didn't leave the room til 6:30. i got to the event and i was a bit stressed out for being so late and no one really knew where i was. and i still had bunch of stuff on the dolly to pack up; so it was hectic and i was tired with that frazzled feeling.

in the lobby later, i ran into this student and
the look on her face was priceless. she was smiling and showing off her beautiful piece. she was happy. she gave me a big hug and we took pictures together. until that minute, i don't think i realized how you are as a teacher or how, what you do naturally (i.e. staying to help her), can really have an impact on someone. her smile made me happy. it was a great lesson on remembering that helping others is very rewarding.