There’s no problem finding me between classes. No matter where you are in Woodgrove, you can track me down instantly thanks to the din caused by the four utility wheels screwed to the bottom of my oversized wooden lectern. Where other transient teachers push their LCPS-issued “carts” silently and inconspicuously down the hallway with something resembling dignity, my rig groans with an embarrassing attention-demanding roar every foot of the journey. And the show isn’t just limited to sounds! Occasionally in the jostle my mouse will slide off the pad and burst apart in the crowded hallway. Turning a corner too fast and my guitar will swing like a pendulum and bop the corner. One afternoon the file holder I’d installed on the side spontaneously broke from its fastenings. But the noise is definitely the lectern’s calling card: at least once a week a student will politely suggest that I bring in some WD-40 to alleviate the noise. A few times I’ve had to ask a student to retrieve my lectern from the English workroom. You can hear the roar as they bring it, first faint, then deafening, the once-happy student now wearing an expression of clinch-jawed humiliation. The other day I passed a custodian pushing these giant trash containers on wheels down the hallway, and I realized that both these devices use the same wheels, that my big showy Mr. Scott Education Rig makes the same noise as a mobile trash can…

It’s a standard arrangement for new hires to work in multiple classrooms, those with seniority having earned a more centralized room assignment. 

I teach in three classrooms this year, four if you count my homeroom. It reminds me of the 2017/18 school year, my cart rig my first year at Champe.   

It also causes me to reflect on the duality of the cart life. Like Marlowe’s descent down the river, I’ve seen and learned much through my journey. 

My organization has improved, for one. I built a material-holder on the side after the spontaneous collapse of the first one. I tried to paint it Woodgrove green, but I went too light, according to my students. 

A pen-holder also finds its place in the trunk of the lectern, an important addition for harmony with my colleagues whose room I share. Having my own supplies is a must: I remember a teacher at Champe tactfully asking me not to use her whiteboard markers for students to write on posters, as it dried them out too fast. Indeed, in one of my classrooms this year, all supplies are locked away in a cabinet. 

Harmony is also achieved somewhat by the addition of my guitar. Where at Champe I kept my guitar hidden behind my desk and brought it out at the end of class or in moments of boredom, here it is on prominent display. As such, for a life spent making arch comments, I have now been issued the karmic punishment to endure an endless stream of comments about being the “cool teacher,” or jeers to “play Wonderwall,” or  comments that I am “Woodgrove’s John Mayer,” or the daily observation that I “can’t sneak up on anyone.” But it’s all in good fun. And, even if it’s not, it’s absolutely worth it. Students who play guitar will ask to pick a tune on it — some of them students I meet in the hallway who I would never interact with otherwise. When I note a student’s birthday in the Phoenix attendance interface I can easily retrieve and lead the class in a singing. I leave the lectern in the hallway, and students will often fret that someone will steal the guitar, somehow forgetting that the school is filled with cameras, and, more importantly, a bulky off-brand acoustic guitar isn’t the first priority for an impulse-theft.    

My organization has been further streamlined thanks to Velcro, with my computer charger adhered to the bottom. My prize jar (an old Costco peanut butter pretzel container) is also similarly fastened there.

But it’s not just organization that cart life has afforded me. It allows me to experience different arrangements in desk set ups. Or no desks at all, as in the case of room 606, which is filled with tables. This mix of different set ups creates that perfect new-teacher scenario of guiding students who don’t know you in a physical arrangement you would never use yourself. This obstacle in turn makes for a stronger, more patient teacher who adapts to the challenges of not having things exactly like he wants it. 

But the lessons aren’t all about myself. I’ve additionally found greater respect for the special education teachers and others who are always on a cart. For many long-tenured teachers this is just the way they work, and they do it happily and successfully.  

There are, of course, annoying parts to the cart life. All the creature comforts of a single devoted classroom are missing – the student art, the printer, the materials, the wall of student slang that I learn over the course of the year. It’s also very tough for students with questions to find me outside of our normal class time. The following has happened several times: I’m working in my little corner of the English workroom, completely locked in, oblivious to my surroundings. A student pops around the corner and, upon seeing me in such a novel setting, exclaims, “Mr. Scott!” very loudly – loud enough so that I almost fall out of my chair from the scare. 

Another frustration is simply the act of pushing into a classroom as the bell rings and setting up as students walk in, not being able to have work ready from the get go as soon as students enter. Every career educator has some control-freak tendencies, and this fluidity to entering a classroom already partially filled with your clients requires a certain zen-like ability to roll with it. I’ve experimented with self-starters, activities students must complete as soon as they walk in the classroom (I hate the word “bellringer” for some reason). Students are generally pretty good about doing them, but the catch is that they have to be displayed on the board for students to do them. By the time I’m in the classroom and connected to the board and have settled half a dozen other matters, I have to direct everyone’s attention to the self-starter, which defeats its purpose. This is a small complaint, obviously, and maybe with more intentionality on my part I could make it a class routine to anticipate the self-starter before it’s even on the board.  

One other small complaint: amidst the desire to maximize time and stay organized and be an effective teacher, the cart life also demands adherence to the culture of the classroom one is entering, being conscious of those expectations – such as a single desk that a student might move at the beginning of class and forget to move back at the end of class. My tendency to hyper-focus on the task at hand makes this sort of attention a low priority. I have learned to remedy this somewhat over the course of the year, developing a muscle that was very unused during my pampered four years having my own classroom. 

Whether pampered or rugged, classroom or cart-bound, this job is a human one.  To achieve a certain emotional and pedagogical stability, you have to appreciate the beauty of this endeavor. Marlowe’s trip down the river ended with him imprinted with “the horror,” and indeed I think it is possible to have a similar attitude toward this job, toward any job, toward life in general. My cart journey, however, has been the opposite. The teacher makes a hundred choices in their interactions with the many humans, young and old, who make up the small world of the school. Being on a cart only increases the opportunities to be an active part of this small world, to be an active part of it and continue appreciating its beauty.