Go America!

The teacher for the 4^th Form class I was scheduled to teach in today (4^th Form generally means they are around 14 years old) told me on Tuesday that the class is discussing New York City, and she asked me to teach a lesson about 9/11. My first thought was, “This is the first time I’m meeting this group of 14 year olds, and you want me to cover this heavy topic? They’re going to think I’m super depressing and never want me in their class again.” But as I began to work on the presentation I actually found it to be a really great experience. Because I wanted to share about my personal experience and not just the facts of what happened, I found myself engaging in a lot of reflection and figuring out a lot about myself, particularly how that day has affected me. I guess I don’t do this kind of reflecting often, but I found it to be really meaningful and helped me pull together a much more interesting and special presentation. I focused most of the lesson on the American reaction and how the nation continues to pay tribute to the events in 2001, including the symbolism of the New World Trade Center and the monuments and memorials that have been created since. I talked a lot about hope and strength and perseverance and how these were and have in a new way become core American ideals. I think it was really good for me that I was forced to explain this in simple English to a non-American audience, because I had to really break it down and explain, from the beginning, how special the post-9/11 reaction has been in our country. I’m definitely not the most outwardly-patriotic person, in general. I don’t go around talking about how much I love America or American exceptionalism, and I don’t actually own an American flag, other than on a 1998 Old Navy 4^th of July tshirt. But I definitely got chills and teared up a bit while doing some research about 9/11 response and the number of financial donations, blood donations, etc. I really am so so proud of our country and the way it responded. Yes there were of course plenty of negative consequences, including anti-Muslim hate crimes, among others, but there is definitely something to be said for the American spirit and the way it bounced back after such a horrible tragedy. 

[Then again, this new wave of patriotic fervor I’m feeling might be directly related to the fact that I watched Captain America on the airplane over here, and you can’t help but feel uber patriotic after watching that movie. Also, I listened to Proud To Be An American about 18 times last night while looking for a tribute video to show the class—and that song has an unmatched powerful affect on me]

I think the students learned a lot from the lesson, and they had some good questions afterwards. I asked them what they would do with Ground Zero if they were in charge, and one person said build a park, the other said build a cemetery, so that was interesting. All in all though, it was interesting for me to see how preparing a lesson really forces me to understand some more about myself. Seeing American things from the perspective of Austrians is fascinating and I can’t wait to see what other revelations I have throughout the rest of the year! Yay America!