Rising to Potential

In light of Chana's most recent post, I would like to comment on the difference between being thought smart and actually being smart. I don't know how many people have actually thought about this or considered being a part of the thought-smart category, but it's something I know all too well.

When I was in elementary school, I was smart. I was. I can't remember not knowing how to read, but I do remember when the rest of the class was learning. I remember that I already knew how. I didn't need the letter books. I didn't need the readers. I was already reading books at home on my own. In school, I thirsted for chapter books, especially when most of the book in our classroom library were simple picture books. During this time in my life, I always did well in school and I was seen by the other kids as part of the 'smart kids' category. But there was something wrong, something that wounded my pride, that made me feel inadequate, unnoticed, unappreciated, or just plain not good enough. There was an enrichment program originally called Project Extra and then renamed Rise. My good friends were in it. I wasn't. I wanted to be so badly, but never did any of my teachers place me in it. It was like a special club that only the smart kids could be in, but yet I was excluded. I, who was smart, who couldn't make it on my own in the classroom when the rest of my friends were at Rise. It made me secretly resentful of my friends. I hated feeling that way. I hated not being part of it. I hated being smart, but not smart enough. If I was going to be burdened with being a reader, being studious, being quick at learning, then why could I not be rewarded along with my friends? And if I wasn't going to be rewarded, then couldn't I at least be good at whatever the other kids in my class enjoyed to do? So that I could have friends when my other friends weren't in the classroom? So that I could have things to share with other students in the class?

In elementary school, we also had an annual poetry contest. This was something I wanted very badly to win. I entered a poem every year and never did I get to read mine out loud in front of the whole school during the poetry festival. And I was the writer! I was the one constantly writing stories, writing poems, playing make-believe. But I never won. Not once. There was only one moment in elementary school when I felt pride for my writing and that was when we had an actual poet come to our class. It was in fifth grade and the poet told us each to write a paragraph about something, anything we wanted. I wrote about waking up on a Sunday morning and the rush of racing down the stairs to beat my siblings to the television so I could choose what program we would watch. I remember the poet singled my paragraph out. She said it was very good and that a phrase I had written, "I fumbled for my glasses," was just the sort of phrase writers liked to use. She said it showed a sophistication in my writing. I glowed with pride.

But that was my shining moment. My only shining moment.

In sixth grade, I got the biggest shock from a teacher that I had ever gotten before. I got my first C. Now, you have to understand, not only did I not get C's in elementary school, I didn't even get B's. I mean, I was a good student. This was also the year that I'd had hepatitis, so you would think the teacher would be a bit more understanding. We had a country report which included an actual report and an oral presentation. We drew from a hat and, lucky me, I was chosen to present first. I was eleven. I had never seen an oral presentation before. I had no idea what I was supposed to do. The teacher gave a few suggestions, but I had to make most of it up on my own. I worked incredibly hard with my parents building the Eiffel Tower out of a large 3-D puzzle (I had France as my country). I learned how to play La Marseillaise, the French national anthem, on my flute (I played the flute at the time). I made posters, I gave out what I thought were little French yogurts but really ended up being cheese (no one knew until later. It was pretty funny when my mom and I figured it out). And after all that work, the teacher gave me a C on my oral. Why? Yes, many of the other presentations were more impressive than mine, but how could I have known that? I was first. And I was terrified I would do it all wrong. I didn't have the confidence to go first. I remember being horrified. An actual C.

In seventh and eight grade, I was placed in the highest level class of my grade. It was then that I started to do badly in science and not amazingly in history. What was happening to me? I was supposed to be smart! Everyone still thought I was smart. I never shared my unsatisfactory grades with anyone. Let them still think I was smart, that I was capable, that I was up to their level.

In high school, for the first time I wasn't in the honors class. I was in a class right in the middle. While for many, this would be just fine, for me it was a wound to my pride. Again, almost all my friends were in the honors class. In fact, I was barely friends with anyone in my own class. I was miserable in that class. I didn't show it; I'm quite good at hiding my feelings - at least, I like to think I am. But I was in a class with all the jappy girls who didn't want to work. They just wanted to go on tangents with the teacher about her outfit. I admit, those were ideal times for me to get some solid bit of writing done ( I wrote many a story during class in high school) but I wanted to learn. I didn't care where the teacher got her skirt from, or her shoes. And, what was worse, my real friends and I began to have less and less to talk about during school. We were having different high school experiences on a day to day basis. We couldn't study together. We couldn't talk about teachers together. It was awful.

And still, somehow, I was regarded as smart. I don't know if it's because I never goofed off in school or if it's because I sound smart when I spoke (which I highly doubt. I usually become too nervous to actually say anything very coherent. I find it much easier to express myself when I'm writing). But there it was, I was still thought of as smart. There was one time, I was in twelfth grade, when a teacher from the honors class subbed for one of my classes and she and I ended up having an intellectual debate for a good part of the forty minutes we were together. Sometime after class, she came over to me and told me she had no idea I was like that (like what? That I liked to debate? That I liked being intellectually stimulated? I still don't know exactly what she meant) and that she feels like she missed out by not teaching me. That was probably the first time in the entirety of high school that I felt proud of my performance in the classroom. And that was when I was almost up to graduation.

So even now I wonder, did I actually rise to my potential in elementary and high school? Did I really do my best? And if not, could I have been in Rise? Could I have been in the honors class? Could I have, as a result, ended up with more friends and had a better experience? Sometimes I get so angry at myself when I realize that the answer to these questions is, most probably, yes. And I don't know why I ruined it for myself. Laziness? Getting too used to being regarded as smart that I forgot to try my hardest? I don't know. I just know I'm unsatisfied with the way I've performed as a student all this time. I'm smart. I know I'm smart. It's just not as easy for me to rise to my own potential for some reason.