Classroom jobs let you do your job.

In Herman Melville’s novel Moby Dick there is a short chapter entitled The Dart that correlates with teachers’ need to assign classroom jobs. The chapter talks about the role of the harpooner on a whale hunt. The role of the teacher in the classroom is similar.

Melville compares the calm, poised personality of the harpooner to the other members of the small pursuit vessel’s crew, especially the oarsmen:  “to ensure the greatest efficiency in the dart, the harpooners of this world must start to their feet out of idleness, and not from out of toil.”

In this chapter Melville describes the roles and responsibilities aboard a whaling pursuit boat, focusing on the harpooner’s crucial task. Unlike the oarsmen, who exert themselves with rowing alone, the harpooner needed to remain idle during the chase to conserve energy and maintain precision for the critical moment of throwing the harpoon. Melville emphasizes that the harpooner must rise from a state of rest, not from exhaustion. This practice ensures that when the time comes to strike, the harpooner is composed and accurate, maximizing the chances of a successful hunt.​

On a whaling ship the percentage of successful whale hunts was low due to missed harpoon throws. And the harpooners were blamed:  “Out of fifty fair chances for a dart, not five are successful; no wonder that so many hapless harpooners are madly cursed and disrated.” But it was not entirely their fault, because the harpooner was also expected to row ferociously with the oarsmen. The rowing wore him out and made his aim unsteady when the time to throw the harpoon was at hand. This additional task of rowing was a bad idea because:  “It is the harpooner that makes the voyage, and if you take the breath out of his body how can you expect to find it there when most wanted?”

Only about one in ten whale hunts were successful. That seems about right with teaching too—only about one in ten lessons turn out just the way  I want.  And many times it’s because I am distracted and unfocused on the task of teaching.

Teachers need to be calm and ready to do what only they can do.

The metaphor extends beyond whaling, suggesting that in various aspects of life moments of rest and calm are essential to perform critical tasks effectively. It underscores the importance of balancing activity with rest to achieve optimal results.

Have you ever been blamed for insufficient student achievement? “Madly cursed or disrated“?  I have, and I feel like some of the time it was because I fed into the myth that the teacher has to do everything.

Our education culture admires and rewards frenetic activity, but students are better served when teachers focus on their quiet, poised harpooning-type skills.  There is far more need for teachers to develop the skills and mindset of the harpooner than the muscles of the oarsman.

An additional way to remain at rest until ready to strike is to build in time for daily independent reading in your classes.

I developed classroom jobs to such an extent that students would accuse me of being lazy because all I did was teach—I didn’t constantly scurry around the classroom doing all of the myriad minor tasks that needed doing.

Here’s a compilation of repeated conversations I’ve had with students because I use classrooms jobs:

   “Señor, you are the laziest teacher in this whole school!”

    “Really?  Why do you say that?”

    “Because you don’t do anything in this class!  You don’t turn the lights on or off.  You don’t open or shut the door.  You don’t run the games.  You don’t pass back papers.  You don’t collect papers.  You don’t write quizzes.  You don’t even grade homework!”

    “What do you see me doing?”

   “You just talk to us in Spanish and ask us questions.  That, plus reading to us and telling us stories, but not much else.”

With classroom jobs, I had the wherewithal to think and plan … oh, and I could leave the school by 3:30 most every day.

What’s your reaction?

Does this harpooning analogy fit your classroom experience?  Have you considered using classroom jobs?  Do you use them?  Which classroom jobs work best for you?

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