Second Grade Cursive (a poem)

Second Grade Cursive

Miss Rice passed out worksheets

of cursive l’s spaced like soldiers

commanded us to copy.

I dragged my pencil up and down

left almonds in the middle.

Marty Brewster finished first

his scrawls like deflated balloons.

Even after he redid his letters

I still gripped my pencil

the little fish slowly blooming

life no longer balls and sticks

now muddled into loops and angles.

Questions:

1. Should I leave the lowercase l in the opening stanza? That's the cursive letter I'm describing in the poem, but would a capital L make more sense?
2. Although I usually use commas in my poetry, I decided not to in this one. Would the poem's readability improve if I added commas, or are the line breaks enough?
3.  Does the title work? I originally titled this poem "Learning Cursive" and had the second grade information in the body of the poem itself.

Teaching v. Coaching

I attended a wonderful workshop today. The speaker was dynamic, engaging, and informative. I will take what I learned and apply it to my classroom this week.

Throughout his presentation, the speaker (a former principal, teacher, and coach) occasionally used the example of a coach teaching his athletes. Mentally, I called apples and oranges.

Here are some basics:

• Coaches work with a limited number of players. They usually have at least one assistant coach as well. I can't even tell you how many total football coaches we have at the high school where I teach.
  
• Teachers, meanwhile, usually go it alone in the classroom. This semester I actually have a student teacher, but that is an exception. Most secondary teachers face 120+ students a day without any backup.
• Coaches cut players from the team. Some make varsity, some don't.
• Teachers are required to teach every single student assigned to them.
• Coaches hold practices longer than the typical class period.
• Teachers do not get to hold longer classes, and they must contend with absences and interruptions.
  
• Coaches work with students who inherently love the sport.
• Teachers work with students who may or may not love the subject they teach.
• Coaches are assessed multiple times throughout the season by their team's record.
• Teachers are assessed one time by their students' scores on a single test at the end of the school year.