Teachers with passion – dr Natalia Kiedyk

IB Literature at Kolegium Europejskie –

Why Choose It and What’s Good About It?

“May you teach other people’s children” – goes an old Far Eastern curse. And with every moment of pedagogical frustration, I find myself recalling those words. Frustrations do happen. Especially when I have to accept that not every student of mine wants to dive deep into the meaning of a literary text for 44 pages (a number that’s no accident!). Not everyone enjoys writing either – expressing themselves through words, choosing them carefully, activating the right meanings.

Nevertheless, whether one likes it or not, literature remains a window into other world(s) and a mirror reflecting ourselves and to me, that is undeniable.

Choosing to study Polish literature was an obvious decision for me. We would read poetry, explore the line between truth and interpretation, and create amidst the musty books that smell so good just before you start reading them. Later came archetypes, symbols, and the search for connections between different realities – the literary one and those surrounding us. In the evening  clouds of tobacco smoke and philosophical discussions about the second, third, and ninety-fifth layer of reality.

That’s what I imagined my studies would look like, after experiencing high school Polish classes with Professor Dengel; an invaluable (though sometimes rather strict) teacher from my own secondary school.

As it turned out, the experience of literature in high school, under the guidance of the right teacher, is something you can never quite recreate. Not even university gave me the same insights and moments of awe that I had in Polish class with Dengel.

Years later, on a winding and unpredictable career path, I found myself becoming a Polish teacher for high school students. The bar I set for myself was high. I accepted an offer to teach Polish literature at Kolegium Europejskie – an IB high school in the heart of Cracow. It sounds a bit mysterious, and it truly isn’t your typical “Polish language” class or the traditional literature survey I went through in high school.

I’m not going to be Dengel 2.0 – that is clear. But I also don’t have to read Enlightenment poetry with my students, which, to be honest, was never really my thing. IB Literature is something entirely different.

In our first class, I ask students what they’d like to read. I bring my own suggestions too – titles I believe offer a chance to see the world, and ourselves, differently. We vote. I bring in literary theory texts I remember from university. We read. We discuss. We touch on controversial topics: capitalism, tradition, intergenerational trauma, national identity and how it affects our view of ourselves and the world.

We reflect on what interpretation actually is. After all, we’re all reading the same text. So how is it possible that Gabrysia sees something completely different than Robert? Why? How do ink-covered pages plant entire stories in our heads? Or maybe they just cleverly tinker with our neurons so we can see new connections we hadn’t considered before?

In literature class, we turn into bugs. We kill a pawnbroker. We bathe in guilt. We find forgiveness. With a mix of fear and awe, we look at witches who – as the name suggests  “know” things. Like the fact that a certain soldier will become king. Or maybe they just “name” more? Not “know” more?

Literature lets us embody, empathize, hate, and love. We try to do all this in just an hour and a half.

The IB’s approach to assessment is skills-based and I see that as a huge advantage. The ability to analyze a text is inseparable from the act of interpretation. We let ourselves be swept away by the text and then leave its story behind (or is it still within us?) to uncover the author’s deliberate choices behind that extraordinary imagined world.

And this is what’s amazing about literature… We can communicate with Shakespeare! Not every lesson is a séance, of course, but we do try to look beyond just grades – even if they’re sometimes hard to escape.

My experience teaching at Kolegium Europejskie has convinced me that these moments of literary “magic and marvels” are actually the best path to a successful IB exam.

I’m lucky to teach a subject that requires heart (and brain cells are welcome too 😉 ). After all, those two forces: the heart and mind make up a truly mature adult.

For me personally (and my students probably don’t realize this) one more thing is important: them. They are the kind of reward no tax office can measure.

The contact with young people, those who are, for the first time, at the age they’re at, with all the freshness, imagination, and intelligence that entails is priceless.

And only sometimes do I joke that “I’m closer to the end than the beginning” when I look at the shamelessly young people sitting in front of me.

Sometimes I also glance up at that high bar in my imagination, the one my Polish teacher once set.

Am I like him? Probably not.

Teaching literature has allowed me to hang up my own bar and quietly sit on it, enjoying the experience and the relationships more than the pressure to meet expectations.

That’s what I also wish for my students.

__
The text was prepared by Dr. Natalia Kiedyk, who teaches Polish A SL and TOK (Theory of Knowledge) at Kolegium Europejskie.