Student teacher sandwich

There are days when I go to my class at the zen center straight from school. This creates an interesting scenario in which I go from being the teacher to being the student in a matter of hours. It's interesting to be in this sandwich where I watch the kids being taught by me, and then watch myself being taught by a teacher. There are a lot of similarities between me and my students and it's really quite instructive to see the same behaviors from the point of view of a teacher and of a student.
Case in point: "This is too hard! I can't do it! I won't do it! I give up..."
Last week, during our lesson on reading diagrams, Girl 1 shouted out, "This is too hard! I can't do it!" and started scribbling on her paper and tearing it.
What we were doing was actually not hard. Girl 1 was totally keeping up with us for the first 20 minutes and then suddenly, she started proclaiming that it was too hard. My guess is that that she's not used to being so focused for so long or maybe she lost interest but for whatever reason, she just gave up.
I was kind of annoyed by this, completely unsympathetic, and basically said, "Yes, it's hard, but you can do hard things.This is something that you can do, so, do it."
She did. She kept complaining about it, but she finished the work.
Later that day, I went to class. I started class by asking the teacher for help and he started giving me koans. I was annoyed by this because I wanted him to give me answers, not koans. But, like Girl 1, I stuck with it for a while. But as the koans got more challenging and asked more of me, I started protesting too.
"You want me to embrace my suffering? That's too hard!"
"You want me to give up my history? My self? I can't do that!"
"You want me to accept that everything that I've relied upon and take comfort and security in is just a mental construct? I won't do it."
"I give up."
And I left class that night ready to give up.
I thought about this, about how Girl 1 and I both felt like things were too hard, that our teachers were asking too much of us, that what they wanted us to do was something we were unfamiliar with and, honestly, not all that interested in.
And then I thought about why I didn't give up, why I'm still coming to class this week, and why instead of resenting koans, I'm writing about them in blogposts.
After that night when I was ready to give up, I thought about my practice and how much it has helped me as a teacher. The fact that it is useful in my life, that it makes things better for me, makes me willing to keep trying, to not give up.
The koans that the teacher gave, ended up being helpful, and I realized that he gave them to help, not just because that's what zen teachers do.
And finally, what felt like it was too hard was difficult, but not impossible. Once I started to do it, it turned out to be not as bad as I had thought.
Normally when Girl 1 shouts out, "This is too hard!" during a task that I know she can do, I take it as a sign of avoidance or laziness. After my own experience with struggling in class, I'm now willing to see it as a cry for help. She, like me, may feel betrayed by my asking her to do the work instead of doing it for her. Work that seems doable and normal from my point of view as a teacher may seem foreign and useless to her. Me pushing her to be focused and a sustained student may feel to her like I'm asking too much.
I know that she can do this work, but maybe she needs to know that too. Maybe I need to assure her that I do have a reason for doing this, that I won't ask her to do things unless I know that she can do them. I also realize that "being a student" is pretty new to her and might not feel all that useful in her life. I need to make this meaningful for her, give her a reason to stick with it when it's hard.