Nails It

After the year I have had, processing the election is just not something I’ve been interested in doing  I need to focus on my physical and emotional healing, and simply cannot put energy into this horrible result. I’m on the margins now, aware but not engaging.

However, if I could say something, it would be exactly what this guy says.

Click this link to watch: What about all we were taught?

Unwritten

Today is my niece Cheryl’s 40th birthday. She is a writer, and so I sent her this song to celebrate her day and entry into a new decade of life.

I’ve always felt this song an inspiring message about our lives, how we write them day to day. It’s one of my personal favorites from the first decade of this century.

But as I watched the lyrics go by on the video, especially Staring at the blank page before you, I felt without the ability to write my own life again. With all the drama this year, I feel like someone has stolen the pen from me, and no matter how hard I try, I can’t get it back. 

Every time I think, Now I’m moving forward, something arrives to set me back. And not just one step, but several. As if health issues weren’t enough, being away from Jim is even worse.

I know I am writing here, and certainly this is a way I’m writing my life. I sometimes wonder why I can’t have just a teeny bit of control on how things go…why does everything have to be so difficult? 

I used to think it was all in my attitude; I just needed to find the “right” words and phrases to keep me centered. Truth is, I'm exhausted from the effort that takes. How hard I have to think about every move. How isolated I am here in my own home. It’s become impossible to think about anything but my own need in this exact moment.

It all feels so limiting. So out of reach. So NOT like how I live my life. 

I hope by getting these words down, I have written myself to a better place. After all, writing is about finding our truth. 

Here is mine.

Lifting

 

For two weeks now

I've been moving slow

 

Can't hold much weight

in my right hand

 

Have to lie on my back to sleep

Feels so rigid

 

Every day seems to bring

a new crisis

 

To stress me and

raise my blood pressure

 

When I need to be resting

It proves impossible.

 

When the caretaker gets injured

the whole house suffers

 

It's a constant weighing of

who is best to do what

 

And it's usually me

 

It is so hard sometimes to not feel sad

for my lost summer

 

I long to do my yoga

Walk in nature

 

Sleep on my side

Not worry about Jim

 

But all this proves

impossible

 

I know my body and 

yes, I am healing

 

People do care, and they

have been here

 

I really don't mean 

to be ungrateful

 

My injuries make it harder

for me to deal with 

my husband's terminal illness

 

And now here is where

I remind myself

 

It's only been two weeks,

Helen, give yourself a break

 

When no one is here to lift me

I just have to lift myself

Believe

 Finalizing cleaning up my desk yesterday, I found this little card:

I had several of these I gave to students, but somehow this one never made its way to anyone. These cards pop open with a message. Staring at it there on my desk, I decided I’d open to see what it had to tell me. After all, there must be a reason this was still sitting there, right.

I knew right away I needed this message. And sure enough, at 11:00 I went to a meeting about what life will be like getting ready to move into portables and how the campus will be set up and how I’ll have someone in my room teaching during my planning and other depressing news. I came home sad, frustrated, and wondering why I just didn’t plan on retiring this year. 

As usual, my overdrive brain wanted to fix the situation into a frame I could digest. But it was too soon, and I just felt exhausted by the effort.

The best decision right now is no decision. I will relax and spend time with Jim and pray for direction. 

Oh yes…and BELIEVE in this message. The focus always has to be listening for direction. I will know what to do and when to do it. 

Apricity

This is the post I was going to write the other day, but I didn’t.

Then today I needed it.

I’ve been reading an essay a day out of Anne Lamotta’s new book Somehow. In the essay with the same title she talked about “apricity” which is the warmth of the sun in the winter. Growing up in Ohio, I know what a lovely feeling that is.

Today I felt out of sorts. I was sleepless for a couple hours again last night, after a few nights of solid sleep. I can feel the difference. I’ve let myself get annoyed by minor things again. I couldn’t seem to get myself right. And I was feeling additional irritation at trying to figure out what I should write here.

I read Nikita Gill’s poem “Becoming” in which she says:

This woman that you are today,

You became her by breaking

Over and over and over again.

I contemplated that for a bit. I wondered if somehow I was breaking. I couldn’t find an answer to that.

Then I remembered what I was going to write about the other day. I revisited my notes, and I found Anne’s advice for what to do when you’re feeling down:

Make a list of gratitudes

Do chores

Be kind to yourself

Be of service

Get outside

Breathe

I immediately made the list. And, no surprise, I felt lighter. The underlying agitation was chased  away.

Anne calls this the “launch code when under attack” and I think I need it more than I know. It shortens to these words:

Gratitude * Chores * Chocolate * Service * Nature * Breathe

APRICITY!

Had a plan, but…

I had arranged in my mind what I would write about today, but first we had the cancer center and I had to make a run to Publix and make lunch and, oh yeah, gotta make a call to Consumer Cellular because Jim’s phone isn’t hooking up right.

So we make the call and all that I’m thinking is this has to be quick, I have a mountain of grading and interims are tomorrow. 

We were on nearly an hour. The issue isn’t even resolved, and now I have to go to the store and see if someone can fix the problem. Not the way I want to spent my Saturday afternoon this weekend.

Anyway, I became a grump as you can see, but in the midst of it all I looked out the window and 

WOW

The sky.

Pema Chodron says, Beyond all that fuss and bother is a big sky. Right there in the middle of the tempest, we can drop it and relax.

It’s from her book When Things Fall Apart, and it’s one of my favorite quotes of all time.

I can’t say I fully relaxed. But I did feel a certain grace extended my way from that sky, those clouds, and the stunning gentleness of an April day. It’s another example of how nature can reach out and soothe us even in our busiest times.

Crevices

This is going to be one of those “Helen is thinking out loud” pieces,

As it is now April and the gaps that my students have start to reveal themselves

In full. This time I’m not just thinking of them as gaps, but crevices they fall into

And it takes me a while to figure out that is where they are….in the darkness.

It started when I gave my Global Perspectives kids a tracker for our major

Project, one that they were to highlight each step as they finished it, and it

Would provide the next step. It is online, so the idea was I could look any time

And see where they were. But what I found instead was two things:

Barely anyone was using it, and I kept getting asked what to do next.

I cannot say how many times I replied: What does your tracker say?

I cannot say how many times I begged them to follow the tracker.

Most of the time, I had to remind them where it is on Google Classroom.

To be clear, I’ve used these kinds of trackers before with great success.

What is different now? I have no idea.

With my intensive reading students, I’ve dutifully followed the iReady

Curriculum, adjusting as I saw fit, but in general trying to find the best in it.

It wasn’t until the district gave us “drill down” lessons from the ELA curriculum

That I discovered something I had not seen to this point: The kids are having

Problems answering the standardized test style questions correctly, and

If you give them the answer and ask them to tell you how they can determine

The answer is right, only a few can choose words and phrases that support.

The big emphasis in reading and ELA and other disciplines are teaching 

“The standards.” We are supposed to point to the standard on the board,

Refer to the standard over and over…but as I knew long ago when we tried

This, and I know now again, telling the kids about the standards doesn’t really

Teach them a thing. Instead it teaches them to tune out. It’s worthless information.

Reading and ELA are skills-based classes, not content based. Everything we do

Is just about answering standardized test questions, something we used to avoid

Doing until well into the school year. But now it begins Day One.

Back in the day, we had a saying that the three Rs of education were

Relevance, Relationships, and Rigor. Although I am not a fan of the word

Rigor (too much like rigor mortis), I do believe RELEVANCE has to come first.

The curriculum is boring and does not engage them, the activities are dull and

Sometimes indecipherable…it goes on and on.

And that is where the curriculum is lacking. We are all just walking a barren

Terrain and every once in a while a kids falls into the crevice and they don’t even 

Know what to do to get themselves out of it. They don’t have the skill, somehow.

And very often, they just don’t bother to ask for help, or even accept it when given.

This came to light this past week. My GP students completed their research and a

Planning sheet, and now they are supposed to be putting together their presentations.

It wasn’t until this week I discovered that some didn’t understand what to put in 

The presentation. I’d say, What did you put on your planning sheet?

(Of course, the tracker TELLS them to use their plan to create their presentation,

But since they aren’t using it, they don’t know.)  They keep asking questions like,

How many slides do I need? (My response: I don’t know. How many do you need

To tell the story of your research findings?) They ask How long should it be?

Same answer. How long will it take? I remind them again that they are speaking

To their peers, that they need to make the information digestible, keep it in their

Own words. They were to take Cornell Notes on their sources, and the purpose

Was to help them get to that point. But many did not even know to refer back 

To their notes to make the presentation happen. I still find it hard to understand

This disconnect. It isn’t like it isn’t on the tracker, hasn’t been reintroduced

Repeatedly in class, and isn’t on the FAQ page I made to help them look for 

Answers to common questions.Too many of them simply do not know how to connect things, 

Or even how to use provided resources. Everything has to be spelled out and

Walked through for them, or it may not get done.

(I will give a shout-out here to the few kids in each class that CAN do these things.

But it is far too few.)

Then it hit me…and I’ve been guilty of this as well. Very often, teachers create

A skeleton slideshow for presentations and tell the kids what to put on each slide.

Apparently, this cohort of 7th graders don’t know any other way to approach it.

Again, some were hiding in the dark, not telling me they didn’t know how to start,

And wasting precious class time sitting there “trying to figure it out,” which

Is clearly a gap with this generation — the idea if they stare at something long

Enough, they will figure it out. That’s what they’ve done with video games all

Their lives, so they do not believe in relying on any kind of instruction, verbal

Or written. They would rather tune out and see if they can pull it together.

Of course, it’s also not lost on me that most of these kids are unenthusiastic

About the whole project, even though they were encouraged to choose a research

Question they’d be interested in. But I find too many of them, after weeks of work,

Cannot even tell me their research question.

How did we get here? I have no freakin’ idea.

But I will say here what I say to teacher friends and even ones that work at the district.

Our curriculum is failing our kids. I was not taught to teach they way I’ve been

Cajoled into, and once again, I see some successes, but way too many failures 

With the way things are.

So once again, I have arrived to the place I always arrive, and more alarmed than

Ever about the ways things have degenerated. This happens every damn year!

I am going to get the main things done in the next couple weeks, and then I’m going

To do it my way. I hope to write here with happier news when I do. I am getting close

To retirement, and I’ll be damned if I’ll let these kids keep falling in the crevices!

We will walk the terrain together, I will help them avoid the holes, but honestly

Teaching the skills now that they don’t seem to have is a tall order.

All I can do is what I can do.

Doing My Job

 

First, the positives. Yesterday I received this card and flowers from the my school in condolence for Wayne’s passing. Beautiful, and many personal messages on the card for Jim and me.

Second, the Behavior Specialist came in my chaotic 5th period so I could meet with each student about their project. If she wasn’t there, I would have never gotten through them all. As it was, it took up to the very last minute, and some students were absent. I am tremendously grateful for her support. I won’t be seeing these students their next two class periods, and I needed to be sure they had a clear direction. It’s the way I do my job.

But the day was a whirlwind, and started out a bit frustrating. Here is what I wrote in my journal:

I cried in frustration AGAIN during PLC and I hate that. Everyone tells me I shouldn’t be the teacher I am. I know it is supposed to make me feel like I can take the pressure off of myself. Yet, I’m tired of that message. And I’m also tired of “solutions” that do not work.

I knew from the start the intensity of this project wouldn’t be fruitful for all kids. WHY IS THAT SUCH A BAD THING TO ACKNOWLEDGE? I don’t think they should have to be left behind because my life blew up.

I believe if I have flexibility and do what I can to reach all learners, I am doing my job. Giving them alternate ways to learn the same skills seems a natural part of the education process to me. I push against other teachers telling me it isn’t necessary. 

I think it is. If I’m doing my job. And despite my constant absences, I am thoroughly dedicated to get the job done. Call me crazy…but I don’t think that will change. 

I Teach Real People

 

 

I teach real people

Real, live, living, breathing, young human people

I’m tired of the irrelevant expectations

I’m tired of trying to adapt to nonsense I don’t always believe in

Yes, I take charge at times

I close my door and teach

Because I know full well following the rules doesn’t always get the job done

I’m tired of the focus on progress monitoring

While acknowledging it has its place

But it isn’t everything!

I’m tired of people not in the classroom instantly forgetting what it is like

To deal with too many immature students in one room

And the class becomes a constant barrage of who did what to whom

Is it too much to ask that the curriculum acknowledges who they are?

Is it too much to ask to have parental support and not just be told

Deal with it

Is it too much to ask that our society support what we do in public ed?

Doesn’t its success benefit us all?

Yes, I am ranting, borne from a place where I feel like an outlier

For wanting to reach my learners, bring out the best in them.

When too many adults don’t prioritize what they need

How should a preteen know or believe in that mission

When everything they experience tells them otherwise?

They can’t see how it matters.

But it matters.

Always did.

Always will.

Dying? Or Being Born?

 Two inspirations today: “Just Beyond the Fence, A Train” by David Kirby and “I Won’t Stay for Long” by David Crosby.

From the poem: 

You can’t save everyone

You save whom you can

Right now, I’m just trying to save myself

But there may be some screenagers* who will come along

Some who care about learning, growing, becoming a better person

But if they won’t come willingly, I cannot make them

Truth is, I can’t keep pushing this river

Too exhausting

Out of 180+ students, what can I get? Maybe 20%?

Today I speak to them, that 20%. I make it about them.

I do I to save me.

“I don’t know if I’m dying or about to be born”

AFTERWORD:

I’m concluding that my desire to reach all my learners is a fool’s errand. As a teacher, I long to make that difference. But I feel the culture is working so against us all, beating us down.  I cannot continue this way.

Am I admitting defeat? Maybe. Or maybe I’m just retreating so I can find the right reinforcements. My current ones are failing me, not shoring me up like they used to. They just don’t seem to work anymore.

I surrender myself to what is. I listen for my next step.

🌻

* about screenagers—this from a website about Generation Alpha

Tempest

 

Images remain from this week:

Smiling 5th graders

Tears in a sister teacher’s classroom

A mountain of science workbooks scattered on table and floor

A teacher begging for quiet, her ears ringing from the noise

Anxiety raging in her through the restless night

Reinforcements in ear plugs & chocolate

Kick out that back-talking instigator

Sail on to calmer seas

During Ian 9.28.22 "Still Going On"

I wrote this poem around 5 pm, well into the 8th hour of Hurricane Ian.  

The poem was "It is the year 2036" in which the poet Rudy Francisco imagines what is happening in the year 2036.

 

I am reading this after

a long horrible day

with Hurricane Ian

that hasn't ended yet.

                    It could well be 2036 

                    and Rudy forgot to

                    add that the hurricane

                    from 2022 is still

                    going on.

42. Fifty

 #66Challenge

Three of my class periods are better now, ever since I changed seating, added negatives to Class Dojo, and one student left for Success Academy.

The other class...no hope there. Nowhere to move anyone. Smallest class with the biggest problems. Unsolvable, except to keep writing referrals.

Of which I'm up to 50. 

Seriously. 50.

Ridiculous.