Balance

I wonder if you can create balance in your life by doing the same thing over and over, if everyday is busy, active, spiritually grounded, social, but has quiet time.  When stated like that I feel like that is something I try to create in Kindergarten. We have routine because children thrive knowing on where they are, where they are going, and how their needs will be met.  But what about life after Kindergarten?

I'm now in my 5th week of my 42hr+ work week and feel totally out of whack.  There is no quiet time. There is no time for investing in relationships. There is a pile of stuff to get done for school. Professional development. Lesson plans. Endlessly new district initiatives....and there are still 9 more months of school to go.  It is a marathon. But just like a marathon runner once you get a few miles into it your body moves without you consciously thinking about it.  I'm still waiting for my aerobic system to kick in.

Even the fittest marathon runners rest before the big race.  The best training schedule has a balance: long one runs, short fast-paced runs, cross-training doing any other activity and rest.  Lately I feel like I'm waiting for my opportunity to run and my opportunity to rest.  And there just isn't a big race to look forward to.

I think to have balance in one's life there has to be the opportunity for balance.  When the work day takes up too much of my time and bleeds into my home life, I feel like it is all I do.  My work is only a part of who I am. On the other hand one has to take advantage of opportunities when they come. Bring 'em on!

A picture's worth...

I love photography. It is my favorite visual art.  I think the best photographers, much like Michelangelo, has a special sense about them. Just as Michelangelo said of his sculpture David, “I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free,” Great photographers sense the art, see the image, and capture it.  


In my very amateur knowledge of photography, I would say there are two schools of approach to photography: Technology and Technicality, and Intuition and Luck.  Most photographers have probably studied both of these approaches and find themselves on a spectrum of somewhere between the two.  I would say since my point-and-shoot camera is also set on the AUTO button, I definitely subscribe to the latter. I love that photography is something I am still learning how to do, and also a medium for learning about my world.

Then there is the audience and purpose of photography: when it comes to my son, I am the audience and the purpose is largely for me. The photography is for the love and preservation of the subject in that moment. I can see photos of him a thousand times and show them off to others, but still, I am the one that has the true connection to the image. 

There are great photographers that work in the press that are unsung heroes.  I was inspired today by an NPR story on New York Times photographer Tyler Hicks. The story describes Hicks' work photographing untold stories of unknown victims in the Middle East and in Somalia. While the rest of the nation focuses on our bumbling economy here at home: our wealth of money and resources seemingly freezing, Hicks' photo tells a different story of what happens when there simply is no economy.

Tyler Hicks/The New York Times

While Michelangelo also said, “A beautiful thing never gives so much pain as does failing to hear and see it,” this type of suffering is certainly not beautiful and even painful to those of us who are not subjected to this kind of thing. But maybe because of Hicks' work, we will no longer fail to hear and see it, and the beautiful thing will be the action his work can evoke: empathy and compassion for the rest of humanity, 
rather than the self-serving politics we typically seek in our country.


The best photographers view the world with their eyes and minds wide open. Because of this, they are the eyes for the rest of us who are blinded by comfort or self-interest to the plights of others. They show us the true beauty of nature than constantly renews and remakes itself, rather than the transient superfluities created by man. In a frame they have the power to evoke emotions: sometimes those emotions are indulgent and sometimes they move us to change. 

Travels

It is finally summer, which means two things for a teacher: time to read and time to travel. They often go hand in hand.  I go for 10 months of the year feeling like I am running interval sprints during a long-distance run, leaving me with very little, if any time to read for pleasure.  The first few days of summer vacation (after inservice) I picked up some magazines that I hadn't had time to read during the mad dash to the finish line of the school year.

June's Vogue with Penelope Cruz on the cover (who is a favorite actress of mine for a few of her roles in Almodovar's films) had a thought-provoking letter from the editor entitled Point of Departure. Editor Anna Wintour elaborates on a Henry Miller phrase, "One's destination is never a place rather a new of looking at things," to go as far as saying, "travel allows us the pleasure of becoming someone else, even if only for the duration of that trip." While sitting at my kitchen table her comment struck me. Ten years ago I dreamed of traveling all the time, of working simply so I could travel.  I think based on Ms. Wintour's premise, by traveling and trying out different personas in these new places at that time in my life I was really seeking out the person that I felt most comfortable being.

 I think through my past travels I have found my happy medium between shy and outgoing, wallflower and adventurer. I can't say that there are many trips I regret. I got something out of all of them, even if they were negative experiences like bad accommodations or company. I learned how to be a better judge of people by eliminating all of the biases I hold in my own sphere and by being brave (and sometimes naive) enough to get to know new people in a foreign land. But in the end I came home.

I can't help but wonder if wanderlust isn't somehow tied to our own insecurities (or if the term "tripping" in relation to mind-altering experiences has more to do with traveling than falling down, but I digress...) When I am traipsing around the globe I can be the life of the party, beach bum, explorer, adventurer, writer, missionary, etc., and play these roles to their fullest extent a'la Penelope Cruz. I think about my little Kindergartners who take little trips around the school whenever they get the chance. EVERYONE wants to take the library books back and take the folder to the office. When I am at home, I have to be content with who I am and my present circumstances.  Sitting at my kitchen table, with suitcases empty in a closet, I feel like I have finally settled into a "moment" in my life of contentedness. I think perhaps for the first time in my adult life I feel content with where I am, what I have, and where my life is going.

A few weeks back my friend asked me what my dreams were for the future.  I can't say that right now I am yearning too deeply for anything.  I plan on finishing my masters degree, paying off debt, starting my son in school when he's ready, and yes, I'd love to travel again when the time is right, exploring the space between my ears by venturing somewhere 30,000 feet in the stratosphere, but right now I don't feel the urge as I did before.

This summer I have decided that my travels will be close to home, getting to know Wisconsin and the midwest, the land and the people that have largely made me who I am. I think, if Ms. Wintour's perceptions are right, I can be myself and explore this contented moment of my life a little more deeply.

This weekend I was lucky enough to take a day trip up to Door County and Washington Island.  There are so many beautiful places in that peninsula let alone in the entire state.

School House Beach on Washington Island has no sand, only pummeled, polished white stones.
Even on a rocky beach with no sand, these feet are happy where they stand.

Now that I am back home after a short trip,  I am opening that Vogue magazine to read the article featuring Penelope Cruz in this month's vogue entitled The Dream Life of Penelope. She is a new mom, a successful actress and living her dream-life in this moment too. I close the magazine and go to bed, beyond happy to be living the life I never dreamed of.

Sink or Swim, Float or Faith

Sink or swim is a term often used in education and life. It means simply doing something, maybe without preparation or the right skills and either succeeding or failing at it.  Sometimes in our lives we are pulled out into waters we never intended to venture into and we have to sink or swim, even though it isn't a choice we want to make but feel we are being forced into.

Back when I was student teaching in an internship teaching English language-learners and my first classes for my bilingual license, we often talked about ELLs are expected to sink or swim when it came to comprehending academics.  Students with a natural gift for language and learning succeeded and still do, whereas students who didn't have the proper supports (in terms of vocabulary and modeling, etc.) struggled in school and began to account for those gaps in their academic achievementwe are so trying to close between different demographics of students.  Sink or swim means you rely on nothing but yourself, and there are simply too many times (in education and in life) where someone needs support, a lifeline to be pulled in.

Sometimes we are too preoccupied to see that we won't necessarily sink.  We are so panicked by the fact that we are swept out to sea, we do nothing but float.  Being kept afloat is still surviving, but it is no way to teach, no way to learn, and no way to live. Surprisingly some people are satisfied with simply floating with the status quo. Some people look desperately for ways to get out (and those who try are better swimmers than they ever thought).  

This analogy occurred to me while we were in a training for a new math curriculum today.  In our district, Kindergarten hasn't even had a curriculum adopted for our grade level for probably close to 10 years (my best guess).  Experienced teachers knew what Kindergartners could and should learn; all teachers based what they taught and practiced from the skill standards on the report card.  I couldn't tell you what, if anything that was based on as far as research goes.  So there was nothing to use to teach math, and even less to teach math in Spanish.  We were floating with little to hold on to. Some scrap wood, maybe.  Now we have a curriculum that is being adopted for Kindergarten AND it comes in Spanish for bilingual teachers.  It seems like it should be a no-brainer, but after not having anything really for the two years I've been teaching Kinder math, I'm pretty excited. Someone finally noticed us floating out here (teachers and students) and they are throwing us a line and pulling us in to solid research to stand on.  Despite the presenter asking us to have faith in the research and the completeness in progressive skills and behaviors taught, I noticed some teachers in the training were a little unwilling to let go of their floating scraps of wood. It's hard to let go of something that seemed so safe at one point. Adopting the new curriculum isn't going to be easy, but it will be easier for those of us (newer teachers) who were flailing instead of floating. 

There are times when one ends up in the water and has to swim back into shore, whether it be in a job or a relationship.  It's a long hard swim, but sometimes you have to have faith that it will get you where you need to be.  You may not make it if you get overtired or hit an undertow in the current, but there is risk in everything. If you did nothing you would be floating forever at the mercy of the waves (or in Spanish, A la deriva). In reflecting back on the last five years, there were many times when I had little faith in my abilities or value as a person and felt that I was floating. Those were very unhappy times.

Sometimes the only way you will have success, get to solid ground, is if you commit to something full-force, but not blindly. You have to know where the sharks are swimming, a guess of where the current is flowing, and if there's anyone who will throw you a line if you simply can't anymore. I truly believe that faith isn't blind.  I think faith can be attributed to intuitiveness or perceptiveness of our current conditions, part of it is based on past experience, and is also influenced by our hopes for the future. Part of committing fully to something, investing in it, is perceiving what factors affect what you are about to undertake. 

Sometimes you are blessed with the clarity in which you see an opportunity present itself, and it couldn't be a better time. Sweet serendipity, the clouds part, the sea calms, and you swim.

 

I heard this song on my way to pick up my son on the radio, and it reminded me to write. For your listening pleasure, "Faith" by George Michael. 

Before this river
Becomes an ocean
Before you throw my heart back on the floor
Oh baby I reconsider
My foolish notion
Well I need someone to hold me
But I'll wait for something more

Yes I've gotta have faith...

This school year

Today is the last Friday of the school year. There is only a day and half left of school. We are in wind-down mode, doing fun activities so the kids end their school year on a happy, stress-free note now that grades are in, report cards printed, and everyone is anxious for the free time they have earned.

In reflecting on this school year I think I have learned two things. Yesterday at lunch my friend Susan said, " In order for the kids (especially Kindergartners) to learn anything from you they have to love you, and for them to love you, you have to love them first." This is very true.  The best teachers love their jobs, and they love their jobs because they love their students. It isn't because teaching phonics is just THAT interesting, but watching students learn, sense their own accomplisment and ability is that rewarding.

I have to admit that there were days where I didn't feel like I loved my job or my students as much as I should. I feel like if I did I would have done things differently and probably more effectively.

It makes me think of two teachers who are at the opposite ends of the spectrum in this regard. Strangely enough, their rooms are right next to each other.  I find myself in the middle of their spectrum. One has been doing this a long time, has the same worksheets she uses to occupy her students while she beats through guided reading groups, the other also has the same centers she has been using to occupy students in exploratory learning so she can move around the room and work with her students individually.  The second teacher has had nearly miraculous results with her young students achieving a grade level above expectations. The first teacher is, well, frustrated, or maybe burnt out. 

This is the key of quality teaching. You have to love what you do.  The students are not pieces of plastic to be molded in a factory. They give and bend to your attitude. If you love school and you love them, they feel the same way.  It's a beautiful symbiosis that is proven to work when implemented, but impossible to measure other than in teacher attitude. No mini-lesson or workshop approach or scripted curriculum can even being to make-up for this element in great teaching.

Next year I am going to work on my attitude. I want to come to work feeling good, not worn-out. I need to take care of myself and my son first, so when I'm here I can make the most of my time and interactions with my students. This year has been a flurry of activity resulting in a blizzard of stress. Next year I hope for sunnier skies, or at least better boots.

Wholeness

In education we often use the word "whole" to describe something comprehensive and multi-faceted, i.e.: educating the whole child, or the whole-language approach to teaching reading.  In my undergrad courses and several staff developments, educating the whole child often speaks to not only their academic growth, but also developing social and emotional skills. It also means teaching to multiple types of intelligences (Gardner) so that students of varying strengths have the opportunity to succeed and learn alongside their peers.  Sometimes it is difficult as a teacher to measure this.  We often go on our intuition (which I think is largely undervalued at times) to address social or emotional issues with students.  It seems as though we have an assessment for every skill we require our students to know, but never an assessment to either tell us how a child is feeling and why or an assessment on how our students learn the best. When something is awry we feel it but can't always pinpoint it, and when students succeed we celebrate with them.

In a conversation with the first grade bilingual teacher we shared what we knew about some students I had last year.  There were a few that were very bright academically but not achieving their potential because of other social and emotional issues. As teachers we feel powerless to change the circumstances that our students live in for the other 17 hours they aren't in school.  In educating it is necessary to keep in mind all of the facets of our students, and that we can't always attribute successes or failure to a teacher's methods.  This could easily go in to a political rant on merit-pay, but I just don't think I will go there tonight.

In my attempts to teach the "whole child" I often find myself overwhelmed.  Do I assess the child's writing, or talk to him or her about how confident they feel and who writes in their house?  There are simply too many facets of educating a child to approach them wholly at the same time.  It becomes overwhelming and a nightmare of prioritizing.  But yet, when we are required to assess 5 year-olds it sometimes feels like we aren't educating the child but pumping them for answers. This is the inner-conflict I feel in my field as a modern educator.

Personally I think I have been seeking wholeness in my life at many times.  I have gotten to the point now where I realize what factors make me feel "whole" or like a better person, but just like in teaching there are too many things to be addressed at once.  People say "simplify," but I often already feel like I am running a skeleton-crew of priorities: my son, my family and loved-ones, my job, education, and my health. Some people might even say that my list is devoid of certain things like recreation and spiritual growth.  I might be inclined to agree with them.

When we look from the outside in we tend to envy others, thinking they have it made.  Yet from that person's perspective, it isn't enough and they may always seek more.  Being unsatisfied is human nature.  Being unsatisfied inspires innovation, brings immigrants to our country and is the underlying force for progress.  However, being unsatisfied or under-appreciative can ruin something that is already good.  I have witnessed examples of this personally: marriages destroyed by a partner who manically searches for something else while refusing to witness the wonderful things right under their own roof in their own partner.  I have witnessed this in education multiple times: curriculum being changed over and over without ever having the opportunity to be fully implemented, and even the entire educational system being disparaged because test scores aren't as high compared to other countries.  The unsatisfied spouse lays blame with their partner, the public lays blame with teachers.  There is rarely any introspection to see what the underlying missing facet is. What is it exactly that is leaving us feeling deficient?

I propose that anyone who is feeling incomplete take some time for introspection to reflect and appreciate on what is already good, rather than searching for that magic fix.  There never is a magic fix, unless we change our perspective with a new glasses prescription.

Everything I should know I learn from my Kindergartners

Today this morning was crazy.  I found out yesterday that I have a new student coming from an English-speaking classroom.  The poor peanut is going to be confused until we get everything straightened out with her.  You might wonder, "Well, don't you just put her in the English speaking classroom at your school then?"  She has had a good solid 6 years of learning since womb-exit in Spanish, and only 7 months of English learning. Luckily, she is sweet as can be and we are happy to have her.


During centers I have been running the reading center at the rainbow table. My co-teacher has been running the writing center and the other student rotate between free-choice, free-choice reading, and a math activity.  Today one of our students got a nose bleed and my co-teacher threw on the rubber gloves to take care of her.  The 5 students at her center were still "working." One student is very impulsive and likes to get things done very quickly. When he saw that Miss O was busy he just started writing random letter.  The boy next to him in group, who is a solid student and nice to everyone saw what he was doing and asked him to read his sentence aloud to him.  Miss O later recounted to me to what she had heard while squeezing the girl's nose... A boy who I will call Manuel (not his real name) had the boy randomly writing letter read what he wrote. This was his response translated from Spanish
          "Read it to me. No, it doesn't say "gym." For "gym" you need the "g" like guitar."
This is what teachers live for. Kids who learn better when the teacher doesn't have to be pulling them along, and BETTER a student who has learned it well enough and is confident enough to teach it to a peer.


Manuel taught me something today.  Sometimes the best time to help someone is when you see that they need it, but they don't ask for it.  They may resent you for it momentarily, but will thank you for it in the end through returned kinship.  His peer, "Israel" was writing random letters all over the place, and Manuel helped him by redirecting him into doing something more productive, but also showing him the purpose.   One of the major premises in teaching elementary school is, "All children have gifts. It is our job to tap them and use them to facilitate their learning."  Manuel has some definite academic skills... His friend has other qualities, like persuasion and humor, that he doesn't have. Both Manuel and Israel are valued in my class as equals.


I have recently been on the other end of that equation. In the last year or so I have received help from people who care about me and I care about them.  I don't usually solicit it because I believe that I should be independent and earn what I have.  I sometimes lack the time, skill or patience to get done what I need to get done, because just like my Kindergartners I am learning as I go.  More so I lack the humility to realize I do have many things to learn sometimes.  


As a teacher, I am used to being the one with the answers and the "fixits." But now I have met someone who knows more than me about many things. He sees when I struggle and he helps, even when I don't ask. And I made the mistake of being resentful, not because I can't do what he does, but I simply haven't yet. In watching Manuel and Israel I have been reminded of why, as human beings, we like to help.  We help for personal satisfaction in knowing that we know how, we help because we care about each other, and we want others to do well.  


I hope, that just like Manuel, he can be content with showing me on occasion and not always doing for me, so that someday I will learn and do for myself the things he already does so well. I have misconstrued his help for his desire to want to be "better" than me or unequal, rather than what is his genuine attempt to try to make life easier.  I have been praying for a easier row to hoe, and instead of God giving me a new row, I now have cute chicken farmer with a hoe in my row too. His row is already hoed (especially since all his chickens are dead), and he won't leave me out there with the soil untilled. I wanted to say I hoed that row by myself, but I would probably never get there if it weren't for him.  I am profoundly grateful and sorry. 

sorry.

I hope someday I will catch up on this steep learning curve and be the helper and the teacher sometimes too. It's amazing how much Kindergartners love to be the helper or the teacher. I am learning that it isn't so much what we do right now, but that we value each other as equals (almost like the U.S. currency). I hope someday I get to have the satisfaction knowing that I can help him too and show him that I care and want him to do well. And maybe teach him how to cook without recipes.