Pinwheels for Peace

The awesome art teacher at our school introduced a cool activity last year: Pinwheels for Peace is an art installation project conceived of by two art teachers in Florida in 2005. Every year millions of windmills are created and displayed on September 21, in observance of the United Nations World Peace Day.

This year, our new Tolerance Club took the lead on the project, helping to organize materials and set up the display of over 350 pinwheels in front of our school for World Peace Day tomorrow. Tonight as I left the building, hundreds of colorful handmade pinwheels twirled in the soft breeze. Our school is a mixed-use facility, and I saw dozens of people there picking up their children, attending night classes, riding bikes, walking dogs, and jogging past. Few could fail to smile at the pinwheels spinning in the setting sun, especially after reading the banner...

Visualize Whirled Peace

Bunny Ears

Our school system subscribes to a password-protected academic internet service. Each teacher has a "course" with tools like a discussion board, blog, wiki, online assignments, etc. that students can access from anywhere they have an internet connection. One part of my English class involves giving my students the chance to write informally for an audience of their peers on our course's discussion board. I put up topics of interest like sports, music, pets, and video games and invite the kids to post at will. There are other more structured writing assignments, too, and we start the year with introductions. Each student has to write a couple of paragraphs introducing him or herself to the rest of the group. As a follow-up, they are asked to read and reply to at least five other kids.

Anyway, we were in the computer lab on Friday to kick off this activity, and so I've spent a good chunk of my weekend reading sixth grade writing, some of it rather silly indeed. Not that I mind-- I find what they have to say to each other pretty interesting, and this assignment can really provide a lot of insight into their personalities, interests, concerns, and of course, writing skills. Sometimes what they write is hard to understand, which is a good lesson for them, because quite often, whomever it's addressed to will reply in confusion, giving that writer incentive to revise the message.

Today, I read a post that temporarily stumped me. It was in reply to a girl who had written that she was excited about all the field trips we might take in sixth grade. To that another student responded, REALLY, REALLY, Kim Positive can't wait for the exciting (with bunny ears) field trips? WOW! I understood the teasing sarcasm-- it was the bunny ears that got me. I read it again and was just about to click away with a shrug and a note to self to ask him about it tomorrow when I realized what they were... He meant air quotes! I was fascinated by the implication: he didn't realize that the bunny ear gesture actually stands for punctuation marks, much less that he could have written them directly into his reply.

Now, that is going to make a good mini-lesson.

Impulse Purchase

Today while out and about on weekend errands, we noticed that a new shop was opened not so far from our home. It's actually the second location of a place devoted to all things doggie, and since we've driven to the other side of the county to visit its sister store, we were delighted to drop in and browse a bit this afternoon. They had a fun assortment of things we really don't need-- dog beds and t-shirts, collars and leashes (remind me that one day? I really must write about Isabel's extensive collar wardrobe), but as we made our way to the back of the store, we stopped by the small book collection, and there it was... a book on teaching your dog sign language!

We laughed to begin with-- we have many friends who have taught their pre-verbal children to sign, and based on that alone, this seemed like the ultimate scam targeting DINKs like ourselves-- but as I've written before the desire to truly communicate with your pet can run deep. We decided to buy the book.

Our dog has a pretty good repertoire of tricks, none of which I can take credit for teaching her, and she is nothing if not a willing student, so as we plunked our hard earned cash on the glass top boutique counter, I knew that if any dog could learn sign language, it is Isabel, and if anyone could teach her, it is Heidi.

We'll see.

More Than a Rhetorical Question

I heard someone on the radio today describe teaching as being like a salesperson for a product that nobody wants but everyone is forced to buy. That made me a little sad, but I realized that it does speak to one of the most common pitfalls of teaching-- how to make the curriculum relevant to people who are not necessarily present in your class by choice.

The answer must lie in the fact that although no one loves every minute of school, everybody has experienced the utter exhilaration of learning something totally awesome. How can all of the stakeholders work together to make school like that?

Be Prepared

Today was the day when we set up English binders in my class. Last week, each student was asked to procure a 1-1/2" binder and five dividers to store and organize all the reading and writing work they will do in class this year. Last night, I went to the office supply store and purchased 10 binders and 20 sets of dividers. My deal is simple-- I'll lend those students without what they need today in exchange for a replacement as soon as possible. I ran out of supplies in the fourth of my five classes, despite scrounging through all the spare binders I've collected over the years as well as the generosity of the students who bought 8 divider sets and donated the extra 3 to their classmates.

This practice is considered wrong by some. To them, it is harmful to the students because it is enabling: as the theory goes, if students have enough advance notice for any given task, then accepting anything less than full compliance is reinforcing the idea that requirements aren't mandatory. Hm.

To those folks I say: Look. My students are ten and eleven. They are in a new school in a new position of greatly increased responsibility and independence. I think they're doing the best they can. Many of their parents work long hours and some have limited access to transportation. Add to that that today, new figures were released showing that one out of seven people in the US lives in poverty. I suspect that statistic applies to the families of some who come to my class every day.

Not one student turned down my offer; they want to have what they need for the class. I know I'll get back a few binders and some sets of dividers, too, but I won't break even, and I don't really care. We have our English binders ready to go!

I Thought You Should Know

Yesterday a student approached me right at the end of class asking for a moment. When the rest of the kids had cleared out on their way to PE and electives, I asked her what was up. "I just thought you should know that (and here she named another girl in the class) has been spreading rumors that you're gay." She hastened to add that she didn't believe such a terrible thing for a minute; she just figured I'd want to know.

She was wrong-- I didn't really want to know. Knowing forces me into a difficult position. I am gay, and for most of my life I have lived with a certain amount of shame because of it. When I was much younger, it was not acceptable at all, and although over the years being gay has become less of an issue, even for a teacher, I am not open about my sexuality with the students. For a teacher at our school, it's okay to be gay; it's fine if adults-- colleagues and even parents-- are aware of it, too, but we don't mention it to the kids.

In the rare cases that it comes up, as it did for me yesterday, we usually tell the students that it's inappropriate for them to discuss a teacher's personal life. That's not entirely true, though. Any of my heterosexual co-workers would have no problem telling kids that they were married, nor would they be discouraged from doing so. I know of one teacher in my building who happily shared the details of his engagement with each of his classes. He called it "building relationships."

So, what did I do yesterday? I told the first student that although it was inappropriate for someone to be speculating about my personal life, I hoped she understood that there was nothing wrong with being gay, and I was not insulted by the rumors. She looked at me with skepticism. "You should be!" she said indignantly, perhaps honestly believing that she was defending my reputation.

"I'm not," I said flatly, but I was lying. My day was ruined. My stomach ached as if I had been caught doing something wrong; I was worried that the rapport I was building with these new students would be compromised, and I dreaded telling the counselor and the other teachers on the team about the incident, but I had to.

I'd like to say I was back to normal today, but I was still a little off balance. We had a modified schedule for testing, so I didn't see either of the two students involved, and maybe that was for the best. Even so,  I'm sure it'll be fine when I do see them tomorrow. Internalized homophobia is insidious and damaging, and as I know all too well, damn near impossible to get rid of completely, but soon enough it fades back beneath the conscious surface. Until next time.

White Horse

Hey, look isn't that Alfie Kohn riding this way?

Go ahead, give it a click.