I is for It's Hard to Explain

"If 'Good is the enemy of Great,' then how come 'Life is Good' is good enough?" a student asked the other day, looking around at some of the inspirational posters I have hanging in my classroom.

It was a good question.

No.

It was a great question.

"Good is the enemy of great," I told her, "because if you settle for good, you'll never work for great."

She nodded expectantly.

"But, 'Life is Good' is an overall philosophy about life in general. It's not just 'good;' it's 'gooooood'." I made a smooth motion with my hand in the air. "See what I mean?" I tried to explain.

"You mean that says, 'Life is Goooood'?" she asked.

"Yeah!" I told her. "It's to remind us to appreciate the good things in life!"

She shook her head. She still didn't get it.

Fortunately, the bell rang right then.

Good timing!

No, great timing

Life Lesson: "If you can't explain it simply, you don't know it well enough." ~Albert Einstein

J is for Just One More Thing

If you ask me, any assessment should be low stakes because, like Heisenberg famously asserted, you change anything by trying to measure it. That principle is especially true when it comes to middle school standardized tests. We make such a big fuss over them that it seems to hard to believe they could possibly be an accurate measure.

Oh, we are always motivated by good intentions; the tests have become so important, that we just want our students to do the very best they can. And so we give them boot camps, review sessions, and pep talks in the weeks leading up to the test, and then on the day of there are wristbands, pencils, bookmarks, and a free breakfast for everyone.

So today, after all that, when we finally sat down to actually start the test, one student raised his hand. "Do we get mints?" he wanted to know.

The answer was actually yes; I was saving them for a little later, but I really couldn't help myself when I replied, "Oh my gosh! Is this the SOL or an all you can eat buffet??"

The group laughed, and I gave them their Wint-o-green Lifesavers before starting my script, Today you are taking the sixth grade reading SOL... and crossing my fingers that they would all pass.

Life Lesson: "An expert is someone who knows some of the worst mistakes that can be made in his subject, and how to avoid them." ~Werner Heisenberg

K is for Keep this in Mind

It's personal profile time in my little corner of the sixth grade world, and that means students are conducting (and giving) interviews so that each can write a 500 word journalism piece, with a specific focus and theme, about another member of our class. In sections where there are an odd number of students, for the sake of logistics, I get to participate, too.

So, this morning I was being interviewed by a fledgling reporter who asked me what I considered my greatest strength to be. I was stumped by the question.

One of the reasons I value being an active part of the project is that it allows me to model what I want my students to achieve, but the bigger pay-off is that it puts me in their shoes. "Um, I guess, I'm curious?" I answered. But then I recovered, delivering some good evidence as to how and why such a description fits me. Even so, it's hard to be interviewed!

Later I thought about that conversation when I looked at the recipe for gambas al ajillo that I wanted to make for dinner. Take 20 cloves of garlic... it started. That seemed like a lot to me, but I wanted to prepare the recipe according to direction before I made too many changes. Peeling that much garlic though? That would be a pain!

Fortunately, I remembered reading about a clever way to peel garlic which involved putting the cloves in a container and shaking them vigorously until the papery skin fell away. I grabbed a jar, dropped my 20 cloves inside, screwed on the lid, and proceeded to swing that baby up and down until every little piece of garlic was stripped naked. It only took about 10 seconds.

Wow! I thought. I should have said my greatest strength is that I have a good memory!

Life Lesson: "Pay attention. It's all about paying attention. Attention is vitality." ~Susan Sontag

L is for It's a Little Late

When I was in graduate school, my Shakespeare professor told us a story the week before our first exam.

A young woman who was failing a class made an appointment to speak to her instructor. "I really need to pass this course," she said, "and I'll do anything to make it happen."

He raised his eyebrows at her. "Anything?" he asked.

"Anything," she repeated.

"Then STUDY, damn it!" he told her.

In sixth grade the more common inquiry at report card time is "Why is my grade so low?" and when you tell the student it's because a few things are missing, the next question is always, "Can I do extra credit to bring it up?"

Extra credit!

How about regular credit?!

Just do the work, kids, and we'll go from there.

Life Lesson: “Forever is composed of nows.” ~Emily Dickinson

M is for Man I'm Tired!

It was a whirlwind weekend! We busted out of school at 2:30 on Thursday headed for the airport and a flight to Atlanta to surprise my little sister for her big birthday. Fate was not on our side, however, and after several gate changes and an hour of sitting on the plane at the gate, our flight was canceled and we were scrambling.

There was no way we would make it there that night, but I was happy that my mom and my brother were both able to deliver their surprises, and when my sister jokingly texted me "Are you on the front porch?" she had no idea how true my answer was.

"I wish!"

We did make it early the next afternoon, and it was a fun surprise. Two of her oldest friends were flying in as well, and so the eleven of us celebrated my sister and made merry late into the night all weekend long. It seemed much too soon when the alarm rang this morning and we packed and piled into the rental car at 9 AM, happy to have been there, but sad to be leaving.

In an earlier post this month, I mentioned a rule we have around here, which is that you're never allowed to say I am sick. There's another one kind of like it: No naps! In general, I just think that when you are tired in the middle of the day, it's better to get moving and try to make it to an early bedtime.

I tried to follow my own rule today; we went grocery shopping and came home to walk the dog before dinner, but that couch just looked so inviting! I had to lie down for a quick minute. An hour later? I finally forced myself up and into the kitchen to put the groceries away, but you know what?

I felt much better! Maybe naps aren't all bad after all!

Life Lesson: "It is better to be only sometimes right, than at all times wrong, so soon as I discover my opinions to be erroneous, I shall be ready to renounce them.” ~Abraham Lincoln

N is for Noticing

We spent part of our morning geocaching. For those who are unfamiliar, Wikipedia defines Geocaching as follows:

Geocaching is an outdoor recreational activity, in which participants use a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver or mobile device and other navigational techniques to hide and seek containers, called "geocaches" or "caches", anywhere in the world.

A typical cache is a small waterproof container containing a logbook (with a pen or pencil). The geocacher enters the date they found it and signs it with their established code name. After signing the log, the cache must be placed back exactly where the person found it. Larger containers such as plastic storage containers (Tupperware or similar) or ammunition boxes can also contain items for trading, such as toys or trinkets.

So basically it's a world-wide treasure hunt, and you might be surprised to discover that there are probably several geocaches within easy traveling distance of your present location. Just go to the website and look. Finding the troves can be challenging; they are usually hidden very cleverly and the rules of the game call for you to be stealthy in your hunt.

My older nephews and I have spent many a fun afternoon chasing down a cache or two or five, and they were always very good at ferreting them out, although we have been stumped on several occasions. Today it was my niece Annabelle who was our lead searcher, and she turned out to be the best spotter yet-- she located both of our quarries in under a minute. That's impressive, but when I told her mom, my sister said, "I'm not surprised. She notices everything!"

Life Lesson: "Between those who notice such things and those who don't, I prefer those who do.” ~Wallace Stegner, Angle of Repose

O is for One Hundred Twenty Water Balloons

While shopping for writing challenge prizes the other day I came across an ingenious product. Forty balloons banded to plastic straws which are in turn attached to a hose connector. The whole shebang screws right onto the spigot, and, with three to a package, in no time flat you have yourself over 100 water bombs.

How could I resist such a purchase, especially knowing that I would be spending the weekend with my niece and nephew in Atlanta? It was nearly 80 degrees and sunny here this afternoon when we decided to give the battle balloons a whirl, and they did not disappoint. Richard, Annabelle, my brother Bill, and I had all the ammunition we needed to thoroughly drench each other in an awesom water war.  

"You can't imagine what a luxury it was to have so many water balloons!" I told a friend tonight at dinner.

She laughed. "You're right, I can't!" 

Life Lesson: “It's never too late to have a happy childhood.” ~Tom Robbins