Long Distance Dedication

I was working at my desk when the classroom phone rang during my planning time this afternoon. That line is usually reserved to call kids to the office to pick up forgotten-at-home items or to speak to an administrator or go take their medication in the clinic. Rarely is it for me, although I remember the days when we had no phones in our classrooms. 

Then, messages were left in our mailboxes when we received a call, and we had to go to the office if we wanted to make a call, so it was an exciting day when they pulled phone wires through the ceiling and added wire moulding and jacks to our walls. Even so, long-distance calls were forbidden on the dial-nine-for-an-outside-line system. 

Coincidentally, we got wired internet at the same time, and boy! Did we feel connected. Of course, most of those issues became moot with the advent of cell phones and wifi. But we've kept the old landlines in our classrooms, anyway, and since kids are not allowed to use their personal phones in school, we have to teach them how to pick up the receiver, listen for a dial tone, and push actual buttons to make a call.

Today, though, when the phone rang, it was for me. A secretary in the office asked if she could connect a call from my doctor. "Sure," I told her, but I was puzzled. I hadn't contacted my doctor recently, nor did I have any upcoming appointments. Plus? My doctor has my cell number.

"Hang up, and I'll put the call through," she promised, and I skeptically did so; that particular feature rarely works on these phones, and sure enough, when I picked up on the second ring, all I heard was dead air. 

I hung up again, and the phone rang again. A voice on the other end of the line said, "Tracey? It's me, Amy!"

It was a friend from high school whom I haven't spoken to in at least 15 years, or as long as I've had my cell phone, because she didn't have that number. Calling from Arizona, she had tracked me down at work, and yes, she is a doctor, just not my doctor.

"I just said that so they would put me through," she laughed. "I'm so glad I got you."

The Sweet Smell of Success

I keep a bag of Jolly Ranchers in the bottom drawer of my desk as an extra incentive for the sixth graders as we go about the business of writing and reading. Often kids can earn one of the fruit-flavored hard candies for participating in a brain break or other little challenge that accompanies the lesson. 

Usually I let the winners pick their flavor, and in general that means blue raspberry is always in short supply, followed by watermelon and green apple. Cherry, although my personal favorite, and grape are the last to go, because as kids have explained to me, they taste like medicine. I guess that's probably true; children's remedies have come a ways since my mom dosed us with orangey baby aspirin and Robitussin that burned the back of our throats going down. 

Even so, with enough incentive, most kids will take any flavor. For example, I have been known to offer two-for-one grapes when we get to the bottom of the bag, and those fly out of the room. Recently, they have had the option to guess which flavor is in my hand when I pull it out of the bag. If they are right? They will get another Jolly Rancher of their choice, but if they are wrong, then they have to take whatever it is. Most kids are happy to take a chance, and this routine is both entertaining and good for keeping the supply even for all the flavors.

One of my classes is full of silly characters, and they have become convinced, convinced! That they can smell the flavor in my hand, if only I'll allow their noses close enough. It makes me laugh when they ask, but I don't really think they are any more correct than the 1 in 5 chance they have without smelling. 

This weekend I decided to test the theory personally, and I brought a small bag of Jolly Ranchers to our family gathering at the beach. Six of the eight of us tried a blind sniff-test with unimpressive results. "Let me smell each one by itself," I suggested, "maybe that will educate my nose."

It did not, but I can't say it's impossible. I'm sure there are folks out there with sharper schnozzolas than mine. 

Best Case Scenario

I am on the record about how loathsome I find the advent of DST. Losing an hour, any hour? Is anathema to me, especially considering that I must rise in the 5 a.m. hour in order to begin my work day by 7:20. Getting up any earlier than tht is just an insult to my all too human body.

Even so, this year the dreaded beginning of DST happened to coincide with our annual Oscar weekend away, and I must say that rising at my leisure with the spring sun shining through my window and the sound of the surf just outside made the time change a bit more tolerable. And time was almost irrelevant to the unstructured nature of the day, as the eight of us walked the beach, shopped the outlets, and cooked delicious food for our party.

Tonight, we will happily stay up until the end of the awards, adding circles and exes to our ballots, knowing that we can keep our alarms turned off tomorrow morning. And maybe, just maybe, by the time we get home tomorrow and return to work on Tuesday, the time change will be nothing more than the nuisance of having to reset a few clocks.

Seeing Orange

"What's with all the carrots?" Heidi asked the other day, spotting the shaved, orange rounds quick pickling on the counter. "We sure have had a lot of them lately."

"I have to eat carrots every day until June 8," I reminded her. "It's one of my 100 day challenges."

"What are the rules?" she asked. "Is there a certain amount or preparation?" 

I shrugged. "Not really," I answered. "I'm just playing it by ear. I saw carrots in my broccoli soup the other day, and then there were some in the kimchi I used for fried rice. Those counted."

"How about some carrot cake, then?" she suggested. "Let's enjoy those carrots to the fullest!"

On the Cusp

 We saw more snow falling today than we have all winter! 

A spontaneous road trip to Carlisle, PA took us north through central Maryland  and up through Catoctin and Gettysburg where the soft rain misting through the leaden skies turned first to sleet and then to big, fat flurries melting upon contact with our warm windshield. The car thermometer informed us that it was 36 outside, and at midday in March we knew there was no chance that the snow would stick, so we simply enjoyed the flakes as they swirled us along the rolling road.

Back home this evening it seemed like a perfect idea to draw the curtains against the lengthening day and use the last of the firewood to enjoy one more winter's night.

Sixth Grade Sense

To help with creating a theme for the children's books they are preparing to write and illustrate, I asked my sixth graders to share an important lesson they have learned in their lives. As usual, I was amused and impressed by their wisdom. 

The number one answer was don't steal, and I think there may be more than a kernal of autobiographical inspiration in those backstories, but these 11 and 12 year olds also know that it's important to be kind and accepting, to stand up for yourself, listen to others, do the right thing whenever you can, know who your real friends are, forgive yourself for mistakes, let others have their opinions, and appreciate your family. 

These young writers also understand that it's a good idea to eat healthy, ask for help when you need it, and. Some noted that we should never give others the satisfaction of knowing they've bothered us, we can't always have what we want, and we should go ahead and take care of our responsibilities before playing. Others pointed out that sometimes bad things happen to good people, and there are also times when you just have to be mean. 

There was practical advice as well: look both ways before crossing the street, don't use crutches on the stairs, never look directly into the sun, and never swim alone. Although the student who wrote the last one was torn between two lessons, and what she actually shared was Don't ever go into the pool without a stranger!

Buffalo for Breakfast

I ran into the parent of a former student yesterday. "What year is Amelia now?" I asked.

"A freshman in college!" her mother replied, and the two of us marveled at how quickly the time has passed.

This morning I recalled that conversation, and I thought back to 2015 when Amelia was in my class, mentally cataloging the consistencies and differences between then and now. We did do the 100 Day Writing Challenge, but it was housed on our old LMS, Blackboard, which we no longer have access to. 

For the umpteenth time, I felt a pang of regret for all that lost writing, and I reminisced about the early days of the online writing community that my friend Leah and I created.

The technology is certainly better now than it was in 2006 when we started, but the structure of kids writing and replying to each other is still in place in my class today. I laughed when I remembered one of our earliest assignments, a photograph that Leah found of a cowboy drinking coffee across a kitchen table from an enormous bison who was in turn eating out of a giant tin pan. We called it "Buffalo for Breakfast" and asked the students to imagine what was going on and write about it.

I had woken up a little uncertain about the lesson plan I had prepared for today. My classes are working on writing fiction, and they have been diagramming simple plots of children's books and animated short films to see how they work. I wanted them to be in collaborative groups, and I had planned a jigsaw activity with another short film. But the thought of that guy and his bison changed my mind. Instead, I found that old photo and had the young writers work together to brainstorm the plot of a children's story about it, using the plot diagram to plan instead of analyze.

It ended up being a fun and productive formative activity: the kids were creative and silly, and I was able to see from their work which elements of plot were still a bit confusing (Hello, inciting event and resolution supporting the theme!). So often, as teachers, we move on from assignments and activities when they become a bit dated or stale, but today I remembered that there is a difference between old and vintage, and sometimes it's worth a look back into the archives to retrieve some lost treasures.