Waxing Cranky

Sometimes there's no explanation for why a lesson or activity falls apart for a group or individual. Maybe the moon or the planets were in an unfavorable position this morning for one particular group of four boys, who are usually pretty good friends.

The class was working on a collaborative assignment analyzing a model narrative, of the type they are writing, written by a former student. In front of the four boys was a large sheet of paper with a grid of 16 elements to look for in the story, and each student was supposed to fill out four boxes, in consultation with the other members of their group. 

It was an assignment that had been and would be successfully completed by 29 other groups of students over the course of the day, and based on their collective aptitude and achievement, they should have been a dream team, but they found themselves lagging way behind everyone else, because these four guys just could not get their act together. 

In between insulting each other only half playfully, they bickered about which chair at the table they wanted to sit in, whose handwriting was better, which detail they should include, and whose turn it was to write. "What is going on here?" I asked, and four fingers each pointed at a different member of the group.

"Can I get some water?" one guy requested. "I need to get away from them! This group is really stressing me out!"

Jamming

I was just about to close the door to the classroom when I saw one last student hurrying down the hallway trying to make it to class on time.

I gave her an encouraging smile and waved. "C'mon! You can make it!" I said, and I could tell that she was doing her best to get there before the bell because she was weaving in and out and around all the other kids who were in her way.

She slipped in the door and sat down in her seat just as the bell rang. "Sorry I was almost late!" she apologized. "Traffic!"

Spirited

To mark the last week of the month, we are having a Black History Spirit Week here at school. Initially, I was excited when I heard about it; mostly because the last couple of events, Secret Spirit Week and Kindness Spirit Week, have been fun. But when the list of days came out last Friday, I was at a bit of a loss.

As a person who is white, I'm unsure how to participate appropriately in some of the activities. For example, today was Dress Like a Black Activist day and tomorrow is Dress Like a Black Icon of Art. It's unclear to me how I could do that without cultural appropriation. Wednesday is wear HBCU gear, and so I ordered a Howard t-shirt for Heidi and a Spellman shirt for myself, but Thursday is wear African Garb, and I'll be sitting that one out. Friday takes the colors of African Unity and distributes them among our community: teachers wear gold, 6th grade, red, 7th grade black, and 8th grade green. That one, I can do.

Please understand; I am not complaining. In fact, I think it's good for me to be uncomfortable. Who knows how many other Spirit Week activities we've had in the past have been inaccessible or unfathomable to others, students and staff alike? 

Moments, Not Milestones

We have long had a CSA farm share, but if you asked me how long, I'd be hard-pressed to say. It's been more than a few seasons of greens, sweet potatoes, radishes, turnips, tomatoes, peppers, and wonderful eggs, but the exact number? Not sure.

Tonight at the grocery store I saw some pussy willow branches in the floral department, and they reminded me, as they always do, of Josh. He couldn't have been more than 7 or 8 when visiting us one spring. It was early in the morning of his first day here and I was in the kitchen making breakfast when he came downstairs. He had been sleepy the night before when he arrived with his mom, and she had put him right to bed. Now he was sitting on the couch waiting for some waffles when I heard him softly say, "What are those things?" his nasal drawl filled with wonder. 

I thought a moment about what he might be talking about, and I remembered the pussy willow branches that had come with our farm share a couple of days before. As I stepped into the room to explain, I saw Josh reaching out to touch the velvety flowers, which were standing in all their fuzzy glory in a pewter pitcher by the fireplace, amid a few curly willow and slim forsythia cuttings. I'll never forget the look of enchantment on his face.

I know that had to be 20 years ago, although it sure doesn't feel that long. And that means that we've been getting that farm share for at least 20 years, which also seems impossible. Oh, Time! You are such a trickster.

Double Dipping

In case you were wondering what type of stuff I'm writing with the kids, here's what I wrote for my school writing challenge today:

This morning I read in the paper that Flaco, the Eurasian eagle-owl that escaped from the Central Park Zoo last year, died when he flew into a building. I remember when he escaped last year, a vandal tore open the screen on his enclosure in the middle of the night, but I hadn't followed his adventures very closely after that. 

Evidently, he became somewhat of a celebrity in New York City, and there are hundreds of photographs of him all over the city. Everyone was hoping he would find a way to survive while he was free, and he did! Even though he had been hatched and raised in captivity for all of his 12 years of life, Flaco was able to hunt and catch rats and pigeons to feed himself. Eventually, zoo officials decided to "monitor" him instead of actually trying to recapture him. They always knew that his biggest dangers would be cars and tall buildings. Hundreds of thousands of birds are killed every year in NYC by those things, and last night Flaco, who had beaten the odds for over a year, joined those other poor birds. 

Reading about his life made me sad that I hadn't paid closer attention when he was alive. He was only 13 when he died, and his species can live up to 40 years in captivity. I wonder if Flaco would have chosen his shorter life of freedom, even if he knew how it would end. 

What do you think?

If the Shoe Fits

I was near my wits end this afternoon with my last class of the day. 

Despite 4 adults and short, well-defined activities with clearly scheduled, generous breaks, there were a few students whose behavior was derailing the whole class of 22. One student in particular was being openly defiant. He shouted over me and other kids, was out of his seat posturing and dancing, and refused to comply with any redirection until we were forced to remove him from the group.

After the lunch break, we allowed him to return, but I reassigned his seat to a place that I thought would be less distracting for him and the rest of the class. "You're sitting over there," I pointed when he entered the room.

"You mean with the weird kids?" he asked.

I raised my eyebrows and bit my tongue.

Expanding the Fanbase

The other day, as our 100-Day Writing Challenge officially began, a student asked me if I would post my writing every day, too. "Since you already write every day, I mean," she shrugged.

"Maybe," I told her, but to be honest, I have long resisted doing just that. For one thing, I don't really want to share everything I write here with my students. Many pieces offer my own private adult perspective on our days spent together, and kind of like teachers talking at lunch, are not always appropriate for kids to overhear. 

Likewise, what I might write for a sixth-grade audience may not be of interest to my adult readers, (as few of them as there are!), so I've chosen just to continue on here, rather than write twice. But there was something about the request that made me think again, and so I decided to give posting with those young writers a chance this year.

It's only been three days, but already I've seen some benefits. For one thing, I can model the type of writing we're looking for. Many students write what we call bed-to-bed posts, basically listing everything they do on any given day, rather than focusing on a single thing, or at least a single theme, for each slice of life. Another advantage was when I wrote about the mouse in my classroom the other day. As I was composing I worked to find good "mousy" verbs, and then I was able to use my writing as an example the next day for a mini-lesson on vivid verbs.

But maybe the greatest upside of publishing a couple of hundred words every day on our class site is that my readership has skyrocketed: I've gone from 3-5 daily readers to 50-100! Maybe it's not viral, but it sure is kind of gratifying.