X is for X-roads

Every six months or so we have to change our passwords for our school accounts. It's been my practice for a while to pick a phrase that is hard to guess but easy for me to remember, and over the years my choices have definitely reflected my headspace: a few I have selected are thisisbullshit, bekindalways, and most recently rimtorim2025. 

But when I received the notification a couple of weeks ago that my password would expire in days, I ignored the warning, uncertain about the content of my next login. The prompt has come as I have been struggling with whether or not it is time to retire. 

As many things as I love about teaching, I can't do it forever. The job is well-known to be an enormous time suck, and balancing work and life (never that easy for me) has become much harder as I get older. Add to that a new curriculum, the addition of intensified classes, mandatory professional development on the science of reading, and an IB reauthorization, all happening next year, and it seems like this might be the time for a graceful exit.

And yet.

I have been a teacher for 31 years, literally half of my life. Teacher is a huge part of my identity, and to be honest, my world, and I am really, really good at it.

And, as many personal projects and activities as I have put on hold for lack of time and energy, sometimes lately I look around my house and wonder if my life will shrink to fit within its walls. Who will I talk to? Who will I spend time with? Those social interactions will no longer be built into my days, and as an introvert, seeking them out is not necessarily in my nature. Who will I be and what will I do if not teach sixth-grade English?

Recently it occurred to me that working full time makes it hard to consider the answers to such questions, and it will only be when I am forced by circumstances to consider them that I will find the answers. Of course that means retiring.

But back to my new password. After much consideration, I chose 4mynextact, and I think that kind of says it all.

Life Lesson: I've been afraid of changing 'cause I built my life around you. ~Fleetwood Mac "Landslide"

Z is for Zeit und Gedächtnis

One of my earliest memories is of a time when my parents and I were going to my aunt and uncle's for a cookout. My mom had baked a pie for us to bring along, but in the jumble of packing up a toddler and getting out the door, they left it on the kitchen counter. We were only a few blocks from home when they realized the oversight, and I remember the urgency in their voices. My mom made a quick right turn and then another and slowed to a stop in a place I had never seen. My dad jumped out of the car and ran down a hill. A minute later he returned with the pie. This dramatic crisis and its miraculous resolution have stayed with me ever since.

To this day I'm not quite sure where the shortcut my dad took is located, even though I have looked for it, most often when I find myself on that three-mile stretch of Rte 29 between my aunt and uncle's old place and the community of garden rowhouses where we lived. But I thought about that pie today when Heidi and I took 2-year-old Oliva out for a pizza lunch. 

We walked from her parents' townhouse over to a nearby restaurant, and on the way back we decided to take a different route. Our pathway took us on a little trail behind some of the buildings in their community, and Liv was interested in the crows and squirrels and flowers. She was absolutely stunned when we rounded a corner and entered their little courtyard. Clearly, she was clueless as to where we were, and the surprise made her giggle in delight.

I laughed, too, and I wondered for a moment if maybe that memory might still be with her in 60 years.

Life Lesson: Toast to the ones here today. Toast to the ones that we lost on the way, 'cause the drinks bring back all the memories, and the memories bring back, memories bring back you. ~Maroon 5 "Memories"

V is for the Verge

A student approached me nearly in tears ahead of his second interview for the personal profile piece he is working on. He is conscientious but lacks confidence, and the student he was assigned to interview was not being very forthcoming about her dancing. Seeing how upset he was, I walked over with him and began chatting her up myself, asking whether she would like to pursue a career as a dancer and if so, what sort? they both relaxed then, and he eagerly took over the interview as I stepped back.

I took the opportunity then to look over the class as they sat in pairs earnestly working to gather the information they needed to write this last assignment. The energy was subdued but unsettled. Which was hardly surprising for the Friday before Memorial day with just three more weeks of school left.

I circulated, nodding and offering encouragement or a brief follow-up question, focused more on holding everything together than anything else. At last, the bell rang, and they piled out in a jumble, off to their next classes.

I took a breath and prepared for the next group, already rumbling in the hallway outside my door. "C'mon in!" 

Life Lesson: In the middle of a hard rain, a slow boat, or a fast train, I am gonna keep my head on straight. I'm gonna keep my head on straight. Steady on! ~Shawn Colvin "Steady On"

Y is for Yesterday

As the students work their way through their own alphabiographies, I include a question they can come and answer each day once they have written. The reward for them is a Jolly Rancher, but the reward for me is the opportunity to have a brief personal conversation with each young writer. 

I usually try to make a connection between the question and the example title, so on the day that kids might be working on the letter U, the example was U is for Understand, and the question was  What is something that used to confuse you, but now you understand?

I was unprepared for their disarming honesty. Kids told me about being mystified by escalators, military time, their locker combinations, long division, and the rules of football, among other things. And to a one they were so proud of their new knowledge that I was perfectly charmed, and I wished I'd asked the question before.

Life Lesson: But that was yesterday, and yesterday's gone. ~Chad and Jeremy "Yesterday's Gone"

U is for Unquestionably

"Will you make angel food cake?" Heidi asked me this afternoon on her way out of school to meet her trainer.

Looking up from my computer I sighed, and with a trace of a scowl told her I would see what I could do. "It's not a quick thing," I said dismissively.

She nodded understandingly and waved. "No worries. See you at home."

We were talking about our dinner plans. Today is her dad's birthday, the first since we lost him in November. Our tradition is to remember our loved ones on their birthdays by celebrating with a meal they would have relished. We had already agreed on lasagna, but I hadn't even considered a dessert. Even so, I knew that angel food cake with strawberries and whipped cream was Gary's favorite.

As soon as she was gone I realized what a jerk I was being. Later at the grocery store, I looked for a cake in the bakery without luck. There was nothing in the freezer section, either. Finally, I hit upon the notion of a cake mix and rolling my cart down the aisle plucked the last box of angel food from the shelf.

"You really didn't have to do that," Heidi said graciously when she got home and saw the cupcakes cooling on the counter.

Oh, but I did. Happy Birthday, Gary.

Life Lesson: Someday, when I'm awfully low, when the world is cold, I will feel a glow just thinking of you" ~Bryan Ferry "The Way You Look Tonight"

N is for Not a Good Sign

I was reading the examiner's manual to my testing group this morning, a task I have completed countless times over the last 30+ years. As I started, I thought back to the first time I ever got to use my most official-sounding voice to read directions that I had heard dozens of times myself when I was a student. Today you will take a test... The words were a thrilling confirmation that I had made it to the other side of the big desk and was actually a teacher. 

What I wasn't aware of then was how onerous such tests can be for so many students. As a good test-taker myself, I was oblivious to the stamina and engagement it took for some to complete what I always enjoyed as a way to show off my aptitude and learning. It didn't take long for me to observe how unpleasant these sessions could be for some kids, but like so many in my profession, I considered them necessary, if disagreeable.

In the decades since, the powers that be, both local, state, and national have piled on more and more standardized tests and raised the stakes on them for students, teachers, and school districts. In 2023, testing was a 37-billion-dollar industry. We pay for the tests, we pay for the data, we pay for tests that predict the test results, we pay for programs that remediate predicted deficits.

In the same decades, my experience and observations have convinced me that there is an over-emphasis on these 'snap-shots" of temporal data. The exams don't really tell us much we don't already know. Still, in this data-driven world, mine is a minority opinion. (Although I am joined by many other student-facing professionals.)

And so this morning I stood in a room of 14 sixth-graders, all with test-taking challenges. Oh, they were as ready and willing as possible to sit still for 3 hours; they have been reared to this ritual since kindergarten. I read from my examiner's manual and watched as they logged in and tapped their way to the sample question screen, which gave them a simple passage and easy questions to practice using the test's functions. 

Scanning the room I saw that half of them had selected the wrong answer for the first two samples. I sighed and kept reading.

Life Lesson: Sign, sign, everywhere a sign, blockin' out the scenery, breakin' my mind. Do this, don't do that. Can't you read the sign? ~Five Man Electrical Band "Signs"

H is for Huh

"What do you like to do in your spare time?" a student who was interviewing me for the profile piece asked this afternoon.

I dove right in. "I garden and cook and read and walk my dog," I answered. "I also love hiking and pickleball and going to the movies. I used to bike a lot, but I need a new bike. In the summer I swim at my pool. Oh! And I like to do puzzles, too."

I sat back, confident that I had given him plenty of directions to go in.

He looked confused. "Huh," he said. "I would have thought you would say writing."

I laughed. "That too," I shrugged.

Life Lesson: Don't you, forget about me. Don't, don't, don't, don't don't you, forget about me. ~Simple Minds "Don't You Forget About Me"