An Education

When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years. ~Mark Twain

A few weeks ago I ran into a former colleague who had retired back in 2010. Eleanor was the team leader of the sixth-grade interdisciplinary team I was assigned to when I first started teaching; she was social studies, I was English, Cheri was science, and Wes, another new teacher like me, was math. Eleanor was a veteran of the classroom, and she was gracious and supportive of the two newbies she was charged with leading, but she was older than we were, and we found some of her ideas old-fashioned and rigid. For the most part, though, we all worked together well. 

Although Wes left the team first to teach social studies on another sixth-grade team and then to teach at a DOD school in Iceland, Eleanor and I remained teammates until 2000, when I expressed an interest in taking on the leadership role. Initially very supportive, she ended up leaving the team to take another position in our building. To be honest, it was probably easier to be the team leader outside of her shadow, and it was a job I kept for 20 years, perhaps pissing off my own fair share of new teachers along the way.

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.