Teacher Appreciation In The Schools

My wife teaches pre-K in a poor area. The kids come from different kinds of families including those who don't speak much English. It's challenging work. She's a natural at it, which is to say that she has been doing it so well and thoughtfully for so long that she makes it look natural, almost effortless.

On Teacher Appreciation Day some kids and families brought her gifts. Our country doesn't value children so my wife's salary is crap and she has no benefits, but kids and parents know a good teacher when they see her and bring gifts when occasions come along. It was all very nice and my wife was very appreciative.

The next day she came home with one more gift bag. Inside I saw an unopened box of Wegmans cereal. Honey? I asked, pointing to the bag, expecting a ridiculous story. Instead, I learned of grace and wonder.

One child, seeing other kids presenting my wife with gifts, was horrified not to have anything to give. She must have said as much to her family. Remember that we're talking about a four-year-old who doesn't speak much English and lives in poverty. Picture her making a fuss about how she's just got to have something to give teacher. The parent has a gift bag but no present. The parent or kid sees an unopened box of cereal and this seems right to one or both of them. Into the bag it goes and the kid comes to school thrilled to present my wife with a gift.

My wife accepts the gift bag without looking into it, gives the kid a big hug and thank you, her face the very picture of gratitude and love. I know that face and look, having had the good fortune of all that turned on me from time to time, so I know that kid felt like she was the hub of the universe, deserving all the love my wife showed her. I like sitting here imagining that moment of wonder and grace that is made all the more poignant with a four-year-old desperate to give something to her teacher.

I mean, come on. This is beautiful stuff.

Later, my wife sees the box of cereal. For just a moment her face forms a question mark, but then she realizes the significance of this gift, the beauty of it, and knows that she has been presented with something special, maybe something spectacular. This is what she does: she sees the wonder in these things though she doubts the wonder of herself that brings on such acts of kindness.

I filled a bowl with that cereal this morning. I poured milk over it and maybe a tear or two that I was blinking away because of the image of that little kid, her need to give, and the woman who glowed receiving it. God I'm in love with this world and especially in love with that woman.

Danger In The Schools

At my current school we work with at-risk kids who are unpredictable from time to time. They have their outbursts. We deal with those. That's what we've trained for, what our experience has prepared us to handle. We recognize and defuse most situations before kids explode. We are aware of the kids in our classrooms.

One kid I'll call Frank is crazy. Really. He's not right in his mind, needs serious help, and is predictably unpredictable. It's a matter of time before he hurts someone. We've said since he started with us that Frank is beyond our abilities and a danger in the school.

We've let people know. There's a strictly enforced chain of command. We tell our immediate supervisor and then wait. We don't expect much to happen. We know the kid is dangerous, but no one seems to much care.

Today Frank went off. I was down the hall when I heard furniture tumble. The desks here are heavy. When one goes flying, it resounds through the building. When two or three fly, I get down the hall fast to see if I can help.

I met Frank on his way out of the room. Behind him I heard shouting and maybe crying. He began to make his way up the hall, but I turned him around suggesting he'd be better outside where he can't do any real harm to anyone but maybe himself. He kicked the doors open hard enough I thought one broke, then punched the mailbox outside the door. I stood so he was encouraged to walk to the right away from school. Our parking lot is to the left and I wanted him far from our cars. I drove Dad's '72 Chevy pickup to work. No way is Frank messing with that.

Frank walked away. I let him. The last thing we want is him back in the building. I wasn't worried about him out in the tame village in which our school resides. He could walk and blow off steam. If he wandered too far, the police, who work well with our kids, would help him find his way.

Watching him walk, I wondered if Frank would be back in class tomorrow. Probably not. I figured he'd get a day or two suspension. But he won't be removed from our program. I couldn't have said that for sure then because I can't see into the future, but I can damn sure see into the past, rememberoing how this has gone almost every other time.

The teacher in that room is a tiny woman long past retirement age. In that class of ten kids there are four different grade levels, at least four different subjects, and ten different sets of challenges and baggage. It's more than any teacher can manage and still effect real learning. We do the best we can. We work hard. But we're up against it. Then add in an unstable, dangerous kid. I mean, come on.

Frank is a symptom of a systemic problem in the organization's culture. I got Frank out the door and we worked to restore order and calm. We talked with the kids. We closed the blinds so Frank wouldn't put on a show from outside. There's little we can do for or about Frank. There's even less we can do about the broken system in which we try to work.

There are a lot of reasons I'm leaving this school. Danger is just one of them. It's a big one, but remember, it's just a symptom of the real problem, the one driving a lot of us out of the classroom. It's enough to make us all want to flip the furniture, punch the doors, and go a little crazy. That or just quit.

Two Books

My project isn't unusual. It's to figure myself out, to find out who I am and who I might become, to plot a path into some future. You know, the usual. One way I do all this is to read books.

Last week, on the advice of someone I respect, I began reading This Is Marketing by Seth Godin, a guy I've not read before but about whom I was vaguely suspicious. He seemed a guru with too many slick answers, but I was willing to give him a shot.

I tried to see what the book had to teach me, but I've taken the bookmark from between pages eighty-six and eighty-seven and placed it into a new book, Handmade: Creative Focus In The Age Of Distraction by Gary Rogowski. Though the bookmark is only between pages twelve and thirteen I feel better already. Rogowski talks of sawdust, Robert M. Pirsig, learning, and hiking. It's as though I can touch each thing to which he is referring.

In eighty-six pages, Seth Godin gave me two things to touch. Two. I kept waiting for more than platitudes. Maybe I'm just not familiar enough with marketing to get the book. Then again, I'm not much of a woodworker and Rogowski already has me in his hands. He keeps talking plainly and telling stories. He doesn't seem all that concerned about persuading me. He's convinced and that's enough.

I wanted to learn from Godin and maybe I have. Moving the bookmark from his to Rogowski's book tells me a lot. I'm not sure just yet what all of that might be, but I'm getting a strong, strong feeling that might just be some kind of understanding.

Them's The Breaks

I haven't posted in a couple days. Things got busy and I've wondered about other kinds of writing I want to do. Posting daily takes work — though I don't want to oversell it since I can gin up a post in half an hour — and there are times it leaves me without the energy to write something longer. And then there are the streaks and the break.

Streaks sometimes work. They keep me going when I want to quit. A long streak gets me over my inertia.

But streaks can get in my way and become more important than the thing I'm really trying to do. That was how daily blogging had begun to feel. I was churning out mediocre posts that weren't making me happy and got in the way of other writing. I took a break so I might come back with a better idea of how to proceed.

I've kept my Morning Pages streak. People confuse the blog with those. There are posts that come from the morning's pages, but not often. Morning Pages are less about writing than about daily practice like meditation or prayer. I find balance through them. Without them the last five years of my job would have been unbearable. Morning Pages teach me who I am. That streak is easy to maintain. Every time I consider breaking it, I reconsider and keep going. The daily-ness feels necessary and good. It doesn't get in the way.

I'll try to keep publishing a newsletter each week. It's a great way to keep up with people, understand audience, and have fun.

Here are my guiding questions for streaks:

• Is it making me happy?
• Is it making me a better person?
• Is it making me a better writer?
• Would a break improve things?

It has been a good break. I'm back today, happy, better, and ready to see what happens next.

Those questions are a good guide to most anything. Go figure.