Making a Difference

As most of my Saturdays are now, I spent this last Saturday at a wrestling tournament (that eventually landed me spending my Saturday night in the ER…long story).  As with me most of the time, I was running (as I like to call it) “right on time”. The rest of my home likes to be early….I like to be right on time….not late, but not early.  We arrived just in time for Rosebro2’s first match.  I thought it was strange at the wrestling table, but as I was taking my seat, the whistle blew and the referee was holding up Rosebro2’s arm in victory. I had no clue what had happened until my hubby explained that Rosebro2 won through forfeit. The other team didn’t have someone for Rosebro2 to wrestle.  Because wrestlers do not eat prior to weigh in, Rosebro2 came over to us after his victory and asked for his lunch.  He was discussing his next match when he said, “I guess wrestling has taught me something.” Intrigued that he would like to learn outside of school, I listened intently as he said, “Sometimes in life, you win just by showing up!”

It is so very hard to believe that 1/2 of the school year is now complete.  As each year passes of my career in education, I’m reminded how short the time is that I’ve been given to make a difference in this world.  It is the last thing I think about before I go to bed and next to where’s the coffee, it is the first thing I think about when I wake up.  What can I do to make a positive difference in my world?  I often know that I am doing that by raising two incredible young men who have a spirit of giving and a rich understanding that life is about who and what you are on the inside that really matters. But aside from those two, I often struggle with the answer of “am I doing enough to make a difference?” I was sharing this the other day with a friend who reminded me in her ever so eloquent manner that I do one thing every day that makes a difference.  I show up.  As Rosebro2 put it, “Sometimes in life, you win just by showing up!”

The way we gauge success can be shown in showing up.  When you show up, generous, confident, and engaged in what you are doing, amazing things happen.  Now, this is where I’ll get religious, but I believe that when we show up with a generous heart, a confident, kind spirit, and with an engaged mind, God does the rest.  So this Christmas break, I urge you to show up for those you love and rest your weary soul so you will be ready to show up January 8th for an incredible second half of this school year.

Have a wonderful holiday. May you be filled with joy, peace, and fulfillment. 

My New Saturdays.....

My brother was an All-State Wrestler 20 years ago.  Because I was living in Spartanburg at the time, I only attended a few of his matches. I remember being impressed with my brother’s efforts and wins, but recall very little else. In November, Rosebro2 decided that he was going to take up a new sport. Inspired by a former JBE student and SHS football standout, he learned that wrestling would increase his strength and endurance for football.  His first match was last week on one of our work late days so I missed his first match. He detailed it to me, but it didn’t prepare me for Saturday’s tournament.

On Saturday, he had his first wrestling tournament. My husband, through his work as a trainer, has attended MANY wrestling tournaments and told me to come prepared with a seat cushion, a fully charged phone, a book to ready, and work to do. So I headed to Broome High School Saturday with a bag full of books, and paper work- forgetting the seat cushion (big mistake).  The first thing I learned was that there was no need to bring anything with me. How anyone could read or work in that environment was beyond me. Three wrestling matches were going on at one time on three different mats. The entire time those three matches were going on, the next wrestlers to meet each other were being called on the PA system to be in a “holding” area. The other wrestlers surrounded the mats encouraging their teammates. Coaches, only 2 per team, ran around with backpacks on and clipboards, trying to assist each of their players. Parents would be watching their phones (there were many great football games on Saturday) and suddenly would come out of their seats as their child's wrestling match would begin. While sitting in a gym for 6 hours was very difficult for me (partly due to my attention issues, but partly due to me forgetting a seat cushion), I found this whole process fascinating….and just on a side note-so VERY stressful as a mom. During football, there are 22 players on the field. Finding Rosebro2 is somewhat hard for me. I leave it to my hubby and Rosebro1 to let me know if Rosebro2 is doing his job and doing it well. That isn’t the case in wrestling. In wrestling, there is Rosebro2 and one other wrestler on a mat doing what I normally would be yelling at the Rosebros to stop doing in the middle of the living room.

As I was watching this tournament unfold Saturday, I was fascinated with so many aspects. It was amazing to see the culture of the wrestling teams. The different teams (I think maybe there were 8 different schools represented) stayed huddled together all day while occasionally creeping into the stands for encouragement from their families. They would cheer on their teammates either from the side of the mat or while in the stands. In later rounds, teammates even faced each other during a match and I watched as the other wrestlers encouraged each wrestler and congratulated the winner and consoled the defeated. Rosebro2’s team has two coaches and they could not attend each match. I was amazed when the coach was not attending to a match, the other players were right there acting as pseudo coaches. Additionally, I watched the coaches carefully at each match they were coaching and what was amazing was the way they guided the wrestlers- most who have not wrestled before- through each match. They yelled (only because that is the ONLY way to communicate at these events) suggestions and encouraged the wrestlers throughout the match. Then after every match, they pulled the wrestler and told them what they did right and what they did wrong. Rosebro2 did very well for his first tournament. He went 3-1 for the tournament, pinning two guys, winning one on points, and being pinned once (I later learned this happened because of a single wrong move).

The entire time I watched this, I thought about our classrooms. Because our classrooms are full of students with a variety of levels, we small group almost everything we do in ELA and Math. We have to-we’ve learned that the one size fits all mode of teaching doesn’t work at moving all students. We must know which students need us the most. We must teach our students how to use their strengths-but we should know what they are first. We also must ensure our students know what to do when we are not around. To successfully run a classroom with small group instruction, students must be taught what to do when the teacher isn’t around and this doesn’t mean just behave well. This means giving their best and working hard no matter the tasks. This takes time. This takes A LOT of work on the part of the teacher. You cannot teach the students each day what to do. The teacher must create the relationship with the students so that they know what is happening is so very valuable to the teacher and them. The materials must be ready, the lessons must be preplanned, and the work to be completed by the students without the guidance of the teacher must be challenging, attainable, worthy. Additionally, the classroom must have a culture like that of the wrestling team-where they all encourage each other. The teacher must also watch the students carefully through their work and give them tips along the way, but also know what they are doing right and what they are doing wrong so you can encourage and correct for the next time.

None of this is easy. It sounds so simple. Being prepared for small group instruction often means we are at school well past our required 3:15. Understanding student strengths and weaknesses means we must study pedagogical approaches to reading and math instruction. We must spend so much time during our classroom instruction listening, watching students, and instructing that we are forced to spend time afterwards finding the correct levels of reading, looking for methods of helping students reach high levels of math conceptual understanding. We spend time building culture. We spend time collaborating with others-sharing in deep detail not just what we are doing buy why AND listening and learning to what others are doing and adjusting our instruction because of it all. We can do NONE of this if we do not know our students. If we do not know what they know, what they don’t know, what they can do, what they can’t do, we can never move them forward.

Also, and maybe most importantly, we cannot help students if we do not understand the process. As I watched the coaches and players give advice during matches, I realized that I had no idea what to “yell” in support. In football, I can yell, “block”, “run”, “throw the flag”, etc. but Saturday I had not a clue what Rosebro2 (or any other wrestler needed to do), but the coaches and players knew. I don’t yet understand the sport. I say yet, because I will. I sat with my hubby and another Dad who wrestled in college. They began teaching me what everything meant and what the wrestlers needed to do to win. I watched the coaches (the masters in the craft), as they gave suggestions and demonstrated, I watched the brackets carefully and started paying careful attention to those wrestlers who kept moving on in the winner’s bracket. I am sure I will start researching it soon as well (I just know myself too well). We cannot expect to teach students to learn to read, learn to comprehend, write meaningfully, compute math, or solve word problems if we do not understand the process. If you are not in constant study about the reading process or the math process, trying to understand how this process is acquired, then you can never expect your students to learn because you show up each day.

I’m off to the Walmart….if I am going to survive this wrestling season, I must invest in a good seat cushion……

Thanksgiving

Last week I had to run to the hospital to check on a church friend who had a minor surgery that turned into a major surgery and a week stay in the hospital.  I was rushing to the hospital via Drayton and maybe it was the fact that I hate hospitals or that I have a teenage driver son, but I couldn’t help watching how very fast drivers were going on this road that has an actual 35MPH speed limit. As I neared Pine Street where I would be turning right, I made sure I was in that lane-like a good driver should. And as you would have it, the closer we got to the stop light where many turn right, cars sped past me on the left looking to merge right at the last possible moment. Normally, this type of behavior annoys me senselessly. It is my sense of fairness that usually annoys me. I often feel that these cars should wait in line like I have rather than trying to wreck our cars by sticking their nose in front of me in order to get over.  Yet, on this day, I allowed two cars to merge right who were stuck by drivers not allowing them space to merge. Did it cost me anything? No. Did it bother me at all? No, not on this day. Yet, it seemed that this was annoying to others around me.

This stuck with me all week. So, as I rambled around Spartanburg, I looked for ways to do something that others needed. It was small at first. I would hold a door open for someone, I paid for the person behind me in line for coffee, and I allowed someone else the closer parking space.  Several opportunities came up for me to do some other random acts of kindness at school as well.  The more I did this, the better I felt, yet a strange thing happened as well. It was a BAD week last week- I mean really bad. I felt like every time I picked up my phone, checked my email, or invited someone into my office, I was knocked down. In some weeks, this would make me sad, angry, depressed or both, but what I found was the more I did that was kind, while I hated all the other things that were happening it was amazing how all the kindness started to subject the sting of all the bad things happening.

With Thanksgiving upon us, I started thinking about all the things that I was thankful for and my mind began wondering to all of those things that bring me sadness. I am saddened by the number of students we still have who are below grade level in reading-no matter how much work we do in RTI and in small group instruction. I am saddened that our bookbag blessings weekend program is struggling to meet the demands of our most needy students since the number has grown. I am saddened by the stories of broken homes, difficult life circumstances, and terrible situations detailed by some of our students. I am saddened at the immense grief of hurting staff members due to loss, brokenness, financial hardships, sickness, and so many other things. I am saddened by a situation with one of my own sons and the grief he is feeling. But you know what, I realize that even with all that sadness, I have so much in this world to be grateful for and what I can do is give. I can give a smile. I can give a hug. I can give a kind word. I can give a parking place up or delay my trip to allow someone to get in front of me. I can do so much. And I realize that I get so much in return.

It is hard to ask a group of educators to give even more than they already do. We give more than our share of a 40 hour work week. We give our planning periods up in order to grow as professionals, we give up eating lunch to sit and talk with students, we give up our family time to talk with parents, we give and give and give. But I ask you to spend some time this week, to find some ways to give-without costs- to others. 

And it is my prayer that you and yours have a wonderful Thanksgiving-how ironic that it has the word giving in it……

Is your teaching a hobby?

Post-doctoral life is pretty sweet. I have more time every evening and every weekend. I don’t have a looming deadline or a wonderful dissertation chair demanding a revision. Yet, this goal oriented individual struggles with this as well. So last year I decided to take up a hobby. I can honestly say that I really don’t remember having hobbies before. Again, I think it is my personality. I am all in person-I do not do things for recreation-unless you count going to Disney World. I do many things for fun- I love to sing in the choir, I love movies, I love attending sporting events, and I love working in the yard. When I was younger I played the piano and was a cheerleader. Fun was retreating to my room to read. So the idea of a hobby was a bit overwhelming, but the Rosebros decided I needed a little less family time i.e. they got tired of being my hobby. With their blessings, I decided to take a course on making stained glass.

Boy was this harder than I had expected-which was frustrating. I don’t really like to struggle-for fun. Having the correct materials-nippers is a real word by the way, the right oils, the right glass, the correct grain, grinding the class, placing  joints together (and no, these joints did not make me want Cheetos), using copper foil…the list goes on and on. The struggle was real and I would often find myself walking away from my work because it got too hard or I didn’t know what to do. I would stay away for a couple of days when I just didn’t want to look at it again.  I eventually learned enough to make some very simplistic pieces that didn’t turn heads but would have made my Mom proud and with time I got to the point where I could make stained class pieces that were not terrible. I would never, ever give my pieces away. I will never win any contest with my pieces. In fact most days I would not even share what I’ve made. This became my hobby. It took up a lot of time when my hubby was at work and the Rosebros were with friends or playing the Xbox (they are only allowed the Xbox on the weekends). It kept me busy. It gave me some purpose in having something to do from start to finish. I was proud even though I knew my work wasn’t ideal or the best. But I am not passionate about it. I don’t spend hours looking at stained glass. I don’t admire good stained glass when I see it. I don’t search out stained glass groups- is that even such a thing?).

I made a lampshade recently that I almost liked. I was looking for the perfect lamp to place this tiny lampshade on and as I was looking-for hours- for the perfect lamp, I sort of had a revelation about my “hobby.” All too often some educators treat this work as a hobby-this is both a good thing and a bad thing.

Some educators use teaching as a hobby and it is not such a good thing. It is something to do even if they struggle, even if it is difficult, even if they read about it, learn about it, ask questions about it, but it is just something to do. The attitude is one of hobby-they enjoy it-most of the time-and when they don’t they take a “mental health day” (a term that sends shivers down my spine). It is not a calling or a passion that they strive to get better at because the students depend on them. A hobby is also something that is easily replaced with more important work like a check list of items to teach or worksheets to complete. A hobby can be fun and fulfilling but not meant to give you purpose. It is meant to distract you from the hard stuff of life.

Some educators use teaching as a hobby and it is a great thing. These educators don’t use the same lesson plans each year because they know that real growth comes from understanding what their students need. They learn as much as they can but they also know they can only apply that knowledge a little at a time in order to improve. They live to “do” their hobby. They know where their weaknesses are and they search experts to help them improve in those areas. And they do improve.

So is teaching your hobby? If so-is it a good thing or a bad thing?

Election Day

I have loved politics since our family friend, Carroll Campbell, ran and won the office of Governor of SC in the 1980s.  I enjoy following the political races and the platforms that each candidate uses as the basis of their campaigns. As a youngster, I had a strong belief in how politicians could use their power for lasting positive change. While I may have become a little more cynical about it all over the years, I am no less fascinated or interested in the political process. I have no desire to ever run for office or hold political office (sometimes my current position is political enough), but I think, ultimately, I still hold on to the deep seeded belief that our democracy and its foundational theory can and will make positive changes for our community, our state, and our nation.  With all that said, I attended an event last week for our mayoral race that will be decided tomorrow. This pseudo- debate/forum was uneventful so my mind wandered throughout the night about our schools.  The candidates repeatedly discussed “one Spartanburg”- a tagline that we are familiar with this year. I started thinking about the fact that one person matters-something we talk about in our vision each year. And should not each person in our classroom matter?  Then the candidates started talking about the power of their positions.  Then I got to thinking about what our schools and staff would be like if we had to run for office.

What would be your platform if you had to “run” for your position? As a younger adult, I voted based on my family’s political views, then I started changing based on what each candidate could do for me or how they felt about each issue. My voting can, at times, seem very diverse as I rarely, if ever, voted for one party’s ticket. I tend to look at candidates that are most like me, candidates that motivate me, provide for action, and bring us together. Isn’t that what we want in our classrooms? 

Don’t we want teachers who will motivate students? Teachers motivate by being excited about their teaching. Nothing excites me more than a teacher who shares a book with students as if she has never read the book.  Teachers who fill their classrooms with engaging activities because they know their students’ needs are motivating to students. Motivating students means coming in a few minutes early to give an extra push or staying late to help a student who is just not getting a key concept. Motivating is taking the time to really respond to each piece of work that a student does so that student understands the important value they have in your eyes. Making a student feel included and making a student understand their place in the classroom motivates a student.

Teachers who empower students to take action are teachers I would vote for in an election. Teacher empower students by giving students choices. I found in my classroom when I allowed students to have choice, they produced far greater products than when I put my demands on them for assessments or assignments. Empowering students to take action is done through helping students reflect. Engaging in reflection is done as part of “messing up” or making an unfortunate decision, but do we engage students in reflection for other parts of their day. Reflection helps students make sense of learning. Empowering students also comes from giving students a voice-do you ask for their opinions? Do you listen to their feedback?

And finally, bringing folks together is a quality in candidates that I look for-political and teaching candidates as well. Some of the best teachers I have ever worked with made each of their classrooms sanctuaries. They made them places that I wanted to sit in and stay for a long while. What these teachers understood was that the most important part of a classroom was managing relationships. How many of you stand at your door when the bell rings and shake each student’s hand or greet them all by name or a smile or a secret handshake or a pat on the back? How many of you look for ways to praise students all day long? How do you spend time with each student getting to know them?

So if “elections” were held tomorrow for teachers, would you be elected?

Chasing Greatness

Yesterday afternoon, I ran into a teacher that I once worked with at another school. She has long since retired, but we have kept up with one another here and there. She started asking about things at school and I explained about the Read to Succeed law and RTI and PLC. She asked me if I had to go to those things now that I was principal. I was somewhat taken aback by her question. The first reason is surprised me is I hate the phrase “have to”. I love looking at life with the lens of “I get to”.   I don’t have to go to PLC or RTI meetings. I get to go to PLC and RTI. I get to learn right along with our teachers about best practice. I get to listen to the real struggles of helping students learn to read and how to provide small group instruction. I don’t have to go to every RTI meeting, but I want to be there listening to the struggles of our students. I want to hear the problems that some our students and quite frankly teachers are having and help discover ways I can help or listen to ways that others suggest to help the student through his/her struggles. 

The second reason that I was surprised by the question is that I WANT to go to RTI, PLC, IB training, Faculty meetings, and grade level meetings. I want to learn. It took me a while to understand when or how this desire to learn washed over me like a deep Atlantic wave. It certainly wasn’t as an elementary student. I have vivid memories of vomiting out of the back window of my Mom’s Ford Esquire station wagon on the way to school each day. I hated elementary school-partly because I was dyslexic and I could not read and partly because I had some teachers who would, well, let’s just say they would not be “highly qualified.” Once my dyslexia was discovered and my parents got me tons of help, and learning got easier, I didn’t exactly chase after learning either. Teenage stuff (which I will not go into since my teenage boys occasionally read this blog) was far more important than loving learning. While I did well in high school, I didn’t love learning although I did develop a love of reading in high school. My thirst of knowledge in my undergrad degree was more about maintaining grades for my scholarship and trying to get done so I could start my career. It wasn’t really about learning for the love of learning.

Then I started teaching. At first I was learning for survival. Teaching is no joke. It was hard and while my undergrad degree had me really, really prepared, I was so clueless. I learned from every teacher who would give me 5 minutes. I learned from my principal and my assistant principal and our curriculum coordinator. Then I started taking classes for my 1^st masters. I was in love with learning. I started SCRI (SC Reading Initiative) and I could not get enough.  Some 20 years later, I just can’t get enough of learning. I really had resounded that I was just a huge nerd, but I realized while talking with this former teacher yesterday that I love learning, not because I am a huge nerd, but because I want to be great.

My work in our schools is a huge part of my life- while I do manage to have a great family and a few friends- my work is a large part of my life. I want to be satisfied with my life. The only way to truly find satisfaction is to do what is GREAT. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. Do I love being an educator every minute? I don’t have to even pause to answer no to that question. I absolutely don’t love it every single second, but I love something about it every single day. And I will not settle until I am GREAT at what I do. I want to be great not because I want recognition or awards, I want to be great because our kids deserve me to be great.

So I chase greatness. How do I do that? I learn. I never stop learning. My husband says I am the only person who will argue with a book while reading. Most people read books to fall asleep. I start reading a book at night and find myself at 3am finishing it….I read blogs. I listen to others. I just can’t get enough. I will never be satisfied until I am done searching for greatness-which I feel will never be attainable.  IT is my greatest desire to work in a building with others who all feel the same way. Are you chasing greatness?