No Excuses

Today I had a revelation. I finally figured out how to make my life story, and my grief relevant to my students. After a toilsome day of childish arguments, a folder fight, and a child pretending to choke himself I pretty much thought that I'd had enough today. 3/4s through my last block I got to what must've really been my limit: after I'd already sat on the floor under a table with a student (amusing picture to you all I am sure), dealt with tears because a student accused another student of a homosexual kissing session (6th graders have wild imaginations), argued with two angry girl students about how they need to do their work in class even if they're mad...well I just about exploded!

That is actually just what I did. I stood in my "angry spot" in the classroom, bugged my eyes out a little, and with my angry vein throbbing I tried to stare each student in the eye as I said this (said or screamed, it's however you imagine it):

"I am sick and tired of you all making excuses for not doing your work. Where do you think excuses are going to get you in life?" (student response is a mumble that sounds to me like a combination of nowhere and jail...yikes!)

"Do you think that I got to be a teacher by making excuses my whole life?" (blank stares, wide eyes, I had their attention!)

"Now I am going to tell you a little bit about myself, I don't mean to be emotional, but I think that this is very important so listen up! I did not have an easy childhood growing up. I had to take on a lot of responsibility for my younger siblings, and I had to take care of my mother. Do you think that I went to school and made excuses about this? Do you think that I got into one of the best colleges in the country by making excuses?" (The students sat up, looked at me, I had struck a nerve)

"Now that I've shared this I want you to think about me as a person, because although I am a teacher I am also a person and I expect to be treated that way. Do you remember learning that someone in my family passed away a few weeks ago? (nods) Well, do I come into school everyday and tell you I can't teach because of this? No, I do not. So stop coming in here and thinking of every excuse you can in order to get out of doing work, because I am over it, and I am not accepting any excuses anymore, because it's not doing you any good."

Although, I would usually never share one of these lectures to my students on my blog, I felt that this one was very important. Through this little outburst I learned how to inspire my students through my grief and positively influence them despite this.

Tomorrow we are going to begin our NO EXCUSES campaign. In every block I am going to give a similar lecture as today and then I am going to have students write down all of the excuses they have ever made on slips of paper. We are going to display these excuses, and say goodbye to them forever. I am going to share short bios of leaders who did not let excuses stand in their way, and then I am going to let the students share their own stories and how they are not going to let excuses stand in their way. This will be an ongoing campaign for the rest of the year. Please feel free to send any ideas or resources that you have my way!

Namaste

Today in yoga the teacher said that Namaste means "the light in me to the light in you." This may not be the exact meaning but the idea is that you are bowing to the people around you and their inner light, or souls. A few days ago, my friend Hannah reminded me of a pre meal grace that I made up in elementary school, "There is a light in you, there is a light in me, there is a light in everybody." Hannah is using this quote to drive her personal essays to law school, to say the least I am flattered, but Hannah and I both know that this grace is about more than the words themselves. Just as in yoga, when we say "namaste" at the end of class we know that it is more then just celebrating our souls together. In both of these sayings, the essential element is that there is a community of people who celebrate each other, these sayings are just a way to remind us to say it verbally.

As a teacher, I think about community a lot. I remember back to my experience at institute, where my friend Lexy and I created the "Master Learners Kitchen" in order to create a community of learners for our students in the Mississippi Delta. I now work daily to build a sense of community for my students. I went to observe in my old 6th grade classrooms last week, and thought about the community there, the constant celebration of students as individuals. In college I had multiple communities that helped me develop as an individual, and I have a community of friends who do the same for me today.

I studied the sociology of education in school, and thought a lot about the communities that are developed in public schools. In every paper I wrote, or research project that I did my thesis always seemed to come back to the importance of a school's culture in transforming a school. I work in a school that is in the process of transformation. We focus heavily on assessment, management, professional development, etc., but we rarely talk about community. We rarely stop and metaphorically say "namaste" to each other. Teachers, children, administrators, counselors, secretaries, etc. are rarely celebrated for the light inside of each of them. When I began Teach For America I was set on making a difference and I think through yoga and my Quaker values I've found the way that I personally can transform my school. I am going to say "namaste" to my children hourly, to other teachers daily, and to my administrators at least once a week. I hope through modeling this behavior I can influence others to do the same.

So I will start with all of you, my friends, family, and coworkers who read my blog, "Namaste!"

Faces of My Students

I officially miss all of my students. After a pretty challenging year I was not sure that this was going to happen, but it hit me over a week ago and I can't quite shake the excitement to see them again and to meet my new students. Over the course of the summer I have gotten texts from a few students, 1 prank phone call, tutored a student, and even ran into one of my students in person. Today I found a note in a pair of pants (that apparently need to be dry cleaned) that said, "Ms. S my favorite teacher "

I knew that teaching was an important step in my career as I fight relentlessly to close the achievement gap, but it was not until this summer that I realized the meaning that it would have for me. As I observe people who work at the district level it seems that each one of them has a story about their past students that informs their daily decision making. I got to experience this first hand as I sat at a luncheon for the Freedom Schools two weeks ago. The summer school students were all at this lunch with tons of big donors and other influential people in the district and halfway through the event the students broke out into this great song

http://youtu.be/cyVzjoj96vs

Aside from the song being moving, especially when sung by disadvantaged students of all ages, I could not help but see my students' faces in the faces of the students before me. My eyes welled up with tears as I watched one student who looked so much like a student of mine from the MS Delta, and then looked over to another student who was a younger version of one of my most challenging students this year. I tried really hard not to embarrass myself in front of all of the influential people (or the students), holding back tears with all of my might. Since this happened it's happened in almost every meeting, interview, or conversation that I get to be a part of. I can't help but put a face to everything that I am doing this summer and it all becomes so much more relevant.

Student advocacy has been a big topic in the news lately, or it is "trending" right now. In this article in the NYtimes the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is referenced multiple times as supporting grass-roots advocacy groups and even providing grants to encourage advocacy. I keep finding myself talking about advocacy after reading this article and thinking about how much it would help our school system if we just picked a few students (in my case many more than a few) to advocate for. I feel that if we focus on advocacy and the power that people have, a powerful movement will begin. So get the ball rolling, think of your children/favorite student/cousin/neighbor and start to advocate for him/her/them for a better education, and if they don't need an advocate then I have many students that do, so call me up and I will share a story.

What Are You Thankful For?

Sometimes I must take a few steps back before I realize what is in front of me.

When you teach it is easy to get caught up in the daily labors of teaching. Over the past few days I have had the opportunity to visit friends in New York City, and friends and family in Philadelphia. As I reconnect with people who I have not seen in a long time, the teacher stories start to flow out. I am thankful for the people who listen to these stories, and the people who read my blog, write me emails, send me texts, call me weekly and help me stay sane in the midst of the daily insanity that is teaching.

As I take a few steps back from my life as a teacher my spirit to help close the achievement gap on the path to ending educational inequity is reignited. I also realize that in some ways I have made great gains with my students. We are reading our second novel now (Lois Lowry's The Giver) and I think 85% of the kids are actually enjoying it! My students responded to a very complicated discussion question on our class wiki about the importance of diversity last week, and this week they made connections between the movie The Truman Show and our book. Amidst all of these fun activities we are achieving mastery of our objectives for the year.

Before I left Charlotte for the holidays someone advised me to "remember to tell some good stories," and after a chaotic week at school I was not exactly clear on what those were, but after a few steps back it is clear that the good definitely outweigh the bad.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone, and thank you to my friends and family!

On Silence

TFA tells us that October and November is a time of deep hardship for a first year teacher. There is data that says on the continuum of stress for a first year teacher this is the pinnacle of that stress. I admittedly tried very hard to resist this, but I must admit they are right. Since my last post I have worked harder than I ever did before, and I am still working to keep my student's spirits alive.

In order to find some solace this weekend I decided to go back to my roots and attend Quaker meeting in Charlotte. In Quaker meeting silence is very important. As I was sitting in meeting I was reflecting on being silent, and the peace I felt when the only things that I could hear were small movements in the room. I realized that as a teacher I place a high value on silence as well. When I am able to finally get all eyes in my classroom back on me, and mouths shut I feel like I just completed a marathon. So on Sunday I thought to myself, why is this so important to me in class. I can completely justify its importance in my religious life, but in class it's really just about control.

I decided this week to let go of some of this control. We are working in literature cirlces this week and rotating through working on the computers to respond on a wiki site. This means that students are leading each other through reading comprehension, and using their own opinions to talk to me online. We started on Friday and it has been anything but silent in my classroom since then. I think that despite my loss of peaceful silence my students are learning. It is really exciting to see them using the wiki (I am using edmodo.com), and most of the students are doing an excellent job working together to read.

Although October and November are proving to be challenging (just like TFA said they would be) I am learning to find moments in my classroom even when it's noisy that bring me the same joy as sitting in a meeting house in silence. It is my goal to be better about posting, so I should be back to at least once a week very soon!

If you are a mentor, I am sorry that the emails have been infrequent; my students have been busy starting the new book and have not had a lot of computer time. Please look out for some more emails coming really soon. If you never got an email your student is probably struggling with their email so please contact me and I will make sure they send you an email this week.