Speaking to the Future

I am a teacher diguised as a school librarian for a year.  I really miss having my own class, but at the same time, it gives me a chance to see how other teachers interact with their children.  And boy is it eye-opening!

I see teachers who are speak to their students with the respect that they expect to see in return.  These children come into the library and are gentle to each other and their environment.  They feel valued and cared for.

But sadly I had a teacher with her class today who made me wonder how we were ever going to teach our future generation about kindness and respect to each other.  The teacher (who is actually quite a nice person to the adults in the school), said to the little boy, who had pushed in line one too many times.

“You really are a nasty, nasty child!  How dare you treat people like that!”

Urm, excuse me.  Children NEVER start out in the world to be nasty.  You are never going to teach a thing if you respond to a child like that. Doesn’t matter if you have the best lesson plans, the most innovative Smart Board resources or a wall full of excellent student writing, the thing the child will remember about you in years to come is the way you spoke to him.  You gave him a label and labels take years to erase and even then, there will still be a trace.  Worse than that, if you say something for long enough, it starts to become true.  I am sure there is a more gentle and effective way of speaking to the child.  I am not saying any less assertive, because he did infringe on the personal space of other children, just a kinder way.

Anyway, the child did stop pushing in line, but at what cost?  Words imprint themselves in our brains and most importantly our hearts.  I want the future generation to learn about kindness first.  I want them to know that our feelings are worth the same, if not more than how to read and write and multiply.  If we value our future and want it to be a peaceful one, maybe we should think about the words we are using to raise it.

Starfish and Teachers…..

Hello friends and readers,

Welcome to my new space…where I will be writing about the thing that I am most passionate about in the world.  Education.  It was my first love, before I met my husband or my daughter!  And now after a short break, we are back together again and I am so happy.

So here is a story for you….  I have changed it up a little bit, but the idea is the same.

One day a girl was walking along a beach.  The tide had washed up hundreds of starfish onto the beach.  Every so often the girl would pick up a starfish and throw it back into the ocean.  She had been doing this all day.  

A man who was also walking on the beach called out to her, “Hundreds of those things get washed up everyday.  It would take ages to throw them all back in.  Even if you did manage to get them all back in the ocean, another hundred of them would get washed up the next day.  It doesn’t make a difference at all, throwing them back in one by one like that!”

The girl replied, “Oh, I know it won’t make a difference to them all, but it makes a difference to this particular one,” and with that, she threw another starfish back in the ocean.  

And that is the story that I live my teacher life by.  On those days when paperwork and level descriptors and staff meetings filled with complainers get the best of me, I try to remember that I am in this for the little starfish I meet each day.  I try to remember that I have the power to decide the weather in my classroom and that it is in my hands to change the lives of my students, if only for the year that they are in my class.  Just. One. At. A. Time.

Today I am taking the first step in a journey to see how I can become part of the change I wish to see in the way children experience learning in this country.  Please join me as often as you can, I would love the company.