So Yahoo Voices!, the place I had published a few articles to, has shut down. I am currently looking for new places to publish, but I didn't want the 3 articles I had to be left out in internet purgatory. I am posting them here so they will always have a home. Looking at them now, I see that these articles pretty much encompass most of what I love about my life: reading, teaching, and my family.
5 Books I Can’t Live Without
This article first appeared on Yahoo Voices! May 21, 2014
Books, to those of us who love them, are a necessity for
life. As we go through our reading
lives, we may read hundreds, even thousands, of books, but there are always a
few titles that reward us with more than entertainment or knowledge. These books become part of our being. Their images live in our minds. Their characters are as real to us as our
dearest friends. These are the books
that we return to over and over again.
These are our personal “classics.” If I could only take five books to a
deserted island, these would be my choices, my classics.
The Young Adult Classic
The Lion, the Witch,
and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis
This book makes the cut because Lucy in the snow beneath the
lamppost is the first literary image that is a permanent fixture in my mind’s
photo album. I found her in a box at a garage sale when I was 11, and she has
been with me ever since. This old, musty hard cover copy of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
was the first book that I would ever read more than once because C.S. Lewis did
what every author hopes to do. He
transported me to a non-existent place and made me believe again and again. He opened up my young mind to all the powers
of good and evil, and he made me see how hard the choice between the two could
be. Twenty-five years later I still find
myself going back to Narnia when I want to be lost in another time and place.
The Beach Read
Sullivan’s Island by
Dorothea Benton Frank
Benton Frank made me fall in love with the Low Country of
South Carolina long before I ever set foot on its beaches. Sullivan’s
Island makes the cut because if I can only escape in my mind, the Low
Country is where I want to be. Livvie, a Gullah woman of slave decent who cares
for the dysfunctional family, is the character that still visits me when I
least expect it. Her voice has even
prompted me to include her culture as a major part of a novel I’m currently
planning. Since I didn’t grow up
Southern, Benton Frank’s version of it is the next best thing.
The Heroic Adventure
The Harry Potter
Series by J.K. Rowling
I would like to take the liberty of including the series as
one book. I cannot live with out Harry
and his friends in my life, plain and simple.
With each read something new is gained or realized. I could never tire of them. But you want me to choose one book,
right? If I must, it would have to be Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. I enjoy it the most because the whole story
matures during this book. The
characters, the friendships, the element of danger, Voldemort; everything
changes. Because I know the story inside
and out, this turning point book is the one I would read over and over if I
could choose only one.
The Literary Classic
The Complete Stories
by Flannery O’Connor
There is no work of literature that has left so many images
in my mind that horrify me, make me rethink life in general, and humor me in
such dark ways, often all within a few pages.
So many of her stories are worth reading time and again. Lucky for me they are all in one hefty volume
to delight or terrify me all my reading life.
The Undefined, Everything Genre
The Outlander
Series by Diana Gabaldon
While I consider myself a serious fan of one other series I
may have mentioned earlier, I am completely, 110%, totally obsessed with the
epic series Gabaldon has created. This
series cannot be defined by genre because it has everything any reader could
need. Love, honor, sacrifice, scathing
impropriety, time-travel, history lessons, wars, castles, kilts, witches,
secret pasts, hidden futures…you get the idea.
The only real obsession I have ever had revolves around the lives of
Jamie and Claire. I will not choose one book in this series. I can’t. I will
take them all with me if this desert island exile ever comes true. Hopefully, it can wait until June 10th
when the newest book in the series, Written
in My Own Heart's Blood, arrives in my mailbox.
Life Lessons on a Seesaw
This article first appeared on Yahoo Voices! Mar. 18, 2014
I took my kids to a tiny neighborhood park today. It is off the beaten path, slightly obscure. My husband and I took our son there once when he was a toddler years ago. The play structure was too high for him. We freaked out and went home. That quick exit may be why I never noticed something that is rarely seen on a playground these days: a seesaw.
While I helped my kids to understand the mechanics of this new device, I realized that it might be one of the best pieces of equipment that isn't typically installed on playgrounds anymore. Maybe it has gone away from schoolyards because it excludes all but two children. Though, worry of liability and safety are most likely the culprits of its forced extinction.
I was saddened for today's kids a bit when I remembered the sheer joy this lever with two seats and handles provided for my best friend and me in our playground days. I began to see the lessons that could be learned from its simple "up and down."
The seesaw itself is a lesson in building a trusting relationship. It is the one thing on the playground you can't do alone. You and your friend must work together. You have to find the balance of your push and your weight. If you don't "push" your own weight, you don't go anywhere. If you don't pay attention to the weight of your friend you could come down too quickly, ding your heels. If you quit working altogether, and let your seat hit the ground, your friend gets an unpleasant bump as well. It only works when each finds the rhythm of the other.
This is an essential life lesson. Find the balance of give and take in every relationship. Be aware of the needs of the other person and they will be aware of your needs. Failing to do this ends in a hard bump for both sides.
Face to face conversations are slowly going extinct these days. The seesaw is one place on the playground where this could happen with little distraction. Once the rhythm is there, nothing is stopping the conversation from flowing. My best friend and I coveted the chance to be the first pair to the seesaw. It meant we had time to ourselves to talk about whatever we wanted. It is a joy our fast paced world is slowly killing.
Truly focused one-on-one chats with a friend build people up and make them feel worthwhile. In this world of having to include everyone, our kids are missing out on this gift of building close friendships.
Today, my kids found their balance with each other. My son didn't mind working a little harder so that his little sister could have the same fun he was having. It only took a couple hard bounces for them to figure out that the bumps weren't worth it. They worked together to get Mommy in on the fun. It was gratifying for them to find that they could raise me up in the air if we all sat in just the right place. We had to find the compromise between our push and our weight. We talked to each other without a care in the world for anything else. This relic of playground history reconnected us by putting us face to face and encouraging us to find our balance in each other.
Classroom Management
Through Relationships
This article first appeared on Yahoo Voices! Feb. 25, 2014
“Don’t smile until Christmas.” Teachers have all heard this advice in at
least one education course. This classroom management tip is supposed to help
new teachers strike fear and respect into students. But today this mindset doesn’t seem to fly,
especially at the high school level. If
you want a sure fire way to spend less time on classroom management, spend more
time building real relationships with your students.
Get to know your
students as people.
Students need to know that we see them as more than a
missing assignment or a bad test grade.
What are they good at? What do they like to do outside of the school
day? It takes time to find these things
out, but it also saves time in the end.
Students are much more willing to work for a teacher who seems to
genuinely take interest in them. I
recently had a new student who desperately wanted to get kicked out of
class. I knew this and I wouldn’t give
in. Then I found out that he enjoyed working on engines. We chatted a bit about this for a few minutes
and since then, he has been a model student for me. I treated him like a real person worthy of my
time, and he has reciprocated the gesture.
Show your students
that you are a real person.
Students need to see that teachers are more than just
talking heads spewing mathematical equations or grammar rules. We are real people. We have good days and bad days. We make mistakes, and we don’t know
everything. We need our coffee in the
morning and our chocolate in the afternoon. Students are always amazed to find out that
teachers like some of the same things they do.
Conversations about movies,
books, sports, and TV shows may seem like a waste of time, but in the end it
makes us human to them. These connections
build the respect that we need in our classrooms.
Build on the positive.
Students generally know what they don’t know. They don’t need to be told. Instead they need to see what they do well
and how they can build to make improvements. I start every year with a discussion about
what my responsibility to them is as a teacher.
I explain that I never make corrections or suggest changes to their work
in an effort to make them feel bad. I do
it to help them improve. My goal is to
help them be a better student by the time they leave my class. Improvements of any size are successes. Many students need to see small successes in
order to be motivated to reach for bigger things. Classroom management strategies aren’t as
necessary in a room full of motivated students.
Trust your students
until they give you a reason not to.
Most kids are good kids.
There are always a few who ruin it for the bunch. You know who they are, but be careful about
the time wasted in power struggles because you assume the worst. My students
know that my answer to their questions about bathroom or locker use will always
be “Yes,” until they give me a reason to say “No.” They like the bit of freedom they have, and
the majority don’t abuse it because they know they can lose it.
Have fun.
You have to teach your lessons, and you have to be
professional. You can’t always be super
entertaining. But you don’t have to be
bored or boring. If you are tired of
listening to yourself, chances are you lost your students half an hour
ago. Lighten up. Connect to their real life, make a joke, let
them talk and explain their understandings and frustrations. Students feed off of our enthusiasm. Give them something to work with.
At the end of the day, we all have to remember that
no teacher has ever been or ever will be loved by every student. It’s not possible. But, bottom line, students are more likely to
engage if they feel connected to their teachers, and engaged students tend to manage
themselves.
