Tag Archives: School

Education

People-building

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The difficulty in education is finding a balance. On the one hand, we’re tasked with delivering a curriculum. Be dynamic, we’re told. Get the students to discover, explore, and take responsibility for their learning. Give them options. Be accessible.

Oh.

And make sure they score well enough on the exam to get into a university of their choice. Show them how to be successful, provide ample opportunities to practice assessments, and give timely, constructive feedback.

Tension? Yes, without a doubt. But there’s also space. I think real learning happens within that space, learning in terms of how to be in the world.

This is the learning I like to think of as “people-building.”

The End
When it’s all said and done and our students graduate, what do we want? We want to know that we’ve raised good people who will do great things that have a positive impact on the world, on all of us. We want them to care about those around them, about their place in the world, and about who they are as individuals. We hope that they have grown as people, that they see themselves as agents of positive change, and that they recognize and uphold the human dignity of those around them.

At the end of the day, we hope we can say things like, “She’s come a long way” or “He worked so hard this year” or “I can’t wait to see what they become”. We worry about some of them, of course, but we hope we’ve set them up to live good lives.

We hope we’ve raised good people.

And we hope we’ve helped them understand who they are in the world around them, understand that they are part of building the world they want to live in. This is the learning that takes place in the space between curriculum and test. This is the learning that actually matters.

The Beginning
So how do we get there? Last year, I started the year asking my students about what they did not understand. A poster on my wall read, “What’s something you don’t understand that you want to understand by the end of this year?”. We returned to this question several times throughout the year and discussed it fully the last week of school. Some of the responses took me by pleasant surprise.

This year, though, I’m beginning with something slightly different. The question that I’m working on this year is deceptively simple:

Who do you want to be?

Not what. Who. Who do you want to be?

We spend a lot of time asking students about their future plans, even when we know their plans are often unrealistic and will likely change as they grow older and have more experiences. Becoming a certain type of person, however, matters a lot more as we choose whatever it is that we’re going to do.

Space
I’ve learned that there’s something special about asking a teenager, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”. It’s a different question than, “What are your plans?” because it allows them to imagine and it doesn’t presume that they have plans. Often, a dream exists but they don’t know how to get there. Acknowledging the dream means starting from a place of possibility.

But I’ve also learned that this question isn’t enough. A deeper question is “why?” – Why do you want to be a doctor? Why do you want to be a teacher? Why do you want to run a hotel? Why do you want to be a millionaire? Why do you want to be a firefighter?

It’s the “why” that brings us to “who”. I’ve known for a long time that I wanted to be a teacher. It took me much longer to figure out that I wanted to be a teacher in order to help young people understand their world. Teaching was the way I knew I could get there. I know more ways now, and think about them often. But who do I want to be? I can fill in a number of adjectives and I’ve learned that it doesn’t really matter what job I’m doing as long as I’m helping others see or experience something in a different way.

So what kind of person is that? Who is that? Those are questions I want my students to consider. I wonder what conversations would transpire if we focused on the internal elements of becoming rather than what it looks like on the outside. What we’re actually doing in any capacity with young people, really with all people, is making the choice to affirm or reject. The choice to love or be indifferent. The choice to accept or to disdain. This is what happens in the space between “dynamic curriculum” and “passing the test”. This is what matters.

People-building
Over the summer I met up with an old friend, also an educator now, and we talked about what matters with our students. At the end of the day, everyone will learn to read and write and do basic math. They’re going to be fine. The question is who will they become as individuals. In a perfect world, school would be about navigating what’s around us and about raising good people. But that’s not how the world is and that’s not how school is. There are other pressures, too.

I’ve found it helpful to remember, however, that what I want for my students, and what their parents want when we actually sit down to talk about it, is for them to be good people. What students usually want for the people around them, though it’s often harder to be introspective, is that they are good people. We tell students all the time, “This test doesn’t say anything about your worth as a person” and yet our education system and society are structured in a way that at least on paper, which carries a lot of weight, it does.

So as much as I can this year, I’m going to ask my students to think about who they want to be. Maybe we all have to play the school game to put them in a position to have choices, but good people generally turn out to do just fine. And maybe if we think more about who and why and less about what, we’ll be closer to a world that is better and more peaceful for all.

On My Mind

On Dreams

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I think I’m a lucid dreamer. Or maybe this is just how dreams go. The science behind lucid dreaming is sketchy at best, as is much of the science behind sleep, but I know where I am in many of my dreams and make decisions about what I want to happen next. Once I’ve woken up, sometimes I can fall back into the dream and redo what has already “happened.” My own laughter has woken me more than once in the middle of the night, but I don’t think I’ve ever woken up in tears. I think the last time I had a nightmare was in college. I woke up with my arm outstretched, grabbing at something that wasn’t there.

I dreamed about this blog post last night. Or, rather, I dreamed about what I was actually thinking but couldn’t articulate when I spent a couple hours writing yesterday afternoon. That’s why I’m rewriting it.

We sleep. Neurons fire. Things make more sense once our brains have had time to process.

Last night I dreamed about love. I dreamed about what we used to talk about, where we used to go, what we used to do. I woke up with a physical ache that I soothed by resetting my breathing; I turned off that dream before rolling over to fall back asleep. I liked the memories. I didn’t like the longing. Dreams can pull us back into the past and the past can be dangerous. Just look at Gatsby.

I’ve learned that it is one thing to dwell on the past, to romanticize it and see it through rose-colored glasses, but it is quite another, I think, to look upon the past as an old friend, with the knowing smile that comes from the expected. The school year is ending, which means that this, too, will join the past. This is the time of year when I begin to look back on what was, which always leads me to think about what could be or could have been.

“The past” enters, stage left.

Since my life follows a school calendar, “next year” begins with the start of the school year in August and “this year” ends in just a week. Soon, I’ll speak of “last year,” meaning right now and the ten months preceding it. Where we are now, the “end of the year,” is a lot of fun, busy, and always bittersweet. At international schools, we say goodbye a lot and at least for me, it never gets easier. We turn over a lot of new leaves.

Sometimes I indulge when I find myself feeling sentimental. Sometimes I go up to the roof and sit in the dark, eyes closed, Lana del Rey or Bon Iver filling my ears, a soundtrack for feelings too wrapped up in themselves to be put to words. Sometimes I run through a few old favorites – things that were, unspoken dreams of things that will never be, imagination for what is still within the realm of possible but only on a technicality. My mind is filled with people I’ve known and loved, maybe for a long time or maybe they’re brand new. People come and go in transient cities, in international schools, and we’re often just counting time.

Thinking about the end of the year got me thinking about the past and is likely why I dreamed about a love I once had. The past becomes the story we tell ourselves, true or not, and it’s what we do with the story that matters. We write those stories all the time.

This is the end of the school year, prompting me to write the story about wanting to be better next year. This is the part when I am reminded of why, how, and who I was. Who I am. Who I can be. This is the part that reminds me of the people who have been with me along the way and I miss them, even if we have yet to be apart.

But of course, sometimes, my imagination catches me off guard, an enemy rather than a friend. Those are the times when I find myself angry or hurt, which are really just emotions that mask feeling fear. Maybe I don’t have nightmares because I can admit when I’m afraid. It doesn’t come up in the dark the way it used to and I don’t push it away as insistently anymore. I’ve learned to make my peace with people and times and events, recall what I’ve learned from them, and wish them well.

When I let my mind wander, I find myself writing stories about what I want and what I hope for, both for myself and for others. I invent conversations that I wish had taken place, rewrite conversations that could have easily gone another way, and imagine conversations yet to happen. Sometimes my imagination is like a tape that won’t stop running, no matter how many times I press stop. Sometimes it fills me such delight that it’s almost disappointing to keep my dreams to myself. And sometimes I catch myself with a silly grin on my face and can’t help but laugh out loud. I think about my people, the broad category that they are, and hold them tightly.

The end of the year is a time of transition. Living on a school calendar provides a convenient opportunity to make changes, restart, and try again, but it also forces endings and beginnings, often sooner than I’m ready for them.

But here we are. Already. So soon. And yet, we thought it would never come. Or so we told ourselves months ago. There’s so much time and never enough. This is the time to remember or say goodbye to people who have built my dreams, occupied a space in my mind and made it their own. It’s the time to send love and good wishes half the world over, to those gone, those going, and all of those I have left behind.

Thank you for being part of my story, part of my dreams. Lucky are those who will come to know you; lucky are we who already do.

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On My Mind

Peace through Writing

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As usual, I’ve been thinking about peace a lot, particularly in the wake of recent school shootings in the US. This has provoked a great deal of discussion among students and staff at school, much of which has included shaking heads and heavy sighs. Again?

Over the weekend, I got an email from one of the instructors from my undergrad education program begging us to protect our students by rejecting Trump’s call to arms. It’s astounding that she even felt the need to write that email; it’s astounding that there are actually people who believe this to be a good idea. I had a conversation with a sixteen-year-old student about it, but I haven’t met an educator who agrees with this approach.

I’ve been doing a lot of writing in cafés over the last several weeks, setting aside a few hours after my run on a weekend morning to sit over coffee and puzzle through whatever ideas come to mind. I’m working on an extended project about peace in schools as an attempt to provide an actionable framework for how to better our world. We desperately need a better world.

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View from Drury Lane, one of my favorite haunts.

This is the longest independent project I’ve worked on since I was a student and my time to write is one of joy. I look forward to my hours in a comfortable space with coffee, perhaps some music, and the privacy that comes from being in a room full of strangers. As a writer who is not pressed for time (among the reasons why I have a day job and have not monetized this blog), I do the following to maintain momentum and excitement:

  1. Set aside a time to write and stick to it. I’m flexible about whether this work happens on Saturday or Sunday, but I won’t skip a week. Instead, I schedule other weekend events around it.
  2. At the end of the allotted time, stop writing. If you’re stuck and struggling, you have until next week to get unstuck. If you’re on a roll and inspired, take a couple quick notes and then you’ll be excited to start again next week.
  3. Find somewhere comfortable, preferably away from the rest of the week and the rest of your life. Being interrupted is hugely distracting and it takes significant time to get back on track. That’s why I find it helpful to leave my apartment or, at the very least, to sit outside where I’m separated from my daily surroundings.
  4. If you have an exercise routine, stick to it and fit the writing in around it. My brain works better (and I’m better at sitting still) once my body has warmed up. For others, the brain needs to be active before the body can be active. Know thyself.
  5. Write first, edit later. Say what you have to say and then worry about how you’re saying it.

These ideas are informed by personal experience and the guidance of people far wiser than I. On Writing by Stephen King, Zen in the Art of Writing by Ray Bradbury, and What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami all provide philosophies on writing from people with experience, credibility, and successful writing careers. And all three are excellent reads!

Much of my writing in the past has been escapist; a friend called me prolific during my first few months in New York. I write to explain the world to myself and to others, but also out of a sense of desperation and a desire to leave a meaningful imprint on the world. There’s so much to say and far too little time to say it. Yesterday I woke up to the news that the father of a friend’s friend had passed away. Life is fleeting. There’s a sense of running out of time that keeps me on edge.

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I passed this mural on the wall of a guesthouse when I was walking to Artistry a few weeks ago. Pretty, right?

My best work is urgent but detached. It requires me to leave passion, rage, and other strong emotions aside for a moment and look at what I’m trying to say through the eyes of those who are not in my heart or in my mind, not feeling what I’m feeling or thinking what I’m thinking. That’s where the feeling of clarity and exhaustion comes from when I decide that I’ve done enough editing and can move on. But I’m not there right now. I’m still in the writing stage of my current project, still feeling the excitement of writing and the need to write.

There’s a mug on my desk at work, though, that reminds me to slow down. It’s very plain, cream colored with black writing:

peace. it does not mean to be in a place where there is no noise, trouble or hard work. it means to be in the midst of those things and still be calm in your heart. (unknown)