Planned with Purpose

Two weeks ago, I was on a trip to Washington DC with my 8th grade students.  We leave very early on Monday morning, arriving in DC just after lunchtime, and keep our kids moving hard and fast until about 9:30 every night only to return late on Wednesday.  It is fun watching different kids respond to different things, like my little nerd party and the Air and Space Museum, the girls who were very excited to see the Hope Diamond, or the kids who really got into their roles at the International Spy Museum.  Each evening, around sundown, we meet our tour guides who walk the kids through the various monuments and memorials on the National Mall.  

This year, our tour guide kept repeating the same phrase over and over as we encountered each site.  That phrase was "planned with purpose."  As we approached the Vietnam War Memorial, we learned the purpose of the layout of the panels and the meaning behind the two statues.  As we stood by the WWII Memorial, we learned the purpose of the wreaths, the columns, and the relief sculptures.  Even the city itself is laid out with intentional design, for the purpose of eliciting certain feelings in the minds of visitors.  Our trip was designed and planned by our amazing Marcia with many purposes (fun, learning about history, learning about God, honoring sacrifice, bonding time with friends).  The act of taking their phones from them during the five-hour bus ride has a purpose, which was great for me to remember when half of the kids on the bus I was on broke out in a Disney song medley.  "Look at the fun they create for themselves when they don't have their phones," I thought, even though the singing was objectively terrible.  Our purpose had been accomplished.

Because I'm a nerd teacher, I can't help but think of how this should apply to my lesson plans.  I've been writing a fair amount recently about clarity and whether or not students understand the purpose of the activities you are asking them to do.  If not, is there a chance you don't know the purpose behind it?  Are you doing it because it's a fun activity that the kids like (a Grecian Urn)?  Is it a state standard you are required to teach without understanding why?  Or, is there a purpose to your plan?  Have you looked carefully at what you want students to learn and designed learning experiences to achieve that purpose?  Are you planning with purpose?  If not, rethink how you approach your plans.

We know from Scripture that God designed humans with a purpose, both as a species (to tend the earth and subdue it, to glorify God and enjoy Him forever, to make disciples, etc.) and as individuals (Paul going from place to place throughout Greece, Joseph being faithful in prison and used to save Egypt from famine).  As Western Christians who pride ourselves in our individualism, we like to think of our specific call, and we tend to focus only on the big things (college, marriage, career aspirations).  Of course, all of those things are part of our plan and purpose, but each day God gives us also includes a plan and a purpose.  God may have put laundry in front of you today.  He may have put lesson planning or test grading in front of you.  He may have put a conversation with a stranger in WalMart in front of you.  He planned your day with a purpose, and the way you carry out laundry or grading or the conversation is an act of worship as you carry out that plan.  You, as CS Lewis said, "are not a mere mortal."  You are a carrier of the Imago Dei and planned with a purpose every second of your life.  Live in that.  Grow in that.

It's Just What We Call It

Did you know that there is a definition for a properly maintained yard?  According to the American Garden Club, an appropriate type of lawn was "a plot with a single type of grass with

no intruding weeds, kept mown at a height of an inch and a half, uniformly green, and neatly edged."  If you live in Tuscon, Arizona or some other arid place, this would be difficult to achieve, requiring an amount of water you may not have.  For you, a properly maintained yard might be filled with succulents and stones that allow for proper drainage.  

In some places, there are movements to have native lawns or natural lawns, which are more eco-friendly in that they require little watering or mowing, give home to local fauna, attract pollinators, and work with the natural landscape rather than against it. 

For those of you wondering if this blog has changed from education to lawn maintenance, hang with me for a minute.  The Gardening Club's definition is what most American accept, but that's only because we have been taught those standards by suburban cultural norms.  A weed is only a weed because we choose to call it that.  We could just as easily live in a world where a lawn would be considered more beautiful if it had a variety of color rather than a uniformity of green.  While there are objective standards for many things, there are also a variety of contexts in which success is only defined by what we call it.

Let's say a person is in line to ride a roller coaster.  As she nears the front of the line, her heart rate increases as adrenaline and cortisol rev up her muscles. Her pupils dilate, the moisture level on her skin increases, and she feels a tightening in her stomach.  From the symptoms I have described, you may think she is terrified of the upcoming ride.  Perhaps she is.  Or perhaps, she is very excited about the ride.  After all, the physiological symptoms are the same.  An outside observer, when looking only at the biometric data with no context, is unable to differentiate nervousness and excitement.  The difference, it seems, is what we call it.  We make that choice based on our appraisal of the likely outcome.  If we foresee a negative outcome, we call that array of symptoms nervousness.  If, however, we imagine a positive end, we call it excitement.  Helping our students with normal anxieties may be as simple as helping them reframe their predictions.  When a student is anxious about a test, a game, a play audition, or other similar scenarios, they naturally imagine the worst-case scenario.  This is normal and appropriate for our survival as a species because if we do not prepare for danger, we could actually be harmed.  But, it may be helpful to ask our students the next questions.  "Okay, what if the worst happens and you fail this test?  What's the result?  Will your parents stop loving you?  Will I?"  When they realize the answer to those questions is no, it may help them to stop catastrophizing the situation.  Or, you can ask them to imagine the full spectrum instead of just the worst side of it.  Ask them "What if you ace it?"  That may have the effect of helping them reappraise their feelings.  (Please note that I am not talking about anxiety disorders which obviously require medical attention.  I'm talking about the normal day-to-day things that make us nervous like giving a presentation in class.)

The same is true of other things we call stress.  During those especially busy weeks of the semester when it seems like every class is giving a test, students often believe we should take steps to minimize their stress.  I prefer to encourage them to hang in there, recognize it is temporary, and power through it.  When that week is over, I like to remind them that they aren't dead.  "Look what you didn't know you were capable of.  Next time, you'll know you can do it."  This is another one of those things we seem to recognize and find acceptable in sports but not in other places.  When an athlete has a particularly hard workout, we call it conditioning and respect it.  We use phrases like, "No pain. No gain."  When I leave my weightlifting class at the Y with jello arms and wobbly legs after Matt has challenged me, I don't blame him for the pain in my muscles and ask him to make it easier.  I thank him for the growth that he is causing in my muscles and mind.  The same should hold true in academic situations (and all other situations); we should recognize that growth only happens through stress and call it that.  Instead of saying, "This is a really stressful week," we can reappraise that feeling and recognize it is a week that will spur a lot of growth.

We don't have to ignore our feelings, but we also don't have to let them rule us.  We have come to view them as though they are the most real part of us, but they are chemical reactions causing electrical impulses.  As such, we can have some level of control over them.  Importantly, we can teach our students to recognize and manage them as well.

Kids Are Listening (When You Think They Aren't)

One of our alumni came by this week, and we were sharing stories of crazy college professors.  This was after school, and there were only adults around, so we were giggling at these stories as adults, looking back on our common experiences with unusual people.  But, it made me remember being a little afraid of my college years in the years before I got there because I had overheard similar conversations by adults.  My dad had told me about professors who would do things like write with one hand while erasing with their left.  I remember thinking, "I'm a good student, but I'm not that good.  How am I going to do this?"  Of course, when I arrived at college, I found that most professors are mostly normal and teach in mostly normal ways.  But those are boring stories, so you only share things about the strange ones.

On a similar note, when I was a kid, I was a little afraid of growing up.  It seemed like every adult I knew hated their job.  At least, they talked about it like they did.  When I was a teenager, I did a little survey as my fellow choir members arrived at church.  I asked each of them about their job.  I got a wide range of sighs and groans until Ron Butler came in.  When I asked him about his job, he grinned and talked about living with "spizerinctum," a word he made up for how energized he felt by his work.  It was greatly encouraging to hear an adult talk with such joy about the work he was doing, and it was clear that he loved it because he believed it mattered.  

It can be easy to think that kids are not paying attention when adults talk to each other.  After all, they give every impression that they are not listening, and it is frustrating when they seem not to have heard something we explicitly told them.  But they are picking up more than you think they are.  When you call a politician evil (not just wrong, but demonic) while watching the news, they absorb that; and since they don't have the experience to judge whether something is sarcasm or hyperbole, they come to school and share your speculations as gospel truth.  When you skewer the pastor during Sunday lunch, they hear you and learn to disrespect all spiritual authority (and you want to be careful because you are one of the spiritual authorities they are learning to disrespect).  Divorced parents often talk negatively about their ex to other adults while their children are in the room.  You think they aren't listening, but they come to my classroom the next day talking about it.  When I worked in daycare, there was a three-year-old in the building who had a colorful vocabulary, using words his parents had used at home.  His parents were a bit embarrassed by the fact their toddler told us something was BS (except he used the whole word) in his high-pitched baby voice.  He had heard them and didn't know that there were words many choose not to use in public.  It is not possible to tell when they are listening and when they are not.

Not all of the examples of this happening are bad.  I am currently on track to pay my house off ten years early because of a conversation I overheard between two other adults.  One man advised another to always pay whatever extra amount he could afford on his house in order to pay down the principal and save on interest.  I wasn't part of the conversation, but I happened to be in the room and thought that sounded like a wise practice.  As far as I know, the man in that conversation does not know that I have benefitted from his advice to someone else.  I have had casual conversations with juniors about their AP class choices that younger students nearby take as advice three years later.  I only know this because their parents say to me, "She remembered your advice about . . . "  When I say, "I don't remember talking to her about that," they tell me about a conversation I don't remember that I had with someone else (My Lord, the power we wield as teachers should be taken seriously).

I've rambled a bit, but here's my point.  Be aware and be careful.  They hear most of what you say, you don't know what context they are putting around your words in their minds.  They take more in than you think, and they repeat it to others.  It can affect their decisions and may mean they carry worries you aren't aware of.  Don't assume that kids can't hear you, even when they have earbuds in their ears.  Don't say, "Oh, he's never paying attention" because he often is.  If you don't want it to be part of his brain, don't say it.

Traditions Communicate Values

I am writing this on Easter Sunday, and this year, I am in a liturgical church for the first time.  Tradition and ceremony are the bread and butter of the liturgical church all year, but during Holy Week, from Palm Sunday to Maudy Thursday to Good Friday to Easter, Anglicans are at steroid levels of tradition in which every moment, color, and piece of fabric are symbolic and meaningful.  I have loved every minute of it, and it reminds me that traditions communicate values.

Some families have holiday traditions, like reading from Luke or attending church services on Christmas Eve, communicating that they care deeply about keeping the birth of Jesus at the center of Christmas.  Non-religious families may read "Twas the Night Before Christmas," showing that they value time with family sharing a story they have loved.

Even on this blog, I have a tradition.  Every Thanksgiving, I post about educators who have formed my life as an educator, from my own middle and high school teachers to my current administrators to my group fitness instructors at the Y.  This yearly practice reflects my penchant for reflection and gratitude.  

If there is any industry in the world that participates in tradition, it is education.  Schools have dozens of traditions.  There are the obvious, holiday concerts, spring musicals, and graduations.  There are traditions for the first day of school and the last day of school.  Some go back for generations.  

At my school, we have some special ones.  For example, the night before the first day of school, parents of seniors come and decorate their parking space with chalk.  We have a Grandparents' Day celebration, which, even though it has changed somewhat over the years, has been consistently happening for over 30 years.  These communicate that we value the families our students come from and their participation in our community.  We have a high school spiritual retreat, called Ignite, every year and weekly chapel services, communicating to our students that we care about their spiritual formation.  We have an annual basketball game in support of the Kay Yow Fund and a number of yearly service projects, communicating our value of service outside the walls of our school.  And my favorite meeting of the entire year is the last one teachers have before we check out for the summer.  It's called "The Shout Out Meeting," and I consider it sacrosanct.  There is nothing like that meeting to communicate our care for each other as human beings, and it is a lovely way to end the year.

We are heading into the part of the year with more traditions than any other.  What traditions does your school have?  Why do you do them, and what values do they communicate?  Are they values you want to communicate?  If not, is it worth doing or should you replace this tradition with something new?  It matters and should be thought about carefully because, as writer Will Durant said, "We are what we repeatedly do."

Faithful Leadership - A Tribute to Julie Bradshaw

While this post isn't about education (well, actually, it is - just a different kind of education), I wanted to publically thank a woman who has been instrumental in my life this past year because she is moving to a different job next week.  Julie is the Group Fitness Director at the Alexander YMCA, but next week she will be at a different branch.  I won't see her often, so I want to take a moment to thank her for her faithfulness, friendship, and leadership.

The first time I met Julie was in June.  I had been at the Y for a couple of months and I had heard her name from instructors and other members. In June, she came up with an idea for a cycle challenge called the Tour de Alexandre.  Those of us who registered for it recorded our classes and mileage on a large chart with the goal of collectively reaching the same mileage as the Tour de France.  She sent a weekly email, updating us on our progress and including who the leaders were both in the number of classes and individual mileage.  The result was a really fun and motivating challenge.  The two men who were in the lead on miles teased each other and pushed hard against each other.  I knew I wouldn't be able to achieve a high number of miles, but I took more cycle classes in those few weeks than ever before and loved watching that chart fill up.  At the end of the challenge, I replied to one of Julie's emails to thank her for coming up with the idea and keeping us updated because it was super motivating to know that my progress was part of a collective goal (which we crushed, by the way - we ended up at double the mileage of those guys in France).

I didn't see Julie every time I came to work out, but she occasionally subbed for Matt's Group Power class.  In fact, I think the first time I saw her teach was when she and Matt taught Group Power Express together for the summer Group Fit Fest.  I realized then that she wasn't just a creative challenge designer.  She is an exceptional fitness educator.  She cares about the members of her class and is observant of how they are doing.  She is clear in her explanations and models skills well.  She tells Dad jokes both to motivate and to distract you from how hard what you are doing is.  Mostly, she is just super encouraging.  Whatever you are able to do is great, but she encourages you to do just a bit more.

Just as school was starting back, I wanted to tell my Y story to someone, and she seemed like the right person to share it with.  I sent her a very long email, telling her my story from the beginning and praising the educational techniques of many instructors.  She made the mistake of asking me about cognitive science, so she got a few more very long emails as a result.  Every time I see her, she asks lots of questions because she is great about learning everything she can about her members.

In September, Julie asked me if I would be willing to participate in fundraising for the annual campaign.  I was both honored to be asked and thrilled to have the opportunity to give back to the Y.  She kept me encouraged throughout the campaign, even when responses were slow.  When I first began feeling God's pull out of the classroom and towards the Y, she was the first person I talked to there.  I just wanted to feel out if it was a crazy idea, so I asked her if we could talk after a Group Power class one Saturday morning.  I'm sure she would have rather gone home after class, but she agreed to talk with me.  She was so helpful and encouraging and helped me explore the job posting website.  She set up introductions with important people so I could explore options, even introducing me to the president after class one morning.  When I decided to certify in cycle instruction, she was helpful and encouraging.  One of the final things Julie has done in her role at Alexander is to hire me as a substitute cycle instructor, and I couldn't be more grateful.  She gave great feedback on my demo class and asked great questions during our interview.   She has been walking me through every step of the process.  Mostly, she is providing me with an opportunity to be part of the Y's mission.  

In Drew Dyck's book Just Show Up, he discusses the value of faithfulness as both a character trait and a form of leadership.  He describes three questions you can ask yourself to identify faithfulness.

1.  Can people depend on me to do what I say I will do?

2.  Do I look for ways to help others?

3.  Am I a person who can be present even when I don't know what to say or do?

Julie exhibits all of these in her leadership at the Y.  She took the time to meet with me when she didn't have to and followed up on everything we talked about that day and at other times.  She took advantage of every opportunity to be there, not only for me, but for all of the instructors she is in charge of, and gave many members opportunities to be part of fundraising.  During more than one of our conversations about my future, I have begun to cry.  During each of those times, she has been patient to let me express whatever I needed to, comforted me with a hug, and given encouraging words when possible.  Her faithfulness has influenced more lives than she will ever know, and I am proud and grateful to call her my friend. 

This Becoming is Harder Than it Seems

I decided a couple of weeks ago that I wanted to see what music I would hear if I let randomness decide.  I put my iPod on shuffle and left it there.  As a result, I've heard some Christmas songs and skipped through a few things I don't remember purchasing.  But I've also heard some songs that I love and had forgotten about.  

One of them is a Michael W. Smith song called "Place in This World."  If you are younger than I am, you may not even know this song as it came out in 1990.  I had it on cassette tape back then and listened to it until I wore that part of the tape out.  It had become clear that I was not going to be an astronaut as I was already taller than their height limit with no sign of slowing down.  I had not yet found my love of physics, so I didn't know what the future looked like.  The line in this song that most resonated with me was "A heart that's hopeful, a head that's full of dreams, but this becoming is harder than it seems."

As I listened to it in my car this morning, I had many of the same thoughts I had back in the early 90s.  I don't know what happens next at 47 any more than I did at 17.  (And it is all the more jarring after 21 years of knowing exactly what I would be doing from day to day and year to year.)  I have to trust God for that every bit as much now as I did then.  And, I also thought of my students.  They are in the same position I was at that age.  Modern life doesn't make it easier; in fact, in many ways, it makes it harder.  They have more access to information, which seems like it would be helpful; but it can bring about a form of cognitive overload called choice fatigue.  Previous generations may have had to choose between college and a job or the military.  If they went to college, they likely had only one or two options.  Now, students apply to many colleges, and if the one they most want defers them, they are left with many choices they consider disappointments.  They are told all of their eggs rest in this basket even though we know God's plan for them will not be thwarted by one decision.  It's a lot of pressure, and it is worse than it was when we were kids.  Some of them become practically paralyzed with indecision.

If you know a teenager, pray for them.  "This becoming is harder than it seems" is just as true now as it was when Michael W Smith wrote it.  And they likely still feel this:

"If there are millions down on their knees

Among the many, can You still hear me?
Hear me asking, "Where do I belong?"
Is there a vision that I can call my own?
Show me, I'm

Looking for a reason

Roaming through the night to find
My place in this world
My place in this world
Not a lot to lean on
I need Your light to help me find
My place in this world."

Pray for them to know God can still hear them.  Pray for to find that reason.  Pray for God to give them the light they need.  Pray for them to learn to trust Him in the process.

The Last Time I Will . . .

For those who may not know, I am in the last semester of teaching.  After 25 years in the classroom, God is moving me in other directions.  Because it is mid-March, that means I am experiencing many things for the last time.  Some of those are fine.  I'll be happy not to conduct department chair observations or grade NASA essays in the future.  They aren't bad things, but I can't say I'm going to miss them.  

But there are other things that I'm sad to be doing for the last time.  God gave me training wheels for this last year when I was advising my last yearbook, so I am familiar with the feeling of being nostalgic for something while it is happening, but this week has been that experience on steroids.  I think it is because we are in my favorite chapter in 8th grade science (sound waves).  In physics, I am teaching many of the same students that I had as 8th graders during lockdown, and we have reached the material that I taught them from home.

Thursday, for example, I taught 8th graders about how our ears process sound.  I LOVE teaching that. Even though you will not find it in any physical science textbook, I set aside a day for it because I think if you are going to talk about sound waves, you should talk about how you interact with them.  (The same will be true in the light chapter after spring break - we will spend two days talking about the eye and dysfunction of the eye.)  I have honed this lesson into a perfect act, and I love doing it.  I love the questions they ask.  I love the weird answers they give to my questions.  So Thursday was a great day, but I was also sad because it is unlikely I'll ever have a reason to put on this particular show again.

I am excited about the new things that are coming in my life, but there are few things I'll really miss.  For 25 years, I have shown three of the episodes of From the Earth to the Moon to students.  I may have to watch them by myself at home next January because it just won't be January if I don't see them (I'll refrain from watching the same episode 4 times in one day).  When I teach the Doppler effect, I love getting in my car and driving past the kids at 40 mi/hr while holding down my horn.  If I do that after this year, someone will have me evaluated for mental issues.  A lot of what I do are things non-science teachers don't have an excuse to do.  

What is nice is that I know this is the last year.  I can savor these last moments of "This is the last time I will . . ."  The other nice thing is that I can now share this feeling with my kids.  Prior to making the announcement in February, I was having this experience, and they didn't understand the weird vibe I was giving off.  Now, I can actually say to them, "Well, that's the last time I'll ever get to do that" and share a nice moment with them as the people I got to do it for the final time with.