The Toxic Effects of Either/Or

It's become a cliche to say the world is polarized.  Whether it is the divide between left and right, rich and poor, black and white, or old and young, we have become people who decide we are correct, and every other view is wrong.  "It's my way or nothing" has become our default position as though the world is really that simple.  Most things, however, boil down to balancing the perspective of many people, not just adopting the preference of the loudest person in the room.  The either/or mentality has toxic effects that we are only just beginning to experience.  It led to, among other things, the events of January 6.

A few days ago, I read this tweet from a teacher. "Classroom management is not about having the right rules.  It's about having the right relationships."  While I don't think this was a person who would advocate not having rules, there are people who think that way.  They believe that if they invest all of their time in personalized handshakes and playing the music their kids like and talking about popular television shows, their students will want to please them so much that they won't need rules.  If you think that sounds nuts, connect with some teachers online because they are out there, and they are super-passionate about it.  Both ends of this spectrum are damaging to you and your students, as I learned during my student teaching experiences.  The first teacher I was placed with had been teaching for 30 years, and he was burned out but didn't know it.  Structure was everything to him, right down to the fine-tipped black ballpoint pen he insisted I use to take attendance.  His students barely spoke in class, and, when they did, it was to answer a question with what they were certain was the right answer.  There was no joking; there was no curiosity.  His students were well-behaved, and they may have learned some physics; but I doubt any of them are out there right now telling their children about their amazing physics experience.  My second placement was with a pregnant, basic-skills-science teacher for whom "winging it" was a daily event.  She had a loose idea of what she wanted to cover, but there were no rules.  She spent most of her class time just chatting with students.  She knew everything about their lives, from who they were dating to who was on drugs.  While she probably helped a lot of her students through some personal decisions, they did not learn much about science; and no substitute ever wanted to be placed in her class because the kids were accustomed to bouncing off of the walls.  I had to reflect on both of these experiences as I entered my own classroom, and I recognized that I could not be either one of them.  While I want to build relationships with my students, my role in their lives should not be the same as their friends.  It is important that our relationship exists within proper professional boundaries and that they are confident that I am the authority in the room, but it is also important that my students feel free to show their individual personalities and that we laugh together.  That balance is how students feel intellectually and emotionally safe in my classroom.  It's not either rules or relationships.  It's both rules and relationships.  

I also see a lot of either/or mentality when it comes to curriculum and student choice.  There are schools in which standardized tests are so high-stakes that no one ever dares to stray from the curriculum.  Teachers exhaust themselves and their students, trying to stay on pace with the set curriculum.  They do not entertain student questions if they are not aligned with the curriculum.  They are not able to be creative about projects or labs or topics that might inspire their students because they must prepare their students for the test.  I cannot imagine being handcuffed in that way.  However, the backlash to this seems to be a trend toward not having a curriculum at all.  The theory is that students will decide what they should learn on their own and not be required to learn anything they don't want to.  This is, of course, as ridiculous as it sounds, and we would never attempt this in other areas of their life.  No parent would say to their child, "Oh, you are thirsty.  Any liquid will do.  You have an innate understanding of what would be good to drink."  If they did, we would have a lot of five-year-old alcoholics and kids who drink antifreeze because it is as sweet as Kool-Aid.  What a parent might do is give their child a choice between a bottle of water, a juice box, and carton of milk, providing them with choice within a safe and nutritious set of boundaries.  Education should be that way as well.  A teacher with professional judgment knows what is essential in the curriculum and what has inspired students in the past.  They also know what skills can be developed using different kinds of projects.  Why wouldn't they use all of that knowledge to set up a project in which students can choose either from a variety of topics or a variety of methods, allowing choice within a set of boundaries?  It doesn't have to be a strict adherence to a confining curriculum or a free-for-all with little content learning.  It can be helping students develop curiosity about topics they wouldn't have even known they could have chosen without your example.

It seems that the biggest controversy in America right now is the teaching of Critical Race Theory.  I confess that I know little about the theory itself.  I know that it was developed in the 1970s and has been taught most to college students, majoring in history or philosophy.  I have not spent enough time learning about it to know if the allegations that it is based on Marxism are true, but I also don't believe the majority of people screaming about it online have put in that time either.  But, here's the point.  If it turns out that CRT is a horrible thing to teach kids younger than college, that doesn't make the other alternative ignoring history and pretending that slavery, voter suppression, Jim Crow, and hate crimes never happened.  My fear is that completely appropriate teaching of American history, including our racial sins, will now be labeled CRT and protested because no one wants to take the time to find out what they are objecting to.  It doesn't have to be either CRT or nothing.  It can be a curriculum that acknowledges the good America has done in the world without turning our founders into demi-gods.   It can be teaching that includes our maltreatment of Native Americans, Japanese internment camps, and slavery without ignoring the progress that has been made.  You don't have to assume that every white American is a violent racist to recognize that some of our legislators were Klansmen.  Our country's history isn't either/or, and our instruction about it shouldn't be either.

Let's stop treating education as a simple thing.  It is a group of complex and flawed human beings being taught by a group of complex and flawed human beings about complex and flawed topics.  Let's start doing the intellectual work it takes to treat it that way.

Adaptable Planners

No one who regularly reads this or knows me will be surprised by this, but I am a planner.  Some of that was built into my DNA, but becoming a yearbook teacher is really what cemented it into my daily life.  You can't end up with a good yearbook unless you have a lot of plans laid out.  I plan lessons, units, days, and semesters.  Even during the summer, I make a to-do list for the following day before going to sleep at night.

Good plans rely on good information.  For yearbook, you need to know when and where the volleyball game will be played.  You need to know when the dress rehearsal is for the play and how many cast members there are.  For lesson planning, you need to know what supplies you have available and whether your schedule that day involves a shorter time frame or missing seniors.  

Today, I was dressed in my walking gear and was putting on my shoes to head out to church.  It's a 90-minute walk, so I have to be ready to leave between 7:20 and 7:30.  It was ten after seven when I noticed that the sky seemed a little darker than normal.  I supposed that I should perhaps look at the weather forecast, and I found that we are expecting remnants of tropical storm Claudette to be coming through this area for most of the day.  Somehow, in all of my planning, I had missed that little detail.  Now, I had to look at my other options.  Will I drive to church or watch it online?  I can accomplish the same thing in different ways, so I have to figure out which way is preferred.  

School is that way too.  No matter how good a planner you are, times will happen when you miss important details.  You forgot it was a half-day when you planned a test.  There's a pep rally you forgot would take away one section of your 8th-grade class.  You suddenly realize there isn't any salt in the lab.  You have to adapt.  Salt is an easy fix; you can run to the store quickly.  You might even find some in the teacher's lounge.  The half-day might pose a trickier problem.  Moving a test isn't always easy because it might run into other tests, so do you move it or do you shorten it to fit into a shorter testing time?  The answer to that depends on your schedule and the particular material covered on the test.  Losing one of your class sections is annoying because you either have to plan something for the other classes that is valuable but doesn't need to be made up in the other section or you are going to have to teach that one class really fast the next day to catch up.  

Here's the point I am making.  You should absolutely plan.  Flying by the seat of your pants on a daily basis is irresponsible.  But, you will suffer if you stay rigidly fixed to those plans because school is filled with plan changers.  Adaptability MUST be part of your makeup, or you will lose your mind.  After a few years of experience, this becomes easier because you know what the ultimate goals are and can keep your eye on those while figuring out a different way to achieve them.  

By the way, this is an important life skill to teach students.  We all know that no matter how long you give students to do a project, many of them will wait until the last few days and cram them in.  You can help with that by putting in checkpoints along the way; I'm not saying that they can't lie on them, but at least you are putting a structure in place that shows what adaptable planning looks like.  On any project I have that lasts longer than two weeks (I have three), I ask students to submit a timeline during the first week.  I ask them to look at their schedule and plan realistically rather than idealistically.  On each checkpoint, I ask if they are still on schedule because I want them to know that not being on the planned schedule is acceptable if there is a good reason, not just procrastination.  Life happens.  If the answer is no, I ask what their plan is for adapting to those changes.  Can they catch up, or do they need to readjust their timeline?  

The content of a project is important, but the skill of adaptive planning will remain with them throughout their lives.  Teach it.  Model it.  It matters.

The Lessons of Cancel Culture

Let's talk about cancel culture.  Don't run away just yet.  I'm probably not going to say what you think.  Cancel culture has been around for a very long time.  It isn't going anywhere.  And, like any other part of our culture, there are things we can learn from it.  

Let's start with that first statement.  Cancel culture is not new.  It wasn't created by liberals in the last five years.  It may seem that way because Jim Jordan decided quite recently to make it the center of his ranting in spite of his complete lack of understanding of it.  It may seem new because Twitter hashtags to cancel something or someone didn't exist when we were young and are now pretty common on social media.  It also may seem new because it hasn't always gone by the name cancel culture, which is what I think Representative Jordan does not understand.  We used to call it boycotting, and by that name, it is nothing new and pretty equally used across the political spectrum.  Yes, liberals have attempted to cancel Chick-Fil-A, but do you remember when Franklin Graham encouraged all of his followers to boycott Disney because he heard an interview in which it was implied that there might be a gay character in the live-action version of Beauty and the Beast?  Calls to burn your Nikes and boycott the NFL over Colin Kaepernick don't keep our conservative friends up at night, worried about cancel culture, but when Dr. Suess Enterprises decided on their own to stop publishing 6 of his 60+ works because of their negative portrayals of minorities, they screamed that the left was destroying children's literature.  While these are recent examples, I remember a lot of calls for boycotts from my childhood.  The U.S. led a boycott of the 1980 Olympics in Moscow.  The 80s and early 90s were filled with academic boycotts in protest of South African apartheid.  The word itself comes from Ireland in 1880, but I would imagine the collective practice of people abstaining from doing business based on a belief goes back even farther than that.  Don't let the fact that you hearing more about it in the news make you think it is new.  It is not.  Both sides of the political aisle have wielded it as a weapon for as long as there has been a political aisle.

For all the shouting and many calls for action, very few people have actually been canceled.  Last summer, the cancel Ellen hashtags were many and frequent.  Yet, her talk show was still renewed through 2022, and her Game of Games is still being aired.  If that's a cancellation, it's pretty minor.  During the spring of 2020, people called for Jimmy Fallon's cancelation for about three days.  After the most unnecessary yet heartfelt apology I've ever seen, it was over.  He didn't lose viewers, and he has been renewed for 5 more years as host of The Tonight Show.  Disney, Nike, and the NFL are still going pretty strong.  As best I can tell, the only people who have truly lost their positions of influence are the people who should have, Matt Lauer, Harvey Weinstein, and (as sad as it made me) Bill Cosby.  Just because you see a call for someone's cancellation doesn't mean they are actually "over."

Let's balance our perspective on this issue.  Of course, you should not do business with corporations who support that with which you fundamentally disagree.   If you truly believe Disney is damaging America, you should not pay for things that increase their profits.  I do not donate to or buy products from the Susan G. Komen Foundation because I do not want one red cent of the money I have control over to go to Planned Parenthood.  That is, however, a personal decision based on my own values, not a belief that I can bring them down by getting people to join me.  Your decision about how to spend your money is admirable.  The power trip that causes the organization of boycotts is not.  

There may also be results you don't expect when you boycott something.  Let me illustrate this with a powerful memory I have from childhood.  Picture it, Raleigh, 1988.  I was in the backseat of my parents' car when we drove past the Cardinal Theater.  There were a few dozen people walking around in front of it with signs, calling for boycotts of the movie theater.  It was harder back then.  You couldn't participate in slacktivism, using a hashtag from your couch while wearing your pajamas; you actually had to do some organizing, sign-making, and showing up.  I was confused because I had been to that theater many times; it's where I saw ET.  It turns out that they were protesting because of the movie The Last Temptation of Christ.  I have never seen it (I was twelve when it came out), but I have read about it, and they were right to be horrified.  The things that the movie says about Jesus are reprehensible and no Christian should have ever spent their money watching it, but I was definitely more interested in it as a result of their marching.  I imagine I wasn't the only one, and it grossed a modest eight million dollars.  In a perfect example of the Streisand Effect, they drew more attention to it by trying to get rid of it.  I would likely not carry this memory with me if it were not for the next part of the story.  The movie came and went, as movies do; but this group was not satisfied.  They continued to call for the boycotting of this theater as punishment for having shown it in the first place.  They continued their boycott for almost two years, and they were successful.  In 1990, the theater closed and was replaced by a Blockbuster Video store.  And, that's why this memory is powerful for me.  You know what you could rent at Blockbuster?  The Last Temptation of Christ (and many other movies on the same level or worse) were available.  They got what they wanted, but they didn't really.  That has stuck with me and is the primary reason why I have never participated in an organized boycott.  The movie came and went in about three weeks, but for 13 years, people could walk into that Blockbuster and rent things Cardinal Theater would not have shown.  If you are going to boycott, be careful.  They have unintended consequences. 

While that was a big lesson for twelve-year-old me, there is a bigger lesson that comes from cancel culture.  While the MeToo movement had been around for about a decade, it was 2017 that really brought its power to the front of our minds because it seemed like there was someone being brought down every day.  It started with Harvey Weinstein, but about 200 pretty powerful and celebrated people were accused of sexual misconduct that year.  While a few of those were likely innocent, many were finally being held accountable.  It was sad, hearing every few days that someone whose work you liked may have been a predator.  I remember at one point saying, "God, just leave me with Tom Hanks. I would be devastated if he turned out to be a creep."  And that brings me to the lesson I think we should teach our students.  The lesson of cancel culture isn't that we shouldn't hold people accountable because it makes us sad.  It's that we should never have been idolizing people in the first place.  Everyone is sinful, and while we can admire people, we must also be aware that we don't know everything about them.  Last year, when the allegations about the late evangelist Ravi Zacharias came to light and the investigation revealed monstrous behavior and spiritual manipulation, that lesson finally became complete for me.  People who live their lives in the public eye carefully craft their persona.  That doesn't mean they all lie or that everyone is hiding a truly dark secret, but it does mean that we see what they want to show us (which is true of everyone, not just public people).  Guard your heart by being aware that you don't know everything about them and that you would likely be disappointed if you did.  

The actor or musician or comedian you admire most may be a really great person, but they are a lousy god; so be careful of idolizing them.  That is the most important lesson of cancel culture.  

Summer Goals

As the year that would never end finally came a close, one of the tasks I had to check out was to review my Professional Growth Plan.  I'm not sure if other professions require this level of introspection on a yearly basis, but at my school, we examine goals in a variety of categories, spiritual, relational, professional development, and technology use in pedagogy.  One of the things they ask us to do is to choose a word that we would like to focus on for the following year.  In the past, I have chosen words like Depth and Enjoy.  Last year, I chose the word Trust.  

The word I have chosen for next year is Restore.  This year was a lot of things, but most of all, it was exhausting.  I don't mean tiring (although it certainly was that).  I mean exhausting in the sense of depletion.  Teachers were drained of physical energy, mental energy, emotional energy without the social aspects that usually refill those reservoirs.  I chose the word Restore as a way of thinking about stocking back up on those resources.  To that end, I am also structuring my summer goals (which I always set to keep summer from slipping away while I just watch TV) around renewing some of what became depleted.

1.  Getting my brain back - For me, one of the things that occurred from the lack of physical contact during the lockdown was structural brain changes (I'm trying to avoid saying the phrase brain damage) resulting from a lack of oxytocin.  From March to June of 2020, the only other being I physically touched was my cat.  From June of 2020 until March of 2021, I was still only engaging in physical contact with my mom.  After vaccination, I started touching people a bit more, the occasional pat on the back or punch to the arm; but it wasn't until two weeks ago that I started having regular contact, hugging friends and students.  That lack of oxytocin has created some cognitive issues, mostly slow processing (kind of a brain fog) and searching for words (mostly people's last names).  For that reason, I am going to do a lot of mental weight lifting this summer.  I have a large stack of books on a variety of topics, both fiction and non-fiction; and I am starting with Tolkien.  I have already started The Hobbit, and I hope to get through at least one of the Lord of the Rings books in addition to other reading (The Stuff You Should Know book that's been waiting to be read since November, a book on church history I have had for a year and finally started reading last week, a few books about learning, and some novels).

2.  Physical Health - While I was careful not to eat poorly throughout the pandemic and did not gain weight from it, I know the stress under which I have been operating for the past year has taken a physical toll.  I first noticed it when I gave blood last September.  My blood pressure was higher than it has ever been, and it has been high (for me) every time that I have given blood since.  To that end, I have to do some aerobic activity to bring it back down.  I have been clenching my jaw at night since August 3rd.  My Vitamin D level got pretty low this winter, so I want to get back to long outdoor walks.  Also, at 45, I feel like it important to build muscle strength, so I'm doing a little weightlifting, including a full box of yearbooks so that, by next year's distribution day, it won't feel as strenuous loading those into the car.

3. Working on my House - School required all of my thought and energy in the past year, so my house got very little attention.  I've got some home repairs to do, and some of my walks will be to Home Depot for the tools I need to do that.

4. Reacquainting Myself with Public Spaces - This morning, I went to Walmart for only the third time since January of 2020, and it gave me just a little anxiety, not because I'm worried about the virus, but because I just haven't spent much time around strangers (or anyone outside of my family and school people) in a long time.  I know when I go to camp in July that I will have to make 6 or 7 trips to Walmart, so I need to reacclimate myself to this store.  I have only been in a restaurant three times, and I haven't been to church in person because we were supposed to register and sit with our bubble.  That would have meant me surrounded by six empty seats, which felt silly because a six-person bubble could have been in the space I was taking up alone.  That requirement has now been lifted, so I plan to return to church in person next week.  Many of my walks this summer are going to be public spaces, just so I can get back being in them.  

5.  School videos - For some time, I have thought that it might be good to have some videos for students to review while doing homework or to pull from on a day when I have a sub or to do a flipped lesson.  I had never done it because setting up and familiarizing myself with the tech I would need was time-consuming.  This year, doing everything online meant I had to develop familiarity with many tools.  I started making some of these videos on Memorial day weekend, and I have been making 1-3 each day (some are more complicated than others) ever since.  I will be able to begin school next year with a decent pool from which to draw different types of lessons, reviews, and help for struggling students.

This is what I have chosen for myself, and I do not expect it from anyone else.  You may have decided that recovery from this year looks like playing Fortnite with your kids all summer.  You might want to binge Seinfeld.  You might want to train for a marathon.  All of that is fine, but I would say that whatever you decide, be intentional about the goals you want to meet.  For you, it may be catching up with your family or allowing yourself to do nothing for an hour a day.  What do you want to restore this summer?  Design your days around that, so you don't enter August 2021 as depleted as you are right now. Get some rest.