Blowing Off Steam

When the Instant Pot first came out, people acted like it was an amazing new piece of technology that no one had ever seen before (and that it was super scary).  Because I'm a middle-aged white woman,  my social media feeds were filled with women worried they were going to get hurt, proclaiming the glory of potatoes made in three minutes, and photos of both their disasters and their triumphs.  All I could think was, "It's just a pressure cooker, right?"  Those have been around for as long as I can remember.  It's how my mom and grandmother cooked collard greens back in the day.  It turns out that they go back even farther than I imagined.  According to Wikipedia, the first pressure cooker was invented in the 17th century.  It's just basic chemistry.  Raising the pressure raises the boiling point of water, allowing the food to cook faster as a result.  The old ones were pretty dangerous because the pressure got to really high levels, so the lid could be blown off with a pretty high amount of force.  It wasn't until the 1930s that the pressure valve was added.  That is my most vivid memory of the one in our house.  I remember that it would jiggle up and down and sometimes whistle as it let steam out.  The tech has changed slightly, but the concept remains the same.  Slightly elevated pressure is good, but if it gets too high, the result is potentially dangerous.

The start of this school year has been stressful, possibly even more than last year.  Last year, we expected it to be the most difficult year of our careers.  We knew it was going to be strange and masked and stressful, but we were all so grateful to be back on campus in person that none of that mattered at the beginning.  This year, we expected things to be back to normal, but, of course, it's not.  Kids who had been troopers about masks last year have to be reminded multiple times per day to wear them correctly this year.  No teacher wants to spend all their time regulating, but we know this matters, so we keep doing it.  Some of our students have been learning virtually since March 2020 while others were in person with us last year, so there is an even wider difference in skill and knowledge level than there has been in prior years.  I had to teach my 8th graders to use a scantron card on our first test, which is not something I've ever had to do before, but because they took all their tests online last year, they hadn't used them.  Cohorting students last year has caused some changes in their social development because they didn't learn the things you would from mixing with big kids in the hall.  Some of this was anticipated, but we couldn't really plan for how to handle it until we got to know our students.  While some things are back to normal (no plexiglass, thank the Lord), things are definitely not normal, not even "new normal" normal.  And everyone, it seems, is grieving someone.  Whether from Covid or cancer or something else, it seems like everyone is suffering a recent loss.  It's hard to think clearly when you are grieving.  (Oh, and that's just school stuff.  I haven't mentioned the state of the world and politics and the fact that we have lost all idea of how to treat each other as we live in a society.)

The pressure has been enormous.  And building.

Our school usually begins the school year with a high school retreat, called Ignite.  It's three days of relationship building and fun and bonding as well as spiritual development.  Of course, last year, we couldn't have it in any form.  This year, plans had been made during the summer for a normal version of it.  Then, the Delta variant happened, numbers rose, and we altered it to a day event.  Then, numbers rose again, making packing kids into busses a bad idea, so it was decided to postpone it to October.  Then, our deans realized that was far enough away to make it impossible to know what might happen between now and then, so they asked themselves, "What can we do for our kids now?"  On Friday, we had Ignite Fun Day.  The first half of the day was team building (with doughnuts), a chapel service, and an escape room activity.  The second half was an outdoor field day with inflatable obstacle courses, velcro walls, frisbee games, ice cream, giant kickball, jump ropes, spike ball, and more inflatables.  God dropped perfect weather on us, and we had a day of laughter and silliness (and I mentioned the ice cream, right).  When we returned to campus, I asked my class to tell me their high points of the day.  They enjoyed talking with teachers and catching up socially.  They liked doing something physical and being outside.  They also appreciated the chapel message.  Mostly, they liked spending a day without academic expectations.  While one day of fun doesn't solve the problems of the world or undo grief, Friday was the whistling steam release from what had been the pressure cooker of the start of the year.  

I am grateful to have an administration of people who recognize the needs of our kids and allow time, space, and budget for a day like Friday.  I also know that it can't happen often.  It has made me ask myself, though, how I can work smaller steam releases into each week or each class period (like the jiggling bobber I remember from my mom's collard cooking days).  It doesn't have to be big to be a valuable reduction of pressure.  Perhaps I can take one minute from a class period to say, "Everyone, stand up on your chair and jump off on the count of three."  That one weird moment might provide a needed mental break.  Perhaps, once a week, I can tell a story or play a song.  Perhaps, once a month, we can do something special at lunch.  It will probably be different in each class, but it is important to remember that while a little elevated pressure is beneficial, if we allow it to build too much, it could be dangerous and do something to prevent it from getting to that point.