Embracing Weirdness in Students

When I was a kid, the bed time routine usually involved my mom giving my stuffed animals voices.  At some point on most nights, I would say, "Mom, you are so weird." She would respond, "That's okay, you like weird."  This was a statement, not a question.  It was like she decreed that I like weird.

And, so, I do.

Which is a good thing.  Because the plan for me for 25 years was teaching middle school.  Not only do you have to be a little weird for that, you also have to like the weirdness you see in others.  You are going to have a boy who sits with one foot up in the desk and leans over until you think he'll fall out of the chair. You are going to have a girl who draws cartoons of animals with human legs (which looks more disturbing than it sounds). You are going to have students who burst into song in the middle of class and those who can't be cajoled to speak with any kind of incentive.  

When we think of school stereotypes, we typically think of the categories from The Breakfast Club - athlete, princess, nerd, bad boy, and weirdo. But the truth is, most kids are a category of one.  

And that's because we are individuals, not types.  For all of the money and air time that is dropped on personality testing, from Myers Briggs to Enneagram, they have little more validity than horoscopes and Buzz Feed quizzes. People in the same generation do not think the same way.  All members of a race or gender are not identical. I can tell from sitting in faculty meetings that not all teachers have the same view of things.  We are each individuals, born with certain gifts, raised in different environments, encouraged to develop different skills, taught to value different qualities.

In short, we are all weird.

And that is a good thing. God uses whatever makes you weird to fulfill His purposes in the world. He put you where you are with the strengths and weaknesses you have because there is someone who needs that aspect of your character to build them up. When you look at Scripture, every person God used in a significant way was unusual. Noah was a drunk. Abraham and Sarah were far too old. Moses stuttered. David was the family runt. And I'm convinced the apostle Peter had ADHD. 

Even if you aren't a person of faith, you have to be able to see that the world has only ever been changed by those who are willing to go against the flow and change the way things are done.  Suffragettes stood against the status quo, often putting themselves in grave danger, to get us the right to vote. The Civil Rights movement was built entirely by those who insisted on doing the unexpected, from sitting at the lunch counter to marching across a bridge to kneeling at the beginning of an athletic event. Nikola Tesla stood in opposition to the smartest men in his field, including the powerful force that was Thomas Edison. Galileo stood against the norm as did Malala Yousafzai. William Wilberforce worked himself to death opposing what was to make the world better. You can bet he would never have uttered the words, "It is what it is." 

Weird is good.  Weird brings change. We must embrace the weird in each other and in ourselves.  

I am not advocating that we all develop into people so strange that we can't operate in culture. We won't have influence that way because there are systems in which things get done and rules that have to be followed. Wilberforce was only successful in the abolition of the slave trade because he worked within the legal system. Civil Rights activists did more than create spectacles; they worked to make slow changes in the law. Tesla made connections with financial backers by proving his ideas weren't as crazy as they sounded. While weird is good, it is only useful if you can function in society.  So balance matters.

I've been thinking a lot about my Granny for the last couple of days.  She was delightfully quirky, and the stories told at her funeral reflected it. She played practical jokes on her family and called friends on their birthdays just to sing to them (and let's just admit that she wasn't going to join the choir). She often called the pastor in the middle of the week to tell him he should get a tape of his sermon and listen to it because it would bless his heart. People cried at her funeral, but they laughed a lot too. Dear God, please let me be weird like that.

Teachers, school is getting ready to start. You are about to meet some weird students, weird parents (maybe even weird colleagues).  Some of them want to hide their weirdness while other will put it on full display. Take the time to recognize what aspect of their character is unusual and useful and help them develop and mature those qualities. Help them to pursue those gifts that will make them influential, not in spite of their differences but  because of them. But also teach them the value of social norms and show them that living within the rules of society is possible while still maintaining their quirkiness. If they combine those things, they will have influence on those around them (and for some, even farther) and have great joy while doing so.

The Interesting, Quirky Kid

When you teach, you meet a wide variety of people.  The Breakfast Club divided high school students into the criminal, the athlete, the princess, the basketcase, and the brain.  Anyone who has been in a real high school knows that list is just the beginning.  It doesn't include the theater kid, the artist, the computer kid, the cheerleader, the marching band kid, the car enthusiast, the mimic (that's the kid who takes on the interest of the people around him).  I even went to school with a girl who red books and openly laughed out loud at them while sitting with other people at the lunch table. 

Of all the types, my favorite is the quirky kid.  She's the one who defies category.  He's the guy with an abnormal hobby.  When you ask them what they want to be when they grow up, their answer is likely a career that you didn't even know existed.  These are the most interesting kids in your class, and it will benefit you to get to know them.

My first year, I taught a young man who rode bulls on the weekends.  I obviously know that there are people who do this, but I had never thought about how they got started.  It was a dangerous hobby for a freshman, but I never got tired of hearing him talk about it because it was just so interesting.  Ten years ago, I asked a parent what interest her son had, and she said he wanted to be a naval architect.  I had to ask what that meant.  It's a person who designs ships.  After that, I noticed that he was drawing boats in my class all of the time.  I tried to work boats into whatever problem I could. 

There's a seventh-grade student in my school, who passes me every day at the door, making some kind of strange sound and/or walking in some unusual way.  She wants me to guess what kind of animal she is.  I don't know if this is just for me or if she does this with others, but it's a pretty fun game.  Thursday, she was a bird, and by Friday, she had become a horse.  It'll be strange if she continues doing this as an adult, but for right now, it's how she feels she can connect with the world.

By the way, if you can, allow them to incorporate their interest into your class, you should.  If you are a math or science teacher, perhaps you can include their quirky interests into problems you are working on in class.  For example, a problem could read, "A naval architect wants to find the volume of a boat . . ."  This not only signals the quirky student that you care about his interests, but it has the added benefit of opening up the world to the other students.  They probably don't know that job exists, and it may help them to know how many career options there are.  If you have projects that allow students to choose their own topics, encourage your quirky kids to choose something interesting.  You are going to have three presentations on the physics of sports, so how great is it when someone decides to talk about flying fish? 

The quirky kids make the most interesting adults.  Don't miss the opportunity to know them while you can. 

My Weirdness - Part 5 - DIY

This is the last of the posts on my weirdness and was kind of the one that prompted the series.  Here's the story.

I teach chemistry, and we were discussing why hydrogen sulfide smells like death.  I love teaching them about floor drains and how pouring water into the trap blocks the gases so that they won't smell that awful smell (talk about some real world science).  Then, I told them about the time I was replacing the toilet at my house and thought I was going to die before I got it bolted down and filled with water because my head was down there next to the open pipe.  Each of my classes responded with, "Wait, you were doing this yourself?"  "Yes," I responded, "replacing a toilet isn't hard, so why would I pay someone to do what I can do myself?"  I've had this conversation with a dozen classes, so their surprise isn't new to me.  I always follow up with, "I don't pay anyone to do something I can do myself."

What happened next, however, was new.  One of my students really thought I shouldn't have done that, so I explained that if there is something I cannot do (complicated electrical work, masonry) or is too dangerous for me to take on (gas delivery to the water heater), I will hire someone.  I simply won't hire someone to do something that I CAN do myself.  He said, "So, you don't have people clean?"  This is when I understood that this boy and I live on two different planets.  I said to him, "You know that's not normal, right?  Most people don't have that."  He got embarrassed and asked to use the restroom.  It wasn't my intent to embarrass him, but I have never had anyone assume that I should have cleaning people.

I grew up in a house where my dad could fix almost anything and believed in making us help.  I have watched him repair washing machines and dryers, furnaces and garbage disposals.  I was shoved into cabinets to pull wires from one end of the kitchen to another.  I was taught how to mud sheetrock properly and how to install a ceiling fan.  I carried landscaping timbers and 2x4's from the truck to the back of the house more times than I can count.  The few times we did hire professionals, it was for really obvious reasons.  We hired roofers because you don't just get hurt if you fall off the house and because doing it wrong results in very expensive repairs.  We hired people to put on siding because we weren't going to buy the equipment required for doing that right.

A few summers ago, I had a leaky bathtub faucet.  I called my dad, and he suggested a few things.  I went to youtube and found out that Home Depot has a channel there.  I was able to repair the leak and replace my fixtures for about twenty dollars.  If I had to bring in a professional for that small job, the price would have been four to five times that much.  The first time I needed to replace a water heater, my parents and I pulled out the old one, put in the new one and reconnected it.  I can't do everything, but I can use basic tools and learn from instructions.  I'm too scared to repair things on my car, but I'm not afraid of most things in my house.  I do have a healthy respect for electricity, so I would never tackle that alone.  When I had to replace the capacitor in my air conditioning, I called my mom over to stand near me.  She asked me what I thought she would be able to do, and I told her I would like 911 to be called as soon as possible if I did electrocute myself into unconsciousness.

You are more capable than you think, and instructions are now just a few clicks away.  Hire people when you actually need to, but you will be very happy with yourself and save a lot of money by learning to do some things yourself.

My Weirdness - Part 4 - Happily Single

In my late twenties and early thirties, this scenario played out countless times.

Friend or parent of student:  "Beth, how old are you?"
Me:  "Thirty.  Why, who do you do want to set me up with?"
Friend or parent of student:  "How did you know?  He's a great guy; you'll love him.  If only he didn't have (insert deal-breaking flaw here)."

People mean well.  I know they do.

I'm sure they do.

I think they do.

Maybe they don't.

Maybe they are just living under the illusion that a person must be married to be happy.  Forget about whether two people are in the same place in life or share the same values or want to date someone or would even be compatible.   "We know single people of different genders," they say, "and we cannot stand for that."  This ranged from public school students wanting to set me up with their currently imprisoned older brother to a teacher friend who wanted me to date her alcoholic neighbor.  "He's great," she said.  "I just wish he were a Christian."  Really?  You thought the person's lack of faith was an afterthought, hardly worth mentioning until the end of this conversation?  Shut up, please.

Okay, this rant is over.  Here's the deal. Back then, I actually was looking.  I really did think God's plan for my life was to be a wife and mother.  As often happens, however, God led in another direction (at one time in my life I thought God's plan was for me to be an astronaut, but I was wrong about that as well).  I was about 31 when I finally felt that God was impressing upon me that I was to remain single.  This was more freeing than you might think, and the peace that came from it let me believe that it really was God and not me just giving up.  I have been happily single ever since.

I'm not going to say I am never lonely, although I will tell you that it is seldom when I am alone.  I'm not going to tell you I don't have normal human desires.  I certainly do, and just like any other person attempting to live a Godly life, I must lay those desires before the Lord.  I'm not going to say that there is never a time when I think it might be nice to come home to someone at the end of the day.  Certainly, when I am particularly tired or sad or angry or even happy, it would be lovely to have someone to share that with.  (And, yeah, Valentine's Day is just a day when you want to go to bed on the 13th and wake up on the 15th because you can't even go to the grocery store without an assault of cultural stupidity.) None of that, however, is the hard part of being single.

The hard part of being single is that no one* thinks you can be happy being single.  No one believes that the only thing I regularly have a hard time doing for myself is fastening a bracelet.  No one believes that virginity isn't really that difficult.  No one believes a person can live alone without being crippled by fear.

People, God equips you for the plan he has for your life.  I have been in training to be single since the day I was born.  When I was growing up, my dad's job took him out of town frequently.  That meant that we were home without an adult male most of the time.  My mom never acted like she thought that was dangerous.  I was never taught to equate being alone with being in danger.  My dad also always involved the entire family in repair projects, so I never learned that I needed someone else to solve problems.  I was a dork in middle and high school (and some would say ever since then as well), so I never dated.  I never learned to depend on a relationship for emotional fulfillment.    I watched girls date guys they hated because they thought it was better than not dating.  I never learned to believe that I was incomplete without a man.

This post is supposed to be about teaching, so here's how it applies.  One of the great things about being an adult dork is that students like it.  They tend to think I am cool for precisely the reason that I am authentically a dork.  Because of that, I have the opportunity to influence students on a daily basis.   Some of that influence is intentional and overt, but some of it comes from just living my life in front of them.  When they see that I am not sitting in a corner pining away for a man to "complete me" (stupidest line in romantic movie history, by the way), I have influence.  I hope that I teach girls that they don't need to date trash just to be dating.  I hope that I teach boys that they are not the saviors of their girlfriends.  I hope that I teach kids that marriage means too much to treat it lightly.  I hope, most of all, that I teach students that following God's plan (rather than following cultural expectations) is the only way to live.

*When I say no one, I really mean very few people, but it doesn't sound as good in the sentence.

My Weirdness - Part 3 - No Interest in Girly-ness

In my house, there are two bottles of nail polish.  One of them is clear.  I'm not against fun colors of nail polish; I just don't care to spend the time.  The only hair appliance in my bathroom is a blow dryer.  I use it for about two minutes.  The last time I wore make up, it  was a different century.  I own one pink thing, and I wear it about one time per year (to Hoops for Hope).

I just don't care about the girly things that other girls seem to find so important.  I never have.  When I was a kid, my parents made me wait until I was 13 to wear makeup.  My mom took me to a Mary Kay rep, we invested in some good make up.  A couple of months later, I decided it felt slimy, and I didn't like it.  I decided to embrace my nerd and became "anti-cool."  If there was a cool store (at the time, that was The Limited), I wouldn't shop there.  Now, it is more a matter of time.  I can get out of bed and be out of the house in 20 minutes.  I just don't like investing time in things that don't last.  I'd rather be at school 30 minutes earlier than to spend 30 minutes straightening my hair.

I do not believe that everyone needs to live this way, but I like that my kids see that being a girl doesn't HAVE to mean being girly.  Then, they can decide for themselves whether or not they care about doing those things or if they have just been doing them because they think they have to.

My Weirdness - Part 2 - No Cell Phone

Imagine there was a person in your life who insisted you take them with you everywhere you go.  "You won't be safe.  You won't be happy.  You'll be wishing you had me because you will always wonder what funny thing I would have been saying to you if you did.  Your friends won't think you're cool if you don't take me with you."  If that was a person in your life, you would find them controlling and manipulative and would not want them around.  I imagine, "You're not the boss of me" would be said at some point in your relationship.  That person would be a bully.

You let a piece of glass and metal, however, do this to you every day of your life.  It's called your smart phone.  This piece of technology that was designed as a convenience doesn't make your life easier.  It bullies you.
- Every day, it says, "You must take me with you, or you won't be safe."  When students find out that I don't own a cell phone, it is the first thing they bring up.  They say, "What if you have an emergency?"  I remind them that emergencies existed before the invention of the cell phone.  They launch into a stream of what if's questions in an effort to impress upon me how much danger I am in.  I'm not going to say that phones haven't helped people out of dangerous situations, but I have also never walked into traffic while chasing a Pokeball, and I've never had the issue of texting while driving; so I think it's a wash.
- Every day, it says, "You must take me with you, or you won't be happy.  You'll be wishing you had me because you will aways wonder what you are missing out on without me."  I do sometimes watch my students joyfully show each other a funny video, but more often than not, I watch them ignore each other because they are each so engrossed in their phone that they aren't present where they physically are.  When they don't have them, they have so much fear or what they are missing that they are riddled with anxiety.  These are signs of addiction, and we would recommend they seek treatment for that if it were anything but a phone.
- Every day, it says, "Your friends won't think you're cool if you don't take me with you."  This isn't just true of students but adults as well.  It's another way of showing your status to the world, and it is just as obnoxious to show off with the phone you have as it is to show off with the car you drive or the watch you wear.  They are all tools to achieve an end.  Having them in rose gold doesn't actually make them better tools.


As technology advances, we must make choices about our lives.  Accepting everything that comes our way for no other reason than because it is new makes us mindless drones.  Have a philosophy of life, and see if new technologies fit into your philosophy.  Note:  I'm not saying you should see if it fits in with my philosophy but that it should fit with yours if you are going to adopt it.  I have decided that there is too much noise in my world.  By that, I don't just mean sound.  As a teacher, I am bombarded with a constant stream of input from students, parents, other teachers, friends, grade analysis, research, and the internet.  Without a cell phone, I don't carry the noise with me twenty-four hours a day.  I decided some time ago that there needs to be some time in my life between thought and action; there needs to be some time between asking a question and the ability to get an answer.  If I don't have that in my life, my patience will plummet.  I use my computer to look for a lot of information; but because I have to wait until I get back to my computer, it allows for that little bit of lag time I personally need.  Smartphones do not give us time to think and process and reflect wisely before we fire off a tweet or look up an answer.  Therefore, they do not fit within the philosophy I have for myself.  My philosophy of any tool is that it should be used properly and for the convenience of the user.  If the phone rings at my house, I do not answer it if the timing is inconvenient because the ring is a signal, not a command.  People ask me all the time how I live without a cell phone, and my answer is always the same, "A lot more peacefully than you live with yours."

If any technology is determining your philosophy instead of the other way around, it is controlling you.  Take a step back and reflect on whether that is what you want in your life.

My Weirdness - Part 1

I am weird.  I have always been weird.  I like being weird.  I believe that one of the reasons God has put me in this job is to show my students that what is normal is not always what is right.  They often do not know the difference between want and need, and seeing teachers they like not have certain things is helpful for their development.  They need to see that what they believe to be critical might not even be necessary.  I've decided to make my next few posts about those things that are so weird about me that it makes my 8th graders stop and wonder how I am still alive.

These will include:
- I do not own a cell phone.
- I do not spend time on hair, makeup, or nails.
- I am a virgin.
- I do not pay people to do things I can do myself.

Those are the ones I have thought of so far.  GRACE teachers reading this.  If you know something else about me that my students think is weird, feel free to comment.  I'm happy to add to this list and write about these things.