Rochester and Bertha Mason

The overwhelming opinion of my undergrads is that the marriage between Rochester and Bertha Mason in Jane Eyre is invalid.  Are they right? Debate over dinner tonight.

Friend of a Friend

My Facebook world just got strange: in one (very short) week, I received friend requests from both a former teacher (my first grade teacher!) and a former student.  My mind is blown and I no longer know how I fit in to the universe.

The Other Half Continues

When I update my blog, it automatically posts to Google Reader and Google Buzz. So I end up with more comments through Buzz than I do on Blogger. My post about my experience at Romeo Elementary generated an interesting conversation, and I want to post some of it here.


In Response to "The Other Half"

DD: I had this very realization senior year of college. My goal as an educator is to teach giving back. Should I get hired by an affluent school, I feel obliged to show my students how they can share their resources with other, less affluent students. (For example, students may tutor or donate year old school supplies, etc.)

For now, that is the only solution I can figure. Fixing the problem itself remains a daunting thought.

AP: I agree. PS 50, where I volunteered in Jamaica, Queens, is far different from Ellis Elementary, where I volunteered in Manassas, Virginia. The trick, I've found, is not to resent those children who are fortunate enough to go to a school with smart boards and shiny playground equipment -- after all, I believe that every child deserves those things. I agree with you that I have no idea how to solve the disparity in education in this country, but begrudging children fortunate enough to live in high-property-tax areas doesn't solve that (not that I'm accusing you of that, of course. I know that you distinguish between the children themselves and the situation in which they live).

From what I have personally observed and read, it is as much the teacher as it is the microphones and document viewers that make education a success. Perhaps one of your Romeo 4th graders will be able to come up with the answers that we cannot.

On a related note, have you seen the movie "Waiting for Superman?" Honestly, it's horribly depressing, but I definitely recommend it.

Beth: Fixing the problem does remain a very daunting thought. And it's hard to tell when my job is to fix the problem and when my job is to treat the symptoms. I have a tendency to want to fix everything, which I cannot possibly do. Coming to terms with that takes a great deal of humility.

Part of the problem is that I'm not sure this tutoring even treats the symptoms. If these kids have enough and more, should I seek other places to serve? It's hard to find poverty in the 'burg, and I'm not sure I have enough guts to go where I need to in order to find it (because it is here). Then again, just because these kids are at an affluent school does not mean that they have everything they need.


The discussion continues for several more posts, and Julia joins in as well. She pointed out (and rightly so) that children who have everything materially may still lack relationally. Just because these students have the appearance of "having it all" doesn't mean that they have no need for another person to be a positive presence in their lives. Indeed, the affluent can sometimes be the most relationship starved of all. I am making judgments about the lives of these 4th graders without really knowing anything.

As for AP's comments about the teacher mattering as much as the physical resources, also so true. In some ways my kids from last year suffered (and suffer more this year, since we lost some good teachers) in that regard, and in some ways they are blessed. I witnessed last year both how much a good teacher can do with a lack of resources and how little a poor teacher can do with the resources he or she is given. The disparity in the education, commitment, skill, and ability of teachers is yet another tragedy that frustrates me.

The Other Half

I found, in the months since I left St. Louis, that I missed kids and I missed volunteering. I also have Mondays off, and only so many of them can be filled "taking care of life" -- running errands, paying bills, cleaning the house, etc. After many failed attempts to find a place to spend my Mondays, I ended up with a group that tutors at local elementary and middle schools. Sadly, none of the middle schools had Monday slots, so I am now tutoring 4th graders at Romeo Elementary.

I'm assigned to Mrs. Smith's room. (Each tutor is with one teacher.) The last time I went, I worked with one student on long division. I noticed that Mrs. Smith wore an electronic device around her neck. I have a friend with a hearing aide and it looked like the device that he hands to professors to help with the sound. I assumed that one of the students had a similar difficulty, although I couldn't identify the particular student.

Today, I stayed in the classroom for instructional time. During it, I noticed the amazing acoustics of the classroom -- Mrs. Smith was not speaking loudly, but her voice was on math : comparing fractions. I learned a "fail-proof" method of comparing fractions.

Then things got fun. She handed out egg cartons, plastic tokens, and string to pairs of kids and explained how to make fractions out of them. They divided the carton with strings. The number of holes became the denominator. Then they filled the holes with chips for the numerator. So maybe 3 of 6 holes had chips in them.

It was all very confusing, and I settled in with two boys and helped them figure it out. As I sat on the floor, Mrs. Smith kept talking. It dawned on me that I couldn't figure out where her voice was coming from. That's when I realized that she had a projection system in the classroom -- essential, she had a microphone!

I later learned that all the classrooms at Romeo are similarly equipped. They also have document projectors that show full-color images of objects. The President's Day display had legit colonial clothing on it. Both times, someone had left goodies in the office for teachers. It's fairly clear that this school has money. Earlier in the day, I had gone to read with 3rd graders at another school, similarly shiny and high-tech. I spent a few minutes in the library there -- a large, clean room, lined with organized books, bright and shiny with a plethora of tables and chairs. For a moment I saw my library from last year and my kids. I resented the abundance here and the lack there.

So by the time I figured out how loaded Romeo is, I was predisposed to be upset. I am already enjoying the kids and learning their fun personalities, but finding out that each classroom has microphones made me a little sick. How is it that schools across the nations have such disparities? Not only are these schools so much better off than mine last year, but St. Louis public schools are even worse. It's not right, the way some children have the world in their hands while others have so little education. But it's one of those problems in this world that I have no idea how to solve.

Summer School, Take II

Somehow, during my tenure as a self-employed bum, I agreed to moonlight as a substitute teacher. Both Benjamin and my college roommate, Wendy, work this summer for what Benjamin described as a "Korean academic boot camp," and I let him talk me into subbing. After all, coming on the heels of an inner city middle school, how bad could 5-9 Korean children be?

The answer was, much as I suspected, not very. I found myself more concerned about whether they were learning and I was following correct instructional procedure than whether they were going to kill each other or start a riot. That's not how it usually goes. I handed them packets of work, and they proceeded to complete the packets, without question or comment. What?

On the other hand, they presented, even in three hours, some new challenges. At least 4 of my 7 fifth grade readers knew Korean better than English and spoke in Korean. I like to be able to understand what students are saying; especially with a culture whose expressions are stoic compared to much of America, understanding words helps me take the emotional pulse of a classroom. Also, it made for an interesting dynamic, because the English speakers and the Korean speakers had very different ways of processing vocabulary words. Just like with my children this past year, they lacked a good deal of the cultural literacy that informed the packets, but unlike with my former students, I didn't know their frame of reference well enough to help them contextualize their new ideas.

After 2 hours with fifth graders, I had a group of five third graders. Besides being adorable, they were smart and enjoyed doing the work. One of them had a hard time remembering my name and told me that she remembered Korean names better. I told her I understood -- I had a hard time remembering Korean names.

Finally, as I stopped to chat with Benjamin on the way out, we had the moment of truth. I'm used to being one of the few white people at a school and watching students process this fact. Here I came across the greatest difference between my Korean students and my African American students. No one asked if he was my brother or cousin. They asked if I was his girlfriend.

Exit Story

I had to write a story about my year as part of my paperwork for AmeriCorps. I want to post it here too; it's longer what I normally write, but it's a good summary of my year here.

Every now and then, as I bend down to help a sixth grader with a math assignment, I am extremely conscious of my blonde ponytail swinging down my back or of the color of my skin next to my students’. I become suddenly aware that I look like a poster-child for charity. You know, the kind you see on a website, the white teacher smilingly instructing minority students, patiently explaining to them how to read, how to add, how to find Europe on a globe.

Mostly, I am aware of this appearance when someone new comes into the school: a parent, a visitor, a new teacher. At other times, I forget. No matter what color your skin, fractions work the same way and the patterns of the solar system are the same. When I came into the school, the lack of knowledge surprised me. I knew I was coming into material poverty; the educational poverty and lack of cultural literacy astounded me. However, I quickly learned that my children had many lessons for me that sprang from who they were. Our society often attempts to disguise differences. I learned from the places where who we were as separate from each other shone.

To lose our differences is to claim a loss. Although the 7^th and 8^th graders hesitate to say the word “white” in front of me, let alone notice our differences, I have learned this year that our differences make us whole. My students’ perceptions of our difference range: from the kindergartner who created my portrait with dark skin and brown hair to the sixth grader who told me he had thought I would be mean because I was white, to the 8^th graders who complained about “ignorant black people” and apologized to me for saying it.

Racially, the difference that fascinates me is hair. With their weaves and extensions, the braids, curls, and straightenings, my girls did beautiful things with their hair. In turn, they couldn’t believe that I had to wash mine every day or that it was all mine and all its natural color (especially because I have bright highlights in my hair). They flipped out when I donated it to Pantene, because it would take them much longer than 18 months to grow enough hair for that. I think they are all beautiful; they love my hair. It was an easy way for my girls to notice that we are not the same without making a value judgment. It is an easy way to show how diversity adds to beauty.

First Realization: Our differences are beautiful.

The hair is for the girls. With the boys, the difference I noticed was the way they jumped. I’m sure if I found another community of boys as intent upon basketball playing, they also would jump. But I had never seen anything like this before, the way my boys flew into the air with or behind the basketball, aiming at the falling-apart hoop. In my neighborhood, we never had to jump that high.

In fact, the playground is the best place to take this story next. The teachers own the classrooms, but the students own the playground. We don’t really have a “playground” – recess is held in a bumpy, pothole-riddled courtyard, with basketball hoops facing each other at fifty feet across the yard and one hundred feet of asphalt stretching around them. On this courtyard, two games of basketball back up to each other. A football barrels match through them and around the four square and jump rope at the far end of the yard. Two or three children playing tag weave in and out of the other games. And a teacher can walk the hypotenuse of the yard without looking and not a single child will collide with her.

Second Realization: We learn from what we have.

Just like the “playground” offers less than what my children ought to have, the computer lab hosts a legion of dinosaurs on which the students learn to operate Microsoft Word. Another volunteer and I hold newspaper class in that room. At the end of the year, the class shrank. When it consisted of two teachers and two students, we spent more time chatting than writing the newspaper. I tried to explain to one of the girls why she had to be in school from eight in the morning until five in the evening. She, in turn, tried to explain to me that her neighborhood was not dangerous. She told me that they didn’t even hear gunshots very often.

I offered her my own story – that in some places, you don’t hear gunshots at all. “Not even on New Year’s?” she asked, not believing. Not having any idea that gunshots were as foreign to me as their lack was to her.

Third Realization: We don’t always know what we deserve.

That same girl had gotten in trouble recently for an altercation with some of her classmates. Then, it turned out, they got in trouble too, because they had been talking about her brother. And try as she might to keep her temper (although, like most 13 year olds, she didn’t always try hard), her classmates had done the one unacceptable thing: they messed with her family. Whatever and whomever family may or may not be, it means something very clear. It means being there. Even when Mama leaves marks on your arms, family trumps self.

One of my sixth graders proved it clearly. I was substituting for the kindergarten teacher and had fourteen little people running havoc across the courtyard. Then one of the littlest tripped and fell. As the tears started to fall and I started to move, her sixth grade sister was there. I almost hadn’t seen her step out of the door of the school, and here she was, halfway across the yard, comforting her sister, the errand that had taken her out of class forgotten.

Fourth Realization: Being there matters.

Not only did the school have a high concentration of families – siblings, cousins, half-siblings – but many of the families had been there for years, generations. So friends became like family, with the same sort of love-hate dynamics that some families have. Stories grew, like family traditions, of the day a new student came to school, the time that the loud girl used to be quiet, the teachers they chased away. Because teachers didn’t stay, principals didn’t stay, people didn’t stay.

I could impart all the classroom knowledge in my own repertoire and that wouldn’t mean as much as my simply coming to school every day. My simple acknowledgement of each child’s beauty, talents, humanity. An acknowledgement of humanity is an acknowledgement of human dignity. For all the pride my children had, they had very little dignity.

Take, for example, on seventh grader. She believed that she was going to go into high school, get pregnant, and drop out. In seventh grade, someone broke up with her because she wouldn’t go far enough with him. Her hurt and bitterness spilled into the way she treated other people and herself. Throughout the year, with the constant attention and affirmation from a few positive women in her life (one of whom was myself), she began to blossom, gaining confidence, self-love, and maybe even a bit of book-learning.

Fifth Realization: We cannot change each other, but we can leave God’s fingerprints on each other.

If I left His fingerprints on my students, they left theirs on me. They showed me beauty and taught me why people jump. They reminded me who was my family and how not to run away. Even on the days I came home raging against God and His world, even on the days I fell like an unbalanced trapeze artist onto my community because I couldn’t take it anymore, even on the days I had to remind myself to breath, they pushed and molded me into the person I am now.

So even those days when I know I look like a poster child for charity, I know it’s just an illusion. I’m not reaching down to give a generous educational gift. My students and I are in a reciprocal relationship, sharing our lives and our differences.

Diversity

The summer school program with which I work draws students from schools and neighborhoods throughout St. Louis. In their ceaseless campaigning for students, the volunteers at the summer school gained for us the first bit of diversity I have seen at a school this year : We have a Vietnamese boy.

I had a moment of well-concealed shock the day I looked across the courtyard and saw him, startlingly Asian among a sea of African American faces. He made one or two comments at first about being the "only one;" I can imagine it came as a quite a surprise to him. The other kids, in turn, call him "Chinese," which he politely ignores.

Other than outward appearances, he doesn't stick out at all, just another little boy wriggling around, kicking soccer balls on the playground. I can't imagine but that he's going to learn and change a lot this summer, though I have no idea what his home life is like, so that could be an erroneous assumption. His father does stand out; when he comes to pick up his son, I see him walking down the stairs, and he, unlike other parents, will make eye contact with me and smile, genuinely happy.

Office Space

Here's another poem that I've finally edited enough to be shareable. It's about the three rooms at school that were most "mine."

I am a spare office at the end of the hall

A shared space, scattered with the chaos

Of other people’s forgotten paperwork:

File-folders stacked in star patterns

Textbooks – catalogs – cabinets with drawers that stick –

A light switch behind a cupboard

That can only be reached by stepping through

The wire frames of disassembled shelves.

I am the unsorted books of the new library

With Dewey Decimal spines and no place on the shelf

Scattered with frustration when someone wants a specific book,

Never given a second glance afterwards,

As I sit, collecting dust and pollen.

I am the “science room,” fluid space

Ordered and reordered by someone else’s whim –

A convenient empty dumping ground –

Used often enough to collect distended experiments

But not enough to make upkeep worthwhile.

The flotsam and jetsam of a busy school –

Broken tables, desks, and Petri dishes

Line the walls to wait for

Dental exams, flu shots, and reading services.

I am the scientific method, almost followed.

I am the alpha-numeric code, striving to be understood.

I am the .pdf on the computer, that explains the world

Unopened because no one here has Acrobat.

A Summer Job

Summer school started up on Monday, so I have been remiss in updates on my summer job. Ana and I went into work Monday afternoon, excited about a program from the Butterfly House : "A-MAZE-ing Cockroaches." Excited, but a little nervous. After all, it was the first day of school all over again; plus, what if the students really didn't like cockroaches?

We got to the school early than necessary, so had time to set up and calm our nerves. The number of students was lower than expected, but the fourth and fifth graders were excited and eager, something I didn't see often as a middle school teacher. The cockroaches went over well, with the girls conquering their fear of the Madagascar hissing cockroaches more easily than the boys and a friendly maze competition ending the day with high spirits.

Tuesday and Thursday the Shakespeare Festival sent us two dynamic teachers who taught our children about Shakespeare and did drama-type games with them. To my surprise, they knew more about Shakespeare than they had known about insects. Or at least, they could answer more questions for the Shakespeare team than the Butterfly house lady. Theories of explanation : 1) They may have learned about Shakespeare earlier that day in preparation; 2) the instructors know how to phrase questions for their age range.

Wednesday our planned activity fell through so we did crafts. I was amazed at the amount of enjoyment the children got from making God's Eyes and beaded bracelets. Friday ditto as to planned activity; we made ice cream. Or attempted to. I don't know why, but the ice cream refused to freeze. Luckily, the children didn't care -- it was hot out and they got to play with ice. Eventually, they gave up and drank the sweet cold milk. A few kids did get upset, but Ana managed to put a positive spin on it and encouraged them to try it again at home.

The best part about summer school is seeing kids again. I've missed them. At school, I get outside of myself. I have a hard time focusing anywhere other than the students. Plus, little children give so much love when you give them positive attention. It's good for me.

How 6th Graders Do Math

It looks so pretty, but it isn't quite right! This is how my 6th graders did math. They do get points for creativity! You should click and read the mouse-over text as well.

If you don't get it, follow the equations very carefully, one step at a time...

That's What I'm Doin' These Days

School is over. If you've been reading faithfully (you have, haven't you?), you know this already. So what does a teaching assistant do with her days after school ends? Summer school, of course!

Ana and I are working with a summer school program that takes place on-site at our school, but is not actually run by our school. So I have a new boss now. The program focuses on maintaining and improving literacy skills for 4th and 5th grade students. Most of the day, the students will have different reading-related activities, as well as art and PE classes, although even those classes will link back to reading. The school day ends at 3:30, and then the aftercare program begins.

Enter Beth and Ana. Our boss commissioned us to set up education-related after-school activities for our kids. So, while summer school doesn't start until June 28, we've been keeping ourselves busy with planning. For the past week and a half, we've been scouring the St. Louis area for organizations that might bring activities and presentations to our school for free or cheap rates. And by "scouring St. Louis," I mean spending many hours online, researching groups and programs and sending emails into the dark : "I don't know if you can help, but..."

I've been working out of a coffee shop, which has been fun. Meemaw introduced us to a cute one in the Italian section of town that has free wireless and, unlike Panera (known as St. Louis Bread Co. here), they don't kick you off after 1/2 hour during lunch time. So Ana and I can sit for three or four hours shooting out countless emails, calculating budgeting, and creating calendars.

We're working out some cool programming. The Humane Society is coming to talk about animal rescue; the Science Center is doing demonstrations on "Creepy Chemistry" and where you can find plastic that you wouldn't expect. The Magic House offers free programs for schools with 50% or more free and reduced lunch. The Shakespeare Festival has offered us sessions. (I am in love with our contact there. He is speed and generous, has a cool email address, and passionate about Shakespeare. I am also likely never to meet him.) Our challenge is to come up with 28 days of programming on a very limited budget.

The other challenge for me relates to timing. I will only be with the summer school program through mid-July, and we are planning up through August. Logistically, for the summer school, it works out; Ana, my new boss, and one of his interns are more than capable of handling whatever I get set up before I leave. I just have received another task in patience to set up all these exciting programs knowing that I won't be around to see them. God has given me the task of planting what others will reap a lot this year, and this ministry is another of them.

Weapon of Choice

In case you aren't aware, school ended Friday! I am officially DONE as a middle school teaching assistant. For the rest of my year, I will be preparing for and working with a summer school program geared to 4th and 5th grade students. While I am intimidated by younger children, I am looking forward to the 3:1 student to teacher ratio!

The last day of school was a half day, and the teachers decided to have a water-fight, due to the intense heat of the past few days. So at 10:15, the 7th grade teachers and I began filling water balloons for the kids who had brought them in. We worked for 45 minutes, until the fight officially began. Whereupon the 7th grade teacher opened fire with the hose in an attempt to clear a radius around herself. Fact : if you want to stay dry in a water fight, do not fire. She ended up soaking wet.

The kids had a ball, and I loved how little time it took to destroy our 45 minutes of water balloon work. They had come up with plans, strategies, and teams, which were promptly forgotten in the hurry to soak anyone and everyone. With the destruction of the water balloons, the kids with squirt guns had the advantage -- but the kids with squirt guns were too few and far between to make that game fun. So instead, they poured into the building and found cups, containers, and anything else that would hold enough water to pour onto someone else. In the end of 45 minutes, every child was soaked and happy.

After the students left, the faculty had a meeting with the administration. Or rather, with two administrations. Our old team is leaving and new one is coming in. The change is going to be difficult, and I am not ready emotionally for it, so the meeting was a little hard. But I at last have a name and face for the incoming principal, which is exciting, even if I won't be working with her. I still care about what happens to the teachers and kids I am leaving behind and want to leave them in loving and capable hands.

On Being Hot

I am sore, blistered, and tired... and hopefully triumphant. I spent most of today doing garden work, which makes for a good day, but involves heavier labor than I normally encounter in a school day. When the volunteers laid out our garden a month ago, they had extra soil, so instead of neat rows, they made us a huge plot of dirt. Fantastically fun for the kids -- we haven't put anything there yet and they still love it -- but problematic in one sense. It wasn't cleared of grass first, and, rather than dying, some of the grass grew through the layers of soil and manure.

We've spent a couple days in the garden poking at it with rakes and shovels, but removing grass is heavy labor. I know this may be hard to believe, but middle schoolers do not like heavy labor. So, someone has been procrastinating about bit of the garden project.

Today, at long last, we took care of the grass. Ana and I bought several carloads of peat moss and humus and a big ol' jug of Roundup. I attacked the grass with the weedkiller in the morning, and then we spread the dirt in the afternoon.

The 8th grade, having graduated, is gone from the school (with the exception of the quartet who showed up for no discernible reason for hours remarkably similar to those of which they often complained), but I had small army of 6th and 7th graders. The size of the corps was necessary, because somehow St. Louis skipped spring and went straight into high summer weather. Or maybe spring hit briefly in the midst of the rain and my immune system giving out on me, so I missed it. (My body decided for a while that functionality was not necessary, and I spent an awful lot of the past week and a half sleeping and struggling to breath.) No matter what happened to spring, we nearly hit 90 today... and the school has no air-conditioning.

But through the effort of two very determined and very small people, all the soil got spread. Long after the boys gave up, the smallest 6th grader and a wayward 3rd grade girl kept going until I shooed them away, afraid they'd get overheated or dehydrated. I pulled up a bunch of grass by its roots as well. If, after being sprayed, smothered, and uprooted, this grass lives on, I will find a way to crossbreed it with corn and feed a few third world nations. If not, I won't have solved world hunger, but we will be able to plant pumpkins, cantaloupes, and watermelons before school lets out!

2010

The class of 2010 is obviously awesome. And no, my huge bias doesn't play into that statement at all... I have a number of friends who commenced at my college last weekend and two sisters who will finish high school and college (respectively) very soon. Unfortunately, simple living translates into no flying home over Memorial Day weekend for my sister's college commencement. It means no flying home to wave and cheer for the class behind me. It means I can't skip our closing Mass to be present as my youngest sister completes her career at the top high school in the nation.

Therefore, I only get to attend one graduation this year, and it belongs to the 8th graders I have taught since August. My 8th grade class was given a smile and a wave as we transitioned from one public school to the next. From the way these kids, their family, and the school culture treats this graduation, one would think that they were graduating high school. The very name graduation was a misnomer, but that, in the internal culture of the school, is what it was.

Friday marked the 8th graders' last day of school. In my favorite part of their graduation exercises, they burst onto the playground for the last half hour of the day with water balloons and cups of water to douse the 7th grade. The seventh graders scattered, screaming, to hide behind teachers and in buildings. The 8th grade had the clear advantage : they are 24, as opposed to 13.

Saturday, yesterday, we held the graduation ceremony. One of the parishes with which we are affiliated is located about 2 minutes up the road, so we gathered there. The 8th graders had caps and gowns (royal blue for boys, silver for girls). While these are school colors, I disapprove of the silver; it was not the best color on these girls. They processed in at the beginning of Mass, a feat which they had practiced amply and executed with minor silliness and no disaster.

But putting mortar boards and shapeless gowns on 14 year olds does nothing to change who they are. So after the walking in, which they had practiced amply, they went back to being their normal selves, just in funny outfits. Since the faculty processed in too (which I didn't find out until basically when we were walking), I had a front and center seat to see them chatting with each other and fidgeting with their 2010 stoles.

I also had a front and center seat for the more beautiful moments. For example, when the principal called the honor roll, he read one name that no one expected to hear, least of all the girl to whom it belonged. Her face registered, shock, surprise, delight, and disbelief, all compete and equal.

When the valedictorian stood up to give his address, I could see his face clearly as well. This kid is a basketball star, a straight-A student, as genuine of a nice guy as you can come by at our school, and has all the confidence of knowing it. He regularly speaks up in class and on behalf of his class. So the idea of giving a speech didn't seem to phase him -- until he stood up in front of the huge crowd. His nerves were written all over his face as he stared out at them and started his address. His first words didn't come from his paper : "I'm really nervous; this's lots of people..."

Then the principal handed out the diplomas. In a class of 24, that's not too painful. And it hit me that although a middle school graduation might seem ridiculous to me, it means something here. Kids in this demographic statistically end up high school drop-outs or flunk outs. They get in trouble on the streets and land in jail before they graduate high school. But as of today, in this moment, in this here-and-now these 24 are on the right track, heading into high schools, looking to become something more than statistics.

And that means something.

Opening Day

Today was opening day for the Farmer's Market where we sell the gourmet dog treats I blogged about a while ago. Remember Louise and our business? We haven't gotten into boutiques or high schools yet (long story) but we do have a tent at this farmer's market.

Although I did not need to be there, I went to the tent today. Louise is there every week with a student to represent the team. Normally, due to Archdiocesan policies, I'll need to be at the booth with Louise, but today another volunteer staffed it -- because the 8th graders were graduating this afternoon. However, I wouldn't miss the first day of something like this event. Besides, Louise and a Farmer's Market can be very intimidating, and I wanted to be there for Jaydin. He just joined our team and is the youngest; we need a future, after all.

My favorite part of the morning was watching Jaydin get a feel for the selling. He was obviously out of his element behind a sales table, targeting upper-middle class women. Despite this fact, he didn't miss a beat. My boss had trained the entire team on salesmanship on Friday, so he had some idea of what he should be doing. Louise and I prompted him every now and then -- when a potential patron walked up to the table, we'd give him a lead-in. Louise would turn to the customer and say, "Jaydin will tell you about the dog bones." I would focus on him : a slight tap forward on the shoulder, or "go ahead."

He held himself with the awkwardness of a confident person who knows he is in above his head. The awkwardness evolved as he got positive responses from customers and made a few sales, for which Louise and I congratulated him profusely. Jaydin's a natural marketer. He played up our fun shapes (squirrels and rabbits) because he had been around Louise enough to hear her tout their importance. He did not hesitate (as I would have) to go greet people walking dogs as they entered the Farmer's Market.

My favorite sale of the day didn't actually happen. A cute little girl, a thin energetic girl with a sprained wrist, who was about Jaydin's age, came up and obviously loved the dog treats. She went running off for her mother, who unfortunately said no.

In future weeks, older students will staff our booth and I'll stay there longer. Supposedly the market will get more crowded and we'll sell even more. While I hope to make lots of money, I saw today how valuable a learning experience it could be for the students working the booth. I can't wait for my 8th graders to take on the challenge!

Film and Literature Class

I mentioned at the beginning of the school year that I had broken down and read Twilight. Remember that rant? Well, now I have come in a full circle. For the "Film and Literature" class Ana and I are teaching (a glorified excuse to watch movies an hour a week), we are treating the girls in the class to Twilight.

The kids are hilarious movie companions. They don't sit quietly through movies and their chatter adds a soundtrack that I love. It brought race to a forefront that it doesn't normally have at school. In case you haven't seen the film, the main characters are pasty-pale, one because her skin is that white, the rest because they are vampires. My girls kept asking, "Why are they so pale? Why is he so pale? Why is she so pale?" After the first ten minutes of this, the seventh grade teacher and I both burst out, "Because they're white! White people get that way when there's no sun!"

Along a similar line, they are all in the Jacob (long-haired, Native American werewolf) fan club, rather than the Edward (carefully put-together, pale vampire) fan club. In general, they hold Edward in confused disdain; he is the hero and Bella loves him, but he is too pretty, pale, soft-spoken, controlled. Unlike the book, he has a subtle sense of humor that my girls were not perceptive enough to appreciate, so his character must have seemed bland.

Especially interesting to me, the girls do not like the relationship between Edward and Bella. Having taught in their school for a year now, I have seen their life decisions... which are on par for middle school life decisions from their particular demographic. But they see so clearly, more clearly than people from my own demographic, the destructive nature of Edward and Bella's relationship. They think Bella is stupid for staying with him. Which is likely true.

In case you are considering watching the film, I find it a vast improvement over the book. It gets out of Bella's head, which helps alleviate the melodrama that irked me. Furthermore, some of my problems with the Edward-Bella relationship are resolved. Edward has more personality, including a sort of dry humor and appreciation of irony. He also is not as peremptory and controlling as his novel character is. I can see the couple as equals, rather than the parent-child feel I got from the book. They also are delightfully high-schoolish at times, as a couple of seventeen year olds should be.

In addition, the film had to cut out much of the book to fit the story into two hours. Finally, I don't get as tired of close-ups on people's faces as I do of the words "smoldering eyes." However, I have heard from people who have not read the book that the film is a bit confusing, and a few clarifying details did get left out. Still, New Moon is likely on my horizon.

Perspective

The school at which I teach follows the NativityMiguel model. I may have explained it already, but the long and short is that we keep middle school students in school for an extended day. At Central Catholic, that means until 5pm (6pm next year), though in other schools the extended day can go as late as 9pm. The long school days serves a dual purpose : to provide educational opportunities (guided study halls, teacher assistance, electives, etc.) and to keep kids off the streets. The after-school hours are the most dangerous for the demographic we serve.

Of course, if I got antsy waiting for 3:15 each afternoon, I should not be surprised when my students rebel against 5pm. Most of them have no idea why we stay so late, and, being myself, I want to explain, especially to the bright ones, who will listen when I explain.

However, the explanation poses a challenge. While most students have a heighten sense of their race, they have very little sense of their own disadvantage, socially and economically, in society, and I like that. I like that they feel empowered, motivated, capable. But how do you cast a vision of something that exists because they are disadvantaged, endangered, vulnerable?

Luckily, in my most recent attempt at an explanation (to 7th grader, whom I'll call So'Journy), I got a reaction to mentioning that some schools let out at 9pm. I then could play up the idea of safety as a reason for the extended day, without it directly applying to So'Journy. I spoke in terms of "kids at other schools" and "other kids in this school" coming from bad neighborhoods. Of course, So'Journy defended her own neighborhood :

"There aren't even gunshots that often. Only a few every now and then."

Well. What do you say to that? I didn't want to put down her neighborhood -- that is a sure way to alienate one of these children -- however, I did tell her that "I never heard gunshots in my neighborhood growing up."

"Not even at New Year's?" she asked, clarifying that people shoot off celebratory shots, the same way my neighbors light firecrackers. I confirmed that even New Year's Eve was gun-shot-less.

I don't want So'Journy to start to think poorly of her neighborhood, because it is her life and part of her. At the same time, part of the cycle of poverty comes from the fact that these children might see themselves in good jobs, but they don't visualize the simple things that other children take for granted : a quiet night when you do not hear people shooting at each other. If nothing else, I hope this thought sticks in the back of So'Journy's mind : that one day, she can raise her children in a neighborhood where they do not hear guns.

Iowa Basics

This week, the 8th graders took Iowa basics and practiced for graduation. These events threw off the schedule for the entire middle school and made me superfluous. I had a very boring week and as a result finished cataloging the non-fiction section of the library. I have entered over 2700 books into the computer.

Criticism

Spoiler Alert : If you haven't read Lord of the Flies and don't want to know anything about it, stop reading.

My 8th graders have been reading Lord of the Flies in small groups. For most of the time, I haven't been sure how much they are actually taking in, and how many connections they are making between what we read one day and the next. At the end of last week, we got to the scene where Simon talks to the Lord of the Flies and then the scene where Simon dies. For those of you who need a refresher course (or have never read the novel), the boys trapped on the island fear a shapeless "beast" who haunts the island. A dead parachuter ends up dropping onto the island, getting the parachute tangled in a manner that, when the boys see him in the dark, he looks like a monster.

Simon, the only boy who is not turning savage, discovers that the parachuter is not a beast and loosens his tangle. Unfortunately, when he comes out to tell the other boys, they are locked in a wild "dance" which ends in Simon's death. As Simon is beaten to death, the parachuter is swept off the island and into the ocean.

When we read this scene in class (with an italicized announcement from me, THIS IS AN IMPORTANT SCENE!), one of my kids got it! He understood and explained the significance of the two events happening together. Then, this week, when we read about the way the boys split into tribes afterwards, another student traced the tribal lines to events at the beginning of the book -- something I hadn't even noticed.

I am so proud of my students for this. At the beginning of the year, I despaired of them ever learning critical thought. Now, at least some of them have demonstrated it!

Getting My Hands Dirty Again

Over the past 2 or 3 weeks, I have started my favorite project yet at the school -- a garden! Louise (of dog treat fame) networked us with a young man who was looking to start a gardening/sustainability project at a school. I sat in on his first meeting with my boss and asked for the project. Over the past 5 years, I have missed playing in the dirt -- as much grief as I have my dad about helping outside, I love gardening and being close to the earth.

Joshua (you guessed it -- another pseudonym) helped me get started with some easy indoor projects --earthworm composting, quick-growing indoor greens -- to give the kids something to do right away. But the big project is the outdoor garden, where we will grow beans, popcorn, pumpkins, tomatoes, herbs, and other food produce to eat at school and teach nutrition and a love of dirt. This weekend (while I'm in Virginia) a veritable army of volunteer (it's a father-son event) plus Joshua and Ana are digging the ground and putting in soil to have garden beds ready to plant Monday!

When we started the indoor projects, some of the kids were squeamish about getting their hands in the dirt. They think it's gross that I'll touch potting soil with my bare hands -- while I can't wait to get dirt under my nails outside. A seventh grader had a moment of triumph when she picked up an earthworm while wearing a latex glove. A sixth grader used all her courage to poke one worm quickly with the tip of one finger. But my favorite was the 7th grade girl who at the end of her first class had her hands as dirty from potting soil as my own.