Where I’m going… and where I’ve been.

We’re short on subs lately, so frequently we’re asked to cover absences during our conference periods. Today I covered a junior English class in P-1, which happened to be my very first classroom at Bell in 1991. The students’ assignment: Read the mentor text, consider their goals (education, career, family, health), and write their own “Where I’m Going” poem. 

After I took roll, I read the sample poem aloud, but as I neared the end, I had to pause to keep from losing my composure (and all my “I-got-this” sub cred). Reading those last two stanzas in the very space where I began this journey—YOWZA! 

"I will be happy and grateful."

It was in this very room that my overhead blew up on my first day. It was here that my parents sat in the corner to watch me teach before buying me lunch one special afternoon. It was here that I held a penny to a makeshift antenna so we could watch the OJ verdict on a big ol' tube TV. Here I announced to my newspaper staff that I was engaged, and here I told them I was pregnant. Here my students and I laughed and learned and struggled and learned some more. (Pretty sure I did most of the learning.) 

Since those days in P-1, I have taught in P-5, B-9, N-22, and N-24, the current room I’m actively trying to empty. All these spaces hold indelible memories, but what a gift to have one last special moment in the place where it all began. 

Macbeth ponders online learning.

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from week to week
To the last syllable of recorded trimester.
And all our yesterdays have lighted students
The way to graduation. Out, out, online learning!
Google Classroom's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and Screen-castifies its hour upon the stage
But cannot replace face-to-face instruction. This is a time
Necessitated for health, full of Zoom and Google Meets,
All of us missing so much, yet learning still.

Our senior team turned in our last set of online lessons today. What a privilege to work with my innovative and tireless colleagues! Over the last eight weeks, we have developed lessons, videos, and websites for online learning that we know will benefit our students in the future, too--whatever that learning environment may be.

Iamb what iamb.

Alas, my Facebook page cannot withstand
The influx of the posts I wish to share
To recognize the birth of the great man,
The one we call the Bard–that is, Shakespeare.

So here I'll save the posts that caught my eye
On this, the day we celebrate his birth
Four hundred fifty years ago. And I
Am thankful for the time he was on earth.

Seems most of these were shared via Facebook,
And one came from a search of my YouTube.
On Twitter I have yet to take a look,
but I'll post tweets (unless they're from a rube).

So I did not intend to write a sonnet,
But it's hard to stop once you get started on it.


From Bell Shakespeare (Australia):




From the great Roy Peter Clark, via Poynter
The Shakespeare sentence that changed my life
"Since many of us will not be residents of this distracted globe when Will’s big 5-0-0 comes around, we should do our best to praise him now, and as often as we can for as long as we can. There is no one like him."



Shakespeare quotes a la Cakewrecks
Where There's a Will
"It's Talk Like Shakespeare Day! So, instead of making Much Ado About Wrecking, we're just going to let the Bard himself insult the cakes."


Via Twitter (@JRhodesPianist)

A quiz from the Chicago Shakespeare Theatre

Take the quiz here!

Peace, Good Tickle-Brain (comic strip)

found here: Happy 450th Birthday, Shakespeare!

plus many other Shakespeare-related comics--great stuff!


From The Independent (UK)
Everyday phrases that came from the Bard


Classroom Ideas from NCTE
In 1564, William Shakespeare was born on this day

From CNN

This is only a drill.

After 23 years of teaching, I felt like I'd seen it all, but today, I experienced something brand new. Today we had a lockdown drill.

I've been through two actual lockdowns. We had one because somebody thought a student had a gun. Turns out he just had a bullet, and unless he threw it really, really, really fast, we were never in actual danger. Better safe than sorry, right? Another lockdown happened because of a bank robbery near our campus. Since the suspect was on the loose, police locked down our building just to make sure the bad guy didn't try to use our classrooms as his hide-out. Again, we were never in danger. The threat was outside, and our entrances and exits were secure. That lockdown happened during our lunch, and I was one of the lucky ones sequestered in the teachers' lounge with good conversation, not to mention plenty of vending machine junk food. We guiltily worried about our colleagues stuck with cafeteria duty, charged with keeping all those kids in that big room calm, but a few hours after it began, we were free to get back to work.

In spite of those riveting experiences, I'd never been through a lockdown drill. And even though we knew it was coming, and even though it was made perfectly clear that it was just a drill, it was still unnerving. 

When the loudspeaker announcement came, we were ready. We followed our procedures quickly, and our students (the ones in my classroom, at least) responded perfectly—just as I knew they would. After several minutes, we got the "all clear," and class resumed. But it took a while to shake that uneasiness, to let go of the thought I'm sure we all shared: What if this were real?

Columbine back in 1999 was my first real eye-opener, and I struggled to overcome my knee-jerk fear. Columbine was not just A high school; it was EVERY high school. I'm sure we weren't alone in thinking that could've happened to us. Just days after that tragedy, two of my students joked about the shooting, even saying how THEY would've acted if they had been in the shooters' place. I was really scared. When I started teaching, I knew I'd be nervous about greeting new classes, assumed I'd be anxious when dealing with certain behavior problems, but I never dreamed I'd be afraid to enter my own classroom. A couple of conversations with my administrators and a whole lot of prayer helped me find the courage to get on with the important business of teaching. But wow, it was tough for a while.

In the years since, with every school shooting, my colleagues and I have been through lots of "what ifs." Virginia Tech and then Newtown—oh, Newtown!—led to plenty of what-would-I-do scenarios. While I'm thankful for my school's clear lockdown plan, I know that there's only so much I or anyone could do. 

I guess a drill like today's should help me feel a little more confident in our preparedness, but really it just makes me sad. I'm sad to think that extra security measures didn't save those babies in Connecticut. I'm sad that lockdowns have to be part of our educational lexicon. But I'm determined to do whatever is necessary to protect my students, just in case next time, it's not a drill.

Nothing to save?

A new school year always brings change, and this one brought a doozie: a different online gradebook. Grading is rarely a teacher’s favorite pastime, and having a clunky method for recording those grades doesn’t make it any better.

Throughout the first six weeks on our campus, we’ve hiked the steep learning curve, relying on our beloved techies, figuring out this new system’s language and idiosyncrasies, making sure technology does not interfere with our students’ learning. Waiting for reports to render may slow us down, but we just grit our teeth and keep posting grades, communicating progress.

Still, I have one pointless yet real complaint. When entering grades, if we happen to click the “save” icon more than necessary, we see this alert:

“Nothing to save.” Boy, does that grind my gears. I understand messages that prevent us from losing data, but do we really need a notification that basically says, “Hey, dummy, you just clicked an icon unnecessarily”?

Besides, we’re TEACHERS. Of all the phrases to use around us, the least applicable would be “nothing to save.” In our line of work, there is ALWAYS something—or someone—to save.

No matter the odds, we refuse to give up on anyone. That girl who missed seven days of school this six weeks? We’ll work with her before and after school so she can catch up. The boy who works 53 hours a week and struggles to stay awake in class? We’ll help him see our classes as his ticket out of his minimum-wage job. The chronically late-to-class kid who collects tardy referrals? We’ll convince her that sleeping in means she’s missing out. The student with the 48 average? We'll let him fail if he refuses to do the work because we prefer he face the consequences of his inactivity now rather than later when there may be no summer school, no backup plan. The students who are happy to just warm their chairs with no interest in warming up their minds? We will build rapport with them so they will trust us and take a chance to invest in their own learning.

Yes, we teachers are out to save the lot of them.

We know that education will rescue them from the ranks of overworked and unfulfilled employees. We believe that our training will convince them to show up on time and prepared to work. We understand that logical consequences will show students the value of their time and effort. We are convinced that our encouragement will push them past their current crises, from bad break-ups to getting kicked out of Mom’s house, so they’ll know how to overcome obstacles in their lives after high school.

In our world, there are no lost causes, no hopeless cases. We will not drop the rope, cannot abandon the rescue mission. We may give up on that slow-to-print gradebook report, but when it comes to our students, there is always something to save.