The sign is literal, of course, but it was also metaphorical. At the end of this school year, I was exhausted. We had been in some form of altered teaching for 15 months and it had taken a toll. There was the tremendous and immediate learning curve, that was the first hurdle. But then there was a never ending list of new and increasingly difficult things to worry about.
How the kids were doing was at the top of it. When I can’t see my students I can’t always tell how how they are doing. Teenagers are prone to say they are ‘fine’ all the time even when they don’t mean it. I spent a lot of those 15 months trying to be sure I was listening for issues that kids couldn’t quite articulate. It made me stressed and tense because I always felt like I wasn’t doing enough. I called home, I left notes, I emailed, I gave families my email and phone number so they were able to reach out whenever there were problems, I surveyed kids to see what they said they needed when it was anonymous, you name it I tried it.
Then I taught them deep breathing techniques, taught them how to meditate, taught them what it means to be mindful, taught them about self care, and taught them how to figure out what brought them joy in the midst of so much uncertainty.
I work for a school that is ahead of the norm in that we scheduled a break into their class times to give them 15 minutes to practice mindfulness or even just stop for a few minutes and not think. We also had a scheduled homeroom time every morning but a second time every Wednesday afternoon when we met with our homerooms for a community building time. We helped the kids get to know us and each other and themselves every week. We also have two counselors, two deans of discipline who help students get themselves back into the classroom when they are having trouble and need more help than the teacher can give them, a staff member in charge of social and emotional learning, a parent liaison, a family technology contact person because every child was provided with a chromebook, a staff technology contact person because every staff member was provided with a device, as well as a full staff and a principal and assistant principal who truly care about the kids and their families as well as the staff.
I am fully aware of how lucky I am to have gone through the 15 months of lockdown with them by my side. What people generally assume when they find out that is the extent of what my school provides, is that I come from a district with wealthy families. In fact, it is the complete opposite. My school and district are Title I, which means we have a preponderance of children whose families are living at or below the federal poverty level. We are also a city of immigrants, almost all of whom speak Spanish as their first or second language because the majority of them come from the Dominican Republic or Puerto Rico. We do have Central and South American families and we do have students from other parts of the world as well, but most of those students are also bilingual and are either immigrants or first generation citizens. I mention it because there seems to be a misunderstanding in the world about what is being provided for students like mine. We literally provide everything humanly possible, and then we search for more we can do.
I was burned out after 15 months because my kids need a lot of support and have a lot going on in their lives in a good year, and the last two school years have been anything but ‘good’ in the normal school year sense of the word. We have learned, grown, relearned, and grown some more. And then we did it again. And again. Ad nauseam.
One of the reasons I survived with my sanity intact and was able to help so many of my students to do the same is because of what I have learned in the past few years. I have tried everything from float tanks to cooking to crafts to writing. All of which I have chronicled here on this blog.
I just wanted to take a minute to thank you for reading, for liking my content, and for commenting and following me. Writing has become one of my favorite ways to be reflective, to teach myself new things, and to relax and unwind at the end of some very long and very stressful days. You are one of the reasons I survived the lockdown, and I can’t tell you how much I appreciate that.
…and now I’m off to try baking three more brands of brownies because I’m going to find a brownie I can love that has no sugar if it’s the last thing I do! lol
Duct Tape and Dreams 