But if you close your eyes...

This week and the past few weeks I've spent a lot of time thinking about teaching before NCLB and RTTT.  

My students opened a restaurant once. We had to do all the math to determine the supplies needed for the pasta, bread, etc. Each of the children applied for jobs at the restaurant. They filled out job applications and we had job interviews. We got creative with marketing our restaurant, creating our menu, and more. We went to the grocery store and we shopped for the supplies for our restaurant and interacted with our community. We had to determine how to use the restaurant space and organize creatively. We cooked and had to make our own pasta noodles from scratch. We worked with the cooks in our school to time everything according to the restaurant schedule the students created, in order to open the restaurant to all of the parents and family who wanted to attend. I am sure the teachers reading this right now are beginning to create a list of the many many skills embedded into such a project. But really what I want to talk about is  how confident my students were - how articulate - how creative - and how engaged they were in making sure that every last detail of our restaurant and our work was ready for the authentic experience (audience) of opening day - how they had to problem solve together - on-the-go - to solve problems because our restaurant was OPEN and we had to be professional and be ready for business.

I also recall getting a grant to allow my sixth grade students to work at a nursing home for a semester. We wrote about our experiences with the residents of the home. We became friends with them. We planted flowers in their flower boxes as we worked alongside them. We created a performance for them with songs, a play and more. We built relationships. My students had compassion and empathy. We loved the men and women who looked forward to our visits every week.

I recall having an entire day of learning outside - just because. We decided to make it a creative "outside" day. We would write sitting under the trees. We would play games, read, and just enjoy the feeling of learning outside. 

I remember working with a class to create multiple service learning projects. We planned and implemented a neighborhood food drive. We served food at the soup kitchen on the weekends. We interacted with activists across the country to find ways to best help our community. We looked across our community and asked the question "What do we need and how can we help?"

When I taught kindergarten we cooked every week. At the end of the year each child went home with a full-on recipe box of recipes they could cook. They learned about math, reading and science....they learned to work together at their tables where they each had their own mixing bowl, measuring spoons and cups. We wrote about what went well, what didn't. We loved cooking day. 

I now find my work with children to be every bit as wonderful as before. The children are amazing - that never changes. The mandates are absurd and abusive. I am involved in testing more than I would like to be. I am a coach so I am not required to do as much testing as a teacher, but even so, it is too much. I refuse what I can, but the mandates and the pushback increases daily. I find that this testing regime has become so "normal" that it is rarely questioned. Testing young first graders using bubble sheets is the norm - how did we get here? And why aren't more screaming in protest - parents and teachers? 

And now to the present...if you close your eyes......

This past Tuesday and Thursday night I attended events involving orchestras, bands, choirs - all exceptional and beautiful at my son's high school. I would like to just close my eyes and enjoy it and believe that these experiences I am having exist everywhere in our country. I am lucky. These experiences are growing more rare by the day.  And then, as a teacher, I no longer can attend an event or even enter a school without looking around and surveying the doors, the windows, the hallways to determine how someone might get in. I think things that I try to shift to the back of my brain and pretend I didn't think them. I can't close my eyes anymore. I can't close my eyes to the fear of death, the fear of the mandates, the fear of the complete destruction of public education. There is fear everywhere. The fear of my own ability to handle what I see other educators handle - as they find themselves and their students in harm's way.  There are fears I cannot speak for fear that what I speak will come true. The unspoken is so well known in our public schools today.  It is everywhere even though the words do not leave our lips.

Then this Friday my school is placed on lockdown. I was in the midst of working in the most amazing classroom with a brilliant teacher and beautiful children. I was sitting on the floor reading books and talking about the characters in the book. Laughing. Problem-solving words. Flipping back to the beginning to make sure we understood the mystery that was unfolding. Watching children help one another dig through a story because they wanted to find out what would happen. They were engaged. They were happy.

And then I read the email as required after we are placed on a lockdown. It said there was a shooting at Arapahoe High School. I read it, went back to my group of my students and began to read again. As a teacher, there is that moment during a lockdown of "not thinking" when you are placed in these situations - you go on auto pilot. And then it sinks in. I was trying to register why my school was on lockdown.  I knew Arapahoe High School. It is blocks from my house. It is my son's school district. My son is not at Arapahoe, but many of his friends are. Many of our neighbors are.  So, my son was on lockdown and I knew his friends at Arapahoe were in harm's way. 

When my school district was taken off lockdown I left. I went to pick up my son at his high school. He was going to take the bus home, but the buses were all being used to transport the Arapahoe students out of their high school. I picked him up. We went home. We went out to dinner. We went to a vigil. We came home.  We talked about the families and friends at Arapahoe. We talked about the fear, those who were injured. I tried to figure out what this means for my son. I don't know. And now it is Saturday. I am still on auto pilot.

Another day. I can't close my eyes. I want to return to my kindergarten class where we cooked. I want to return to my sixth grade class where we visited the nursing home. I want to return to the day when I could send my son to school and never think for one second the thoughts that I now push to the back of my brain, and then breathe deeply, and move on. 

On the way home from the choir event on Thursday Sam plugged in his Ipod and played this song. We blasted it. It was just the two of us. Myself and my fourteen year old son. I think about all the time and energy I use to fight the things that harm children. I think about how often I am met with silence, those who have given up, those who simply walk away. I think about how quickly things can change. How quickly it can all be taken from us. I wonder if I am making the most of every moment - as a teacher, an activist and mostly, as a parent. And then I remember sitting in the driveway blasting this song and singing with Sam on a Thursday night. Not knowing the unknown. But if I close my eyes.....

"Pompeii"

Eh-eh-o eh-o [8x]

I was left to my own devices
Many days fell away with nothing to show

And the walls kept tumbling down
In the city that we love
Grey clouds roll over the hills
Bringing darkness from above

But if you close your eyes,
Does it almost feel like
Nothing changed at all?
And if you close your eyes,
Does it almost feel like
You've been here before?
How am I gonna be an optimist about this?
How am I gonna be an optimist about this?

We were caught up and lost in all of our vices
In your pose as the dust settled around us

And the walls kept tumbling down
In the city that we love
Grey clouds roll over the hills
Bringing darkness from above

But if you close your eyes,
Does it almost feel like
Nothing changed at all?
And if you close your eyes,
Does it almost feel like
You've been here before?
How am I gonna be an optimist about this?
How am I gonna be an optimist about this?
If you close your eyes

Eh-eh-o eh-o [8x]

Oh where do we begin?
The rubble or our sins?
Oh oh where do we begin?
The rubble or our sins?

And the walls kept tumbling down
In the city that we love
Grey clouds roll over the hills
Bringing darkness from above

But if you close your eyes,
Does it almost feel like
Nothing changed at all?
And if you close your eyes,
Does it almost feel like
You've been here before?
How am I gonna be an optimist about this?
How am I gonna be an optimist about this?

If you close your eyes, does it almost feel like nothing changed at all?

Eh-eh-o eh-o [8x]