Family Update

Goodness! Sometimes I read my blog and realize it's really heavy and, well, kind of dry. So I thought I would take a lighter approach and give a family update in the spirit of Stacy Julian:

Right now:

Roz has just finished science camp. She loved it, as did I. To name just one activity she participated in while there: She took an old iPod speaker station that she took apart and explored. She seems to be on the verge to learning to swim, which would be great. After all these years of lessons, she might actually swim across the pool. She finds homework boring, so although she misses school, she is glad to have the break from homework. She is also taking a break from piano lessons. This summer should be fun. She and I are loving reading together.

Sawyer is still obsessed with trains, but has branched out to cars, tools, and Spiderman, although trains are still his toy of choice. I don't mind, since I love them too. We love train rides, and with two trains in town we can ride, we have a fun summer ahead. He is also taking swimming lessons. He is starting a new day care/preschool this summer.

Jason is still working on his master's and is gearing up for his dissertation. His papers are really interesting, and I am learning a lot about post modernism by reading them for him. I am impressed with his hard work, passion, and insight.

I am taking a break from my master's and really looking forward to the summer ahead: Disneyland, Space Camp, naps, a few good books, lots of kid time, and some crafting.

Okay, so maybe this blog post is a little dry and a little Christmas-letter-family-bragging, but I wrote it so I am publishing it just like my students who refuse to edit out that paragraph they love but that actually detracts from the thesis.

Happy summer evening to everyone. I love these nights when the air is that perfect Nevada summer evening air - cool but not frigid, fresh and not hazy.

Feeling ADD

We suspect our daughter might have ADD. Her brain pops around from one thing to another, so much so that she sometimes wanders around the house with one shoe on because something distracted her half way through the dressing process. In fact, right now she is walking around with her PJ shirt on inside out and backward. She reminds me of the dog in Up who gets distracted by squirrels.

And lately I remind myself of her. My goal this year has been to simplify. Part of this process is physical - downsizing the number of possessions in my life. Part of this process is mental - focusing on the things that matter. A lot of that process is task-oriented - decreasing the number of items that find their way onto my to-do list.

This last element - the number of tasks on my to-do list - is challenging for me. I guess I am a bit of a workaholic. I cringe as I write that word workaholic. People often throw this term around with a sort of martyr-like pride. I don't see it that way. Working too much is not a good thing. It's not good for me, my family or my classes. And it's not wise living.

I am lucky in that I work in a field that I find exciting and challenging and fun, but that often means that I find myself immersed in problems I am trying to solve, sometimes even when they don't relate to my own classroom. Because I am buried in way, WAY too many projects at work, they take away from my main priorities in life - my children and my students.

Right now I am reading a book on literacy across the curriculum and taking notes to share with colleagues; I am working on unwrapping the new Common Core standards so that the department can apply them to all levels of English courses; I have been tutoring (for free) a student I have never had in class because he is trying to pass the writing proficiency test; I am meeting with local community members to start creating a broader vision for education in my town; I am reading materials to prepare to assist my colleague as she leads us through the accreditation process; and I am reading Milton Chen's work and brainstorming ways his ideas can apply to what I do. And this is all stuff that I am doing now, in the summer, when school isn't in session.


The result is that I feel like I have ADD. Even without classes to lesson plan for, to teach to, and to grade for, I feel spread too thin with my school-related commitments. Like my daugther, I am running around partially dressed because something has distracted me midway through the process. I am tired, spread too thin, and grouchy.

And these are just my summer work projects. This issue translates very well into my world of crafting and household projects.

A few years ago I read an article called "Saying No So That I Can Say Yes." Her premise was that it is important to say no to things so that you can say yes to the things that matter. Say no to being the PTA secretary so that you can spend more time reading with your child. Say no to that extra committee at work so that you can fit in a workout every day. Say no to a party invitation so that you can say yes to movie night with your children. This should become my mantra - Say No So That You Can Say Yes.


The good thing about blogging is that I can figure things out as the words move from my brain through my fingers and onto this blog. The answer to this problem is that I need to decide what summer work projects are the ones I want to focus my attentions on and erase all others from my to-do list. And I should do the same with the crafting projects and the household projects - choose more wisely where I want to spend my time. Because it's stupid to over-commit.

Wishing you simple living.

Three Books and What I Am Reading

I was pondering literature lately, and I asked myself the question What are three books every American should read? Yes, I do occasionally interview myself, but rather than seeing it as weird, let's all just see it as part of the English teacher/blogger/scrapbooker that I am.

Maybe if I spent more time contemplating this subject, I would have a different list, but for now here are the three I chose:

1. Timothy O'Brien's The Things They Carried - Besides being a work of genius, this book contains themes that I think everyone ought to consider, namely that war must not be taken lightly. When we invaded Iraq, I wanted everyone to think about O'Brien's quote: ". . . [I]t seemed to me that when a nation goes to war it must have reasonable confidence in the justice and imperative of its cause. You can't fix your mistakes. Once people are dead, you can't make them undead." But many consider this novel as much about storytelling as about war. In fact, O'Brien himself has said that the theme of the novel is that stories can save our lives. Just remember that none of the stories are meant to be taken literally because, as the narrator explains, "A thing may happen and be a total lie; another thing may not happen and be truer than the truth." Sometimes a fictional element is more truthful than a factual element.
2. Barbara Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible - Simply because Americans should know how much of mess our country sometimes makes of other countries' business and how missionary work abroad is often more grounded in arrogance than kindness.
3. Shakespeare's Hamlet - Who can't relate to unrequited love, fear, and step-parent issues? Plus, there is so much tragic beauty in the language.

I have too many books going right now. What I want is a good novel to sink my teeth into, but at the moment, I am reading some interesting and thought-provoking nonfiction books:

• Milton Chen's Education Nation - I love his idea that we could be a country that values education and learning so much so that education becomes the focal point of what we do in our communities - parents taking parenting classes, summer science projects, etc. Plus, I find nothing more exciting than reading about schools that are successfully innovating and reinventing education.
• Hayes Jacob's Active Literacy Across the Curriculum: Strategies for Reading, Writing, Speaking, and Listening - Definitely for educators, this book outlines ways schools can increase literacy. I wanted something with researched-based ideas on teaching grammar, which isn't what this book is, but it has given me some ideas nonetheless. I am reading this for an independent study curriculum development course I am taking, which means I have to consciously set time aside to read it or I never will.
• Sharon Salzberg's Loving-Kindness: the Revolutionary Art of Happiness - Even though this book just arrived in the mail yesterday, I am already two chapters deep. I love it. My friend and I are going to read it together. Geek that I am, I love books that have exercises in them, as does this one.

Happy reading!

A School Year Reflection

The school year has ended, and its closure has prompted me to reflect on the year. Without a doubt, this school year has been the most unusual year I have had.

While the year was great for me personally with the Nevada State Teacher of the Year award and the easiest and friendliest group of students I could ask for, there was a lot of sadness around me. Two different nineteen year-old men died. In my classes were each of their best friends and one of the boy's girlfriend. A colleague's boyfriend died, and one of my student's mother died on her daughter's eighteenth birthday. And of course, Steven and Keegan died in the spring. In all of my years teaching, I have never experienced this kind of grief around me. Watching my students suffer through their grief and guilt was incredibly difficult. There were many moments when I didn't know what to do or say.

There were far too many days when I wished I could have carried someone's grief, if even for a few minutes, to offer him a reprieve from his hurt, but alas, the world doesn't work that way. So while I packed my bags and headed off to Dallas to meet my STOY classmates and later to D.C. to meet the president, those around me were simply trying to get through the day.

The whole experience has reminded me how lucky I am to have those I love around me. The truth of the matter is that we are all going to die, and at any moment I could lose a parent, a friend or even one of my children. Life is fragile. All the more reason to take a moment to have lunch with my mom, to play trains with my son, to color with my daughter, to apologize to a friend, to listen quietly to a student telling me about her last conversation with her friend.

People matter, and they leave us or we leave them. What does that mean to you?