My youngest son didn’t love school or his teachers a lot of the time. I don’t think his teachers realized how sensitive he was to their every interaction, to what to them may have seemed small teacher reactions and interactions.
When I picked him up from school in the first week of 4th grade, he entered the car talking as if we had been in the middle of a conversation, “Mom, another good thing about Linda is when I came in late today she shook my hand. She smiled and said, ‘Glad you could make it, Alex.’ She didn’t make a big deal out of it and just let me sit down in the circle with everyone.”
This conversation must have been continuing inside his head because every now and then another statement would pop out. “Mom, another good thing about Linda is she told us why she thinks the Bronco’s will win the football game this weekend. Then she let us say why we thought they would win.” For my sports team worshipping son, to talk about what he loved — the Denver Broncos — during school time and to discover that his teacher shared the same love, well, it changed his view of the possibility for connecting to school.
For Halloween, “Linda wore a blue wig and a big nose so we couldn’t tell who she was. She stirred a pot with smoke coming out of it. Later she showed us it was dry ice. She told us what dry ice is made out of and we guessed about why it would smoke before she told us what she knew.”
I think back to those moments when my son appreciated his fourth grade teacher who was only a few years away from retirement. From my son’s stories of another good thing, and another good thing, and yet a another good thing, about Linda, I carry a constant awareness of the little things we can do to support and engage every student in our school world.
I know it is not always so simple as Alex’s stories may seem. But we can strive not to embarrass children. We can strive for time to connect over common interests and hear what children think. We can strive to provide experiences for inquiry, discovery and curiosity about the natural world. Thanks to Linda.
We know that a caring teacher makes a tremendous difference. In fact, I suspect that little can happen until a student knows deep in his gut and in his heart that a teacher cares. Marjorie, can I use this blog in a talk that I’m giving at TSI?
I’d be honored for you to use it, Stevi. Of course.