I swung the schoolyard door open at arrival time and children clamored into the building with a swirl of cold air and flurry of voices – snippets of conversation. They dispersed to their classrooms and the remaining stragglers passed through, heading to class. I recognized one of my own second graders in the mix.
“Good morning!” she beamed, flashing me a dazzling smile as she swept by.
“Good morning, A–” I did a double take.
Her cherub face was”enhanced” by a brazen smear of fire-engine red lipstick, mostly on the lips, likely done en-route to school on the bus from the look of it.
She cheered once more from the hallway,
“See you later!”
“Oh, my – so……glamorous!” I blurted, regaining my countenance.
Later that afternoon, my second grade writers assembled to give their culminating presentations as “experts” on a non-fiction topic of their choice. Her report was on “How to Sing for an Audience,” and it was doubly captivating for the ruby red lips and her flair for drama. She fleshed out her theme with chapters on microphones, voice, and confidence, and in the Q and A session afterward, she let us know that her current favorite number is “Girl is on Fire,” by Alicia Keys.
I have to admit, she kind of was.
Her charisma and, well – her accessorizing were perfectly mesmerizing. She had this audience in the palm of her hand from the start.
I have no idea if the lipstick has been under her mask for all these months, or whether it was a special prop for today. Either way, she was just what she was hoping to be.
My students struggle with writing more than most, partly because talking is a prerequisite and talking is hard. Risking a raised hand, asking a question aloud, voicing an emotion, retelling anything, or engaging in the confusing reciprocity of conversation are hefty challenges. Despite the lively occupants, my classroom is quiet – especially in September – for weeks and weeks. These are not first and second graders that are bursting at the seams to share news. In fact, morning circle is painfully short and silent.
Then we discovered puzzles.
This past summer, my principal was kind enough to allow me a move from a tiny room to the vacated classroom next door – a real gift of space for a resource room program. Along with the new expanse came my new square table and four chairs – a perfect puzzle spot.
I bought a 300 piece jigsaw of irresistible neon-colored doughnuts and spread it out in great anticipation, excited for the kids to tackle it during brain break.
It sat for two weeks, untouched.
Disappointed, I shoveled the array back into the box, and spread out an old 100 piece dog-eared challenge of a bulldozer from years ago, fewer and larger pieces – less daunting. I waited and watched to see what would happen.
They took to it the next day; it was complete within the week.
Ah, ha! I thought.
The following morning I put the 300 piece doughnut version back out again. Eager bodies clambered around the table with buoyed confidence and never looked back.
Scaffolding at its best!
Since that inaugural 100 piecer last September, my students have completed three 300 count cut-ups, one 400, and one 500 piece contest. Their average is about one a month, and they can’t seem to get enough. Cheers erupt when the last parcel is set in place, and then pleas to begin a new one the very next day. Several of our completed favorites are on display outside our classroom, and even our parents have begun to donate new exploits to our class.
The children think it is all about the puzzle, and it is – partly. Assembly requires a myriad of skills: visual scanning and ground/foreground discrimination, spacial awareness, fine motor dexterity, stamina, patience, delayed gratification, and more. But to me, this time is not really about puzzle – ing.
It is about language.
When children gather at that table, the classroom drops away, the teacher fades to background and they are just there, bent on common goal and moving toward something together, engaged in community and friendship, unwittingly and quite unknowingly.
They converse. They quibble. They question. They joke. They laugh. They ask. They challenge. They argue. They confide. They talk – with each other.
Their easy voices are music to my ears.
We now know that she loves her tap lessons Monday after school, and he is packing up to move to a new house next month, but thankfully still in town. She has a loose tooth, and someone else is testing for his purple belt on Saturday. Baseball practice starts this weekend, and her grandparents live in Florida. The dog has to have a cone on its head for ten more days.
And just like that, morning circle isn’t quiet anymore.
Last year we tried earning a pizza, but lost it at the eleventh hour because of a serious transgression.
We tried earning free time on Friday but rarely got it.
We tried extra recess to expend energy, but they fought often, which sometimes necessitated going back in.
We tried charts, stickers, prizes, and emails…
We limped ourselves to the end of the year and finished with a concerted “flop,” having worn each other out, completely.
This year, I have the same group of students and everything is different.
I don’t need to dangle a “carrot on a stick.”
We don’t need a pizza party.
We don’t need extra recess for decompression.
We don’t require stickers or prizes.
In fact, we don’t require group incentives at all.
Why?
This year, we meditate.
We meditate for five minutes at the start of every math class, and that has changed everything.
The transformation is nearly miraculous because the current situation qualifies as a veritable perfect storm – ripe for failure – for a group of students whose default mode can be impulsivity and stirring the pot. Mostly boys, they come to my resource room for the last two periods of the morning; a double math period that is sandwiched diabolically between specials class and lunch. By this time, they have been following directions, listening, and producing for almost 4 hours, and the only thing standing between them and recess+food – is me.
Despite these tremendous odds, we get two full periods of math in every day without incident, and enjoy ourselves in the process. I almost always send them off to lunch with a “Good job today, guys! I’ll see you for science later on. Well done!”
Meditation and mindfulness.
From the start of class the children enter a darkened room lit only by the soft glow of strands of white lights hanging on the wall behind them. They hand in their homework and sit at their desk or table and lower their heads down on folded arms, usually choosing to close their eyes, sinking into softly playing music in the background. Almost immediately they begin to quiet and I begin – inviting them to pause their day, inviting their bodies to relax and their minds to be somewhere else, or nowhere at all.
One day they are jellyfish floating on the sea, their cares and worries sliding down their tentacles, rippling away on the ocean swells.
Another day they draw a mind castle and explore it, room by room.
Another day they find a rainbow and lay beneath it, noticing the bands of color arching over them, each one representing a positive quality within themselves.
Yesterday they sent a golden glow of kindness from their heart to someone they thought might need extra care, imagining that person surrounded by the soft light of love, from them.
And so it goes.
The meditation draws to a meandering close and the children gently wiggle their fingers and toes, bringing their awareness back to the room. Floating their eyes open, they settle in to the lesson just before lunch, quiet, calm, focused.
Through this interlude, they experience the notion that handling emotions and behavior is a simple matter of going inside to a place that is peaceful, safe, and accessible, wherever they are.
Just Sifting 