Still Memories of My Family

Saturday, July 16, 2011


              My Uncle Morris

My mother’s oldest brother, Morris, was the only one in this side of the family who lived far away from all of us, in Chicago.  He usually came to visit on Thanksgiving and I remember being a bit frightened, (or intimidated) by him.  He was sharp with the question asking, and I was often unsure if I had answered correctly in his eyes.  All the rest of the year I felt loved and appreciated by all my relatives, and if you have read some of my other writing about different uncles, aunts, and grandparents, you would see what I mean.  I spent great time with them, learned from them, and did not feel judged. 

As I look back on the few moments I had with my uncle Morris, I think that my feelings were mixed because the time was so short, and I wanted to be noticed, to be approved.  I remember as a very young little girl, I show him that I can tie my shoes.  I remember reading to him, showing how I could read.  And, linked so much with him, I remember his wife, Dolores, who was purely a city girl who hated the little town where my grandparents lived, and was afraid of all things outdoors.  She mostly stayed in the bedroom upstairs when they visited, only appearing for meals, and eating very little.  She remained a curiosity to me most all my life.  In my early teen years, one visit, she took me aside and asked if I’d like her to show me about make-up.  She wore lots of make-up, a topic of talk among the family after their visit, and I of course loved the idea of trying to be more beautiful.  That visit remains a highlight in my memories of Uncle Morris and Aunt Dolores visiting.  My mother was kind enough to let the make-up adventure stand as that, an adventure.  She knew I’d return to my un-made-up self when the weekend was done. 

One other memory stands out for me and I wonder about it still.  Uncle Morris was a golden gloves boxer, and one visit he showed me and other older cousins several moves that could be used for self-defense.  These older cousins were boys, so maybe he included me just because we were a group, and I suspect the lesson was meant just for boys.  My mother had much love and told many good stories to me about her older brother, and the way he took care of her as his ‘little’ sis.  He was an intense, successful businessman in a place so foreign to us in rural Missouri.  I am interested in him because he was so loved by my mother, and he died in his early fifties from a heart attack, so I never really got to know him when I became an adult.   I think I missed something special.

Path To A New School Year

Friday, July 15, 2011


                                               Time To Start
       It’s time to wind my way through thoughts about the coming school year.  I have what could be called the same job, as literacy coach, but we have a new head of school starting this year and my conversations with him might change some of what I do, plus some of the teachers I will work with are going to have some new challenges because they’ve changed class ages.   One other thing that is different this time is that I’ll be teaching a class about blogging to a small group of middle-school-aged students.  Different years mean different challenges and different activities, yet the basic literacy ideas will remain, like supporting all the lessons teachers need to teach within their language arts programs. 

       I’ve been thinking about what ‘informs’ student learning in all the kinds of writing that is done at our school, and believe the priority is that writing is for communication (even to oneself), and different audiences demand different kinds of writing.  We discuss audiences and point of view quite a lot during workshop and when new assignments are given.   Following is a list of the types of writing that occur during the school year.  

Writer’s notebooks-includes many types of exploration, & students are encouraged to try new types of writing in this non-risky environment.  There is response to weekly written entries. 

Writing within the workshop, with brief lessons:  show/tell paragraphs (identifying what is simple telling, that needs showing for elaboration, as in “she is lonely”—give descriptions that ‘show’ the word, etc.); writing narrowly—using things like ‘windows’ cut into a piece of cardboard-to write only what is seen, not too broad;  introductory & concluding paragraphs,  etc.

Letter journals-a personal piece to the teacher, but once a week students comment on their current book choices, how the book is going, what they think of the author’s style, etc.

Workshop writing includes direct study of different genres—fiction (character descriptions, leads, endings, dialogue, setting descriptions), personal essays (memoir, opinions, nature writing, etc.), poetry, humor writing, plays, literature comparison, book reports and other reading responses

Unit writing where each student studies a personal topic.  This includes:  outlines & webbing, short paragraph descriptions, timelines, short & long research reports, magazine-type articles, mock newspapers and/or articles, booklets & brochures, poetry, picture books, map keys, captions, labels, advertisements, cartoon speech, lab reports, scientific observation descriptions, writing in the style of other writers, bibliographies (sometimes annotated), letter writing, thank you notes, directions for games & other devices, plays, narration for movies

Math writing includes:  descriptions of how math problems are solved and can be solved

Science writing includes:  lab reports, scientific observations, nature writing, single lab write-ups

Field journals include:  sketching, nature writing, scientific observation in conjunction with sketching, data collection

Misc. writing done in the past, often to support the class unit:  oral histories, discussion article responses, many of the pieces listed in the unit writing list, curriculum for a lesson that students teach

Personal work:  Portfolio Evaluations-letter and short answer, applications for various things in and out of school


       Doing so many kinds of writing gives everyone opportunities to practice as well as to find their voices in a variety of places.  Many experiences helps students feel comfortable writing and also helps them improve.

Bounty

Wednesday, July 13, 2011


        I'm still trying to write little pieces about different relatives, and some specific memories of being with them.  This one concerns my grandmother that I saw only in the summer, visiting a few weeks with her and my grandfather, the one I wrote of on July 2nd, his birthday.  

              Bounty

I sit among the green leaves,

on the warm earth, waiting

for my grandmother to finish

weeding, to finish choosing

the vegetables for dinner.

She moves along the rows,

looking and choosing ripe,

skinny green beans for her

basket.  Reaching down, she pulls

up a few onions, dropping those

fragrant white bulbs in, too.

She brings out a handkerchief

to wipe her face, and sits down to rest,

saying, “you should wear a hat.  You’ll

get a burn,” while removing her own hat

to fan herself.

  Then, then

she brings out her knife, reaches over

to grab one of the watermelons on the

vine near where I’d planted myself. 

One stroke and it splits open, revealing

the sweetness, the crunch, the pinky-red

of summer.  The smell is like no other, a

cooling breeze!  Grandmother reaches again

with the knife, carves out the heart, offering me

half.  In this way she shows her own heart to me,

sharing the bounty created by her tireless work.

Each year, she manages an acre, keeping all rewards

in jars and straw in the root cellar. 

There are rows and rows

showing off like high-kicking chorus lines.  

I take another bite, juice dripping down

my chin, and we laugh together over

the riches we share.

Connections With My Teaching

      Tuesday Slice of Life

        In an earlier post, I wrote about planning for a trip, and the three ingredients that seemed important to help the trip be successful.  In today’s writing, I’ve tried to connect those previous ideas to the classroom.  I’ve made several attempts to explain some concepts I value for the classroom, for achieving success with any group or activity.  At first, it was difficult for me to be specific without just diverging into examples of activities.  I’ve written several drafts, and never found a definite way to say what I wanted until last weekend, I saw the documentary Buck, the story of the man called ‘the horse whisperer’.    Some of his words can be found on his website:  I’ve started horses since I was 12 years old and have been bit, kicked, bucked off and run over.  I’ve tried every physical means to contain my horse in an effort to keep from getting myself killed.  I started to realize that things would come much easier for me once I learned why a horse does what it does.  This method works well for me because of the kinship that develops between horse and rider. 

As I read these words by Mr. Buck Brannaman, and the three points I made earlier in order to create success for any experience, all seemed so connected to one another that when I tried to write about one separately, the other kept popping up, too.  Here they are again:

1.       Trust within the group so that everyone feels fully open to a new experience.

2.      Allow everyone to anticipate what is needed and participate in the planning.

3.      Build in time for flexible thinking, in case something wonderful presents itself that supplants other plans.

         These connect to the expectation at my school that we work to help students take risks, to experiment with new ideas of learning.  The school offers much choice in both the learning as well as the communication of that learning.  For example, a student might do quite good research to answer a particular question of personal interest, but choose to stay with the (for him or her) comfortable communication device of a report.  Some of my students were able to dash these pages off with ease, yet became reluctant when asked to create some other kind of product to communicate the findings, like a newspaper, a video, or a multi-media presentation.  My responsibility for each, and for the whole class, was to create that atmosphere of trust within the group so that each felt safer trying on a new kind of learning, a new experience.  In the movie, Buck showed how he waved a flag on the end of a stick to tell the horse which way to move around him.  He waved it often, to show the horse that it was not scary, was a safe thing, and used only for communication.

            I could give numerous ideas for lessons in how to build that trust (and wave the flag), and I’m sure many of you have great ideas too, but I will focus on the basic philosophy instead.  In order to build trust (point number one), I have to do points two and three, consistently.  An underlying concept of this for a teacher is to “say what you mean, and do what you say”.   For example, on the first day, if I say that building a community means that everyone has a voice, not just the teachers, I must start by insuring that everyone is allowed to participate in any sharing that occurs.  And, considering Buck’s words, I must be attuned to why students act the way they do, this time, what might be reasons they become reluctant to share?  Is it fear of exclusion, fear of being wrong, and being embarrassed?  Are the behaviors learned in order to get attention, both good and bad?  Do they miss the comfort of the previous classroom?  I need to intuit the answers as well as I can, and fast.  In lieu of using old lessons that I know are helpful, I must be willing to accept new ideas for reaching our community goals.  I can be a part of the discussion, but not the only part.

            As for point number three, I must be patient, looking for an opportunity to invite or accept changes when serendipitous opportunities arise.  One example of this happened when we had a tornado warning one day.  We had been planning to write, and I had a lesson all ready, but the experience of staying in a safe part of our building, and inner hall, gave me an insight to my big, most-of-the-time brave, almost-adult middle-schoolers.  Many showed they were more than a little scared, so when it was over, we wrote about fears, what scared us, and maybe why, if we knew why.  It was a satisfying time for the group that brought us all together to some common ground.

        Building trust from the first minutes of the first day of school makes us teachers happy and the students happy.  As I watched the movie, Buck, I realized that the trust building in school is exactly like gentling a horse. 

       I wonder what everyone does to create trust in the classroom, or to help those you work with to create the trust?

My Uncle Bill - More Memories

Thursday, July 7, 2011

Uncle Bill on the left, me, my stepfather, Norman

  I spent my early growing up years until I was 12 in a little town where most of my extended family lived.  One of the important people in my life there was my Uncle Bill.  He was the person who taught me much about one aspect of the outdoors; he was a fisherman, and until he died, he fished as much as possible, and was a mentor to others because of this expertise.  I didn’t become an expert with him, but in my earlier years loved getting up in the early mornings to go out with him in his bass boat, drinking up the quiet of a lake, and marveling at the sounds I heard as it woke up with the sun.  Before sunrise, there are small murmurings if you listen hard, of birds and frogs beginning to stir, readying for the day of food searching.  They rustle; yet don’t seem to fly or jump yet.  Birds chirp, but in lower tones than usual.   As the boat with the lowest motor sound cut through the water, sometimes I saw taller water birds at the edges of the lake stretching their necks up, perhaps to check out the scene, or to look for water bumps-fish, which meant dinner.  I don’t believe I learned much about fishing from my Uncle Bill, but I did learn patience for observation and a respect for the beauty of the outdoors.