We are not hurdling towards the end of June. I am trying to put the reigns on summer: "Hold up, Summer! Don't go running wild. Slow and steady, now!" I cajole as if speaking to a spooked horse. I am just beginning to unwind, just beginning to take a long slow breath, look up into the impossibly blue June sky and be grateful for this season, for this time away from work, for this time to spend with friends, family and myself.
Category: mindfulness
The Silver Lining
I could have focused on all the things that went wrong with this lesson, all the content I did not get to share, all the things I should have done. Instead, I reframed those thirty minutes as the room I made to show loving kindness and compassion. Something that is in increasing short supply in our world.
Your Own Best Mother
To spread some loving-kindness: to be a shoulder, an ear, a cup of tea – some sympathy. I had a world-class mother, and she taught me the first rule of mothering: “Be good to yourself.”
Spring Offering
Spring Offering - some flower and poetry to provide calm, peace, and renewal.
Here I Am!: Conferring with Student Writers
There are many things I love and enjoy about teaching – presenting concepts, sharing ideas, being witness to creativity and discovery, but the one thing that is most important to me is connection. I know that connection is key to student understanding. Without connection there are just untethered ideas. And that is why I absolutely love the time I get to sit down with student writers and talk about their work.
A Candle in the Darkness
All my life, it is teachers and writers who have lit my way to new and better understanding; opened my mind to possibilities and promise.
Spring Mosaic
We have traveled the long dark cold tunnel of winter and made it into the light! This year that journey is especially sweet. My confirmation of spring came this week at school where first and second graders have been busy writing poetry.
Possibility of The Blank Canvas
This got me thinking of my own process of creating. I think a blank anything whether it is a canvas, paper, or piece of cloth - gives the artist a moment to ponder and stress. Something about the purity of the whiteness maybe. We don’t want to put something down that is wrong, ugly, or unintended. We want the marks, whether words, a painted image, or a quilted line, to be beautiful and meaningful and what we envisioned in our minds in the first place.
Transformation: The Things We Carry
What if I took my junky art drawer and treated it as a piece of art? What could I make? How could it become a pleasing aesthetic part of my art space? There was suddenly possibility instead of mess.
Oh, How I Love Thee: Let’s Shout it Out!
In the classroom, I turn to poetry and talk to the children about loving kindness, first to themselves and then to others. We make lots of lists of the things we love. These lists mostly revolve around family and food. We practice writing odes and shout outs to all the things we love and are grateful for.
