Fairview Elementary: Capturing the Spark

   “Read like your house in on fire and reading is what can get you out.” That’s what Mason said and I am sure that my jaw dropped, eyes widened... and mind expanded.  Mason was a student of the week at Fairview Elementary in Fairfield, California and he was responding to Principal George Porter's question about his key to improving his reading scores. Principal Porter is a consummate educational professional with a resume’ as impressive as his ability to connect with kids, but he too was blown away by Mason’s powerful framing of the motivation to read.

     I had at least a baker’s dozen moments like the one Mason created while visiting Fairview Elementary for a day. Colleen Hutchinson, my creative, effervescent host and Assistant Principal of Fairview, greeted me and instantly turned the situation into a leadership experience for her student “Principal for the Day,” Angel.  Angel had the Principal ID badge credentials and even a whistle.  With her Minnnie Mouse ears in place, (this was “Disney Day”) she read the announcements to the nearly 600 students and then began her Administrative duties which included being responsible for me as the Fairview guest for the day.

     The three different lunch periods for the Panthers of Fairview allowed the Admin team of George

and Colleen to celebrate several students from Kindergarten through 5^th grade.  I watched as Julianna accepted her pizza up on the stage and grinned with a subtle pride as her friends waved to her from their seats at the tables below the stage out on the gymnasium/lunchroom floor.

     I inquired about the mindfulness curriculum that the school uses to help students combat anxieties and toxic stress. I was whisked off to Mr. Phil Nordin’s room to join his students in a mindfulness session. The just after lunch mindfulness session was calming for all of us and his students were so insightful in their comments on the benefits of the “Inner Explorer” curriculum. Phil’s approach was one of valuing and celebrating the intellect and curiosity of his students. They were co-leaders of his classroom. As their calm mindfulness session ended, the anticipation of reading was almost too much for some of them to handle.  Their love of reading and happy acceptance of coaching from Phil was just another version of “read like your house is on fire and reading is what can get you out.” These students had caught the spark that seemed to be everywhere at Fairview.

      A break from classrooms was provided to me by Jordan and Jessica who were selected to be my guides for an in-depth campus tour.  I do not recall if I ever had to learn so much, so fast.  The amazing sensory overload tour was punctuated by my fear of their occasional and mostly unconscious use of every curb or monkey bar on campus to practice their gymnastics skills.

    

  Getting back to instruction, I landed in Laura Obando’s classroom.  I have followed her creative teaching on Twitter from 2.8 miles away at my high school, but now I was “live” and sitting on the floor trying to help five motivated 2^nd graders find some legos for a bar graph representation. Her stations around the classroom were varied and provided multiple approaches to the math learning target of the day.  I started with the low-tech legos and then moved to high-tech stations.  Rumor has it that she is a tireless advocate for her students and everyone says “yes” to her Donors Choose efforts for a better experience for those lucky kids.

    David B. Cohen’s 2016 book Capturing the Spark: Inspired Teaching, Thriving Schools captures what is really happening in California schools.  He spent a year in classrooms seeing over and over what I saw in only one day--dedicated educators helping students flourish by capturing the sparks of curiosity and inspiration.  Maybe those educators are just doing something close to what Fairview student of the week Mason said.  Maybe those educators are teaching like their house in on fire and great teaching is what can get them out.

Mommas, Music & Respect

    She asked, “what made you listen to Paul Simon.” Now, I can’t think of many reasons why I would not want to listen to Paul Simon.  I love the sounds of Garfunkel too, as long as he is in the background making the sound and sentiments float on and take me to a higher plane.  I did have to think for a second, but it was an easy answer, “mom.” I needed to call my mom back. We talk all the time, but sometimes the daily, nightly and weekend grind of 24/7 work (thanks a million email!) makes the personal and important secondary to the tertiary.  So, what was the tune I had to hear? “Loves me like a rock.” “Oh, my momma loves me” says Paul and he goes on to make all of us feel like proud first-graders getting a hug from mom in front of our teacher…beaming.  I remember listening to that song as a teenager and thinking about someone being the President and still being momma’s boy and proud of it--and wondering if that was possible. Of course, those thoughts were just for me, because “cool,” of course.  Video: Paul Simon: Loves Me Like a Rock

“If I was President
And the Congress call my name
I'd say "who do
Who do you think you're fooling?"
I've got the Presidential Seal
I'm up on the Presidential Podium
My mama loves me
She loves me
She gets down on her knees and hugs me
And she loves me like a rock
She rocks me like the rock of ages”

          --Paul Simon, “Loves me like a rock”

         I gave my wife a temporary pass when she asked why I was spending an entire

afternoon listening to Paul Simon.  When Simon’s Graceland album, or in my case, cassette tape was released in 1986, I played it a few times.  I played it a few times in the morning and continued into the evening and for the next few months I kept flipping that cassette.  Late in the evening or on Sunday morning, my wife was blessed with my continuing fresh interpretations of the world beat of Graceland. The sounds of Ladysmith Black Mambazo were some of my favorites. I later saw them in concert, but their greatest received concerts ever may have been on my driveway and from my “boom box” as I washed my car or pretended to tinker on something.

    Video: Paul Simon: Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes             

     Motherhood is cool. Moms are my hope for humanity.  I see quite a few former boys who as men are not respecting their moms, sisters, wives, and every other woman and girl on this planet.  Your momma should love you like a rock, and every boy and alumni of boyhood should never forget to do as Aretha said, show your    R-E-S-P-E-C-T.

    I once was on the wrong end of a momma who loved her boy like a rock.  Attempting to beat out a possible infield single I decided to not only hit first base, but put a shoulder into the first baseman.  Combining baseball and football was a marvelous moment for me until I turned around to the base after my hard earned single. I sported a 4^th-grader-as-gladiator stride while watching the first basemen attempt to get up from the blindside attack. I then caught a glimpse of a streak leaving the bleachers and heard the sounds of a woman saying something to the effect of “oh, not my baby.” She was headed to check on said baby. She also wanted to say a few things to me, and I stood struck in fear. Luckily my coaches shielded me from the wrong side of a momma’s love. 

     Thanks to the moms and the dads who love their kids and aren't afraid to show it. I know raising children can be tough. Teaching teenagers all day makes me want to help moms and dads in every way possible. Every kid needs a mom like the one from “Love me like a rock." For those kids that don’t, there is likely an educator attacking a mountain of musts so they can mentor, encourage or inspire...like a mom.

    

Diamonds, Runways & Classrooms: An Edu-Bio

 I was raised in a one-square mile town surrounded by orange groves, cattle and humidity.  I lived for diamonds and outfields, baseball was on my mind as well as inside a glove under my mattress, slowly bending toward perfection. But before baseball, there was school, until about three in the afternoon. Truthfully, I loved school too. I loved friends, sports, reading, my teachers & Monday morning laughter about that new, really late television show called Saturday Night Live. 

       I recall a weekend project at a classmate’s house. I do not know why we were putting together some type of structure with pennies and popsicle sticks. I do recall that Bobby did most of the work. What I learned from that project was how other families function. I remember overhearing a discussion about finances. I remember his mom bringing us a sandwich in a bag, even though we were just out the back door.  I guess I can mark that learning opportunity as another insight into how Southern, white, protestant, middle-class, small town families operated...but I needed less Mayo and more Magellan.

         

My parents made the idea of continuing my formal education a given, even though it was not an automatic, expected, or even highly suggested track from the signals I was picking up from the one mile north and south & one mile east and west town in the dead center of Florida.  I left for a college town that was just over twice the size of my hometown of 5,000 and in the insular state of Alabama. Even so, the progressive, global “we are all in this together” point of view my parents cultivated in me was expanded even more in Troy.  

         I again enjoyed school. I loved debating, learning and discovering how much there is to discover. Leaving Troy for a two-decade trip around the world in the US Air Force gave me many more opportunities to learn and teach.  A “desk job” assignment as a classroom instructor, showed me the joy of being on the teacher’s side of a classroom. 

       

 I left flying for the high school classroom and the creativity and challenge are as fresh to me now as my first day 12 years ago. Now I find myself preparing for a future chance to become a leader that supports an entire school of teachers. I feel as excited and slightly overwhelmed as my 22-year old self driving from Alabama to Arizona and the great unknown of Undergraduate Pilot Training. The words of focus from landing instruction apply still, “aimpoint, airspeed…aimpoint, airspeed.”