Tina wrote this on her FB page this morning:
There are some radical, life-altering tenets of CI that, if we would just heed, could transform education from the bottom up. Or at least language education. The payoff is great, if we could but wrap our minds around the fact that ALL it takes is comprehensible, compelling messages delivered in a comfortable community. Simple, right? But it is a mental shift from the way school is “done”.
If all we need to do is BE THERE in the classroom, and all we need to do is deliver messages that the kids find interesting and understandable, in an environment that they feel comfortable and happy to be in, then we can cut the fat. We can cut out 92%* of the planning. We can build up our intuition and our skills, and then we can basically do Improv Theatre and Oral Interpretation of texts (or martial arts or cooking or small talk or “chisme” as Jason Fritze calls that benign gossip about school life, each other, and favorite celebrities and cinema stars). We can become confident enough to do this, and free our hearts to BE THERE.
We need every ounce of mental and emotional stamina we can carve out. Not gonna lie. It is HARD WORK to build a community where all kids feel comfortable. That is why the majority of teachers build, instead, a community where some kids feel comfortable and some kids “play along” and some kids don’t do either and spend time in the halls or with their hoodies up in the back row or sneaking onto their cell phones or reading books under the desktop.
It is HARD WORK to include everyone no matter what their motivation or ability level is, no matter what they feel that day, no matter what happened to them last night, and we have to do it in EVERY MOMENT. It is a practice. Like yoga, like meditating, like letting go of anger. It takes a lot of “with-it-ness” as Alfie Kohn writes in the article attached below.
If it is hard work in-the-moment but not hard work outside of class time, this frees up more time for your yoga. Your spiritual practice. Your community. Your family. Your relationship with nature. Your relationship with God or the Universe or Source or your Higher Power or Mother Nature or whatever makes you feel connected to the truth about being human on the planet.
Seriously. What is more important, planning or taking care of your physical and spiritual development? Especially when there is a way to plan almost not at all, and still have happier kids who are confident, engaged, learning, and growing in proficiency…almost with no effort on your part.
Hey teaching friends. Let’s just see ourselves clearly; let’s just have some compassion for ourselves in this moment right now. Teaching is hard enough without all the planning…it’s hard enough just being there with them, emotionally, just bearing witness to adolescence and childhood in 2016. It’s hard enough just working in the buildings we are in, in the systems we are in, under the conditions that our society has put children in. It’s hard enough just to remain human despite inhuman and inhumane circumstances.
So, if we can do the lightest of planning, we can save our energy to lift the heaviest of boulders…the weight that is being placed on our schools and our students and ourselves.
*Legal Disclaimer: 92% is an estimate, not based on research. Your results may vary. Past performance does not guarantee future results. Lottery games should not be played for investment purposes. Floss daily. Respect your elders. Wash, Rinse, Repeat. Always repeat. Namaste.